Movie Scores

I'm not a huge music guy. My wife can hear three notes of a song, tell you what it is, who sang it, and what old song they sampled when they rewrote it. I could be listening to Thunder Road by Bruce Springsteen (my favorite song by my favorite musician) and not even know it.

When I took guitar lessons, I realized I had tapped out my skill when my teacher was instructing me on how to listen a song and learn to play it. He would strum on the guitar and say "see? this one is in the key of B." My blank expression was less than encouraging. I can read music, but when it comes to tonal recognition, I feel like Simple Jack.

Surprisingly, I can instantly recognize and am very cognizant of music in movies. And I don't mean when Linkin Park blares over some action montage with Vin Diesel. I am talking about how the music soars and is a strong element in what is visually happens on screen.

I should digress here to distinguish in my mind between soundtracks and scores. The instrumental orchestra that intertwines itself with the picture in the frame. This is a movie's score. The bands that play old or original songs that can be listened independently constitute soundtrack. While some soundtracks are good, I enjoy scores much more. I do appreciate innovative sue of soundtrack (Almost Famous), but they are few and far between. So, I've decided to compile a list of my favorite movie scores. I've organized it into several different categories. I wish I wasn savvy to include links to iTunes, but I'm not. I'm in the process of making an iMix of them, but I need to acquire a lot of the songs first.

My All Time Top 20 - These scores stand alone. I listen to them in the car, when I work, when I read. They could be modern classical themes, if they didn't first appear in a movie.

1. Sunshine.
2. Blood Diamond.
3. Gladiator.
4. Stardust.
5. Lord of the Rings.
6. The Last Samurai.
7. Apollo 13.
8. Rudy.
9. Legend of Bagger Vance.
10. Shawshank Redemption.
11. The Fountain.
12. Days of Thunder.
13. 13th Warrior.
14. Superman
15. Last of the Mohicans
16. Transformers
17. Pirates of the Caribbean
18. Crimson Tide
19. Lion King
20 Batman Begins.

Honorable Mention - 20th Century Fox Fanfare. For more than half of my life, I thought that this was part of the Star Wars score. For a long time, I only thought this fanfare preceeded yellow words in space. It gets a spot, because while it seems it is used sparingly, you know when you hear it, you're about to see a kick ass movie.

Top 10 that complete the movie. This is a list of scores so strong, they outshine parts of the movie. a good example is number 4 - Jaws. The Jaws theme is so scary, someone could play just that and you're terrified. Couple it with an underwater shot of a swimmer's legs, and you've got a summer blockbuster.

1. Superman. The first time I saw Superman, I was absolutely positive, when the fanfare hit during the title credits, the music said "SUPERMAN!" You know what I mean
2. The Passion of the Christ.
3. Sunshine.
4. Jaws.
5. Rocky.
6. Rudy.
7. Godfather.
8. Transformers.
9. Halloween.
10. Apollo 13.

Top 5 Horror Movies
1. Jaws
2. Halloween
3. The Omen.
4. The Ring.
5. Requiem for a Dream. I don't care what anyone says. That movie is a horror movie.

Classics (Pre 1975 film).
1. Ben-Hur
2. Laurence of Arabia.
3. Patton.
4. Magnificent Seven.
5. The Great Escape.

Hanz Zimmer
1. Gladiator
2. Days of Thunder.
3. Pirates of the Carribbean.
4. Lion King (I think he did part of this)
5. Crimson Tide
6. Batman Begins
7. I should probably just list every movie he's ever done.

Just parts of the score, not the entire collection
1. Mr. Holland's Opus
2. Empire of the Sun.
3. Somewhere in Time.
4. Iron Man.
5. Ocean's 11, 12, 13
6. All Three Bourne movies.
7. Kingdom of Heaven.
8. The Village.
9. 300
10. Top Gun
11. Kill Bill

Sci-Fi
1. Matrix Trilogy
2. Terminator
3. Transformers.
4. Armageddon.
5. Iron Giant.

John Williams. I didn't list a lot of his scores. He really is in a league of his own. His music is so iconic, it's hard group with others, as it has no equal. So I'll list my favroite John Williams themes.
1. Superman
2. Star Wars
3. Jaws
4. E.T.
5. Jurassic Park
6. Munich
7. Harry Potter

Honorable Mentions
Man on Fire
Spy Game
Batman
Children of Men
National Treasure
Dragonheart
Titanic
The Mummy
Unforgiven
A Beautiful Mind
Amistad
Schindler's List
Rambo
Platoon
Mr. Holland's Opus
Mortal Kombat
Starship Troopers
Hunt for Red October
The Natural
The Mission
Courage Under Fire
Da Vinci Code
Robin Hood Prince of Theives
The Rock
Braveheart
Black Hawk Down
The Terminal