# Movie Songs: worse than the movie, better than the movie, carried the movie, senseless without?



## tuxgeo (Jan 16, 2014)

Would "Lawrence of Arabia" have been nearly as good without the score? Would "Doctor Zhivago" have been even fractionally as popular without Lara's Theme? 

On the flip side, would _anything_ have saved "The Seventh Dawn?" The theme song [youtube video] doesn't appear to have sold the movie to audiences, despite the glorious harmonies of The Lettermen in the theme song. Even the presence of movie star William Holden (and Capucine!) didn't sell that flick to the general public. 

In comments, please share examples of movies where you either wonder, "What's A Song This Good Doing In That Crap Movie?" or "Couldn't They Just Have Left Out That Song And Made A Better Movie By Doing So?" 

My contributions: 
(1) "The Great Race" with Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis was fun; but when the movie took time off to include their love theme, "The Sweetheart Tree," that broke the jovial mood completely for me. 
(2) "Love Potion Number Nine" was made into a movie. (Yes, I saw it. Yes, I'm sorry I did.)


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## Stormonu (Jan 16, 2014)

Star Wars (A New Hope) would not have been half as awesome without its score.

I find the score for Black Hole far more compelling than the movie.

The music for Lady Hawke made a horrible movie even worse.


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## sabrinathecat (Jan 16, 2014)

Jerry Goldsmith's music could make or break a movie, depending on how experimental he was being. Planet of the Apes may have suited the action, but it was not something I'd ever want to listed to. On the other hand, Star Trek:TPM, Gremlins & G2, The Wind and the Lion, Warlock, Lionheart, Looney Toons Back in Action, and Patton would be so much less without him--they might have had to rescore with Danny Elfman!
Flip-side: not even Jerry Goldsmith could save Supergirl.

Butch Cassidy and Sundance Kid really didn't need "Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head."

Kevin Kiner did more to revitalize and bump up Star Wars with his update to The Clone Wars soundtrack than John Williams did with all three prequels.

John Williams work on Harry Potter was probably the best thing to come out of the whole HP phenomenon.


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## The_Silversword (Jan 16, 2014)

Jaws, definitely Jaws, the music really made the movie, and the movie really made the song, without the movie, youd be like what the crap is this?


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## PigKnight (Jan 16, 2014)

All I remember about Inception was "BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!"


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## billd91 (Jan 16, 2014)

Conan the Barbarian's score is and was designed to be a significant part of the storytelling. Just read the liner notes on the album. Without it, the movie really would suffer.


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## Jhaelen (Jan 16, 2014)

Is this about songs or about movie scores?

Anyway, many movies I really like also have an excellent score. My favorite is Bladerunner, which wouldn't be 'complete' without Vangelis' score.

There's a lot of movies that would be better if they didn't have such an obnoxious score, though. In many movies it's simply overdone. My favorite example: The Lord of the Rings. In theory it's fine to have a theme for every character in a movie, but if it gets repeated too often, it gets on my nerves. And The Lord of the Rings trilogy is simply too long for that kind of thing.

There are also a few movies I noticed because of their choice of songs, e.g. Donnie Darko. Magnolia is also notable for Aimee Mann's 'Save Me' - it's the high point of the movie! And the beginning of 'There Will Be Blood' is especially impressive and memorable because of Johnny Greenwood's music.

In many movies, though, the choice of songs seems to be mostly dictated by the popularity of the bands (in the hope of selling the soundtrack, I suppose) and not by how well they support a given scene.


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## Dioltach (Jan 16, 2014)

In terms of television, I've always thought that the choice of Gangstagrass for the theme song for Justified was inspired.


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## tuxgeo (Jan 16, 2014)

Jhaelen said:


> Is this about songs or about movie scores?




Either or both. I named it to be about songs, but then also mentioned scores in the OP. Since the composer of the score often writes the music for the songs as well, it's sometimes hard to draw an exclusive line between them.

Henry Mancini scored "Breakfast at Tiffany's" and wrote the included song, "Moon River," which was covered by other artists. The song was a part of the story, and the film would have been worse without it. 

The soundtrack to "The Lion in Winter" (1968) was very listenable; but I don't think anybody covered "Chinon/Eleanor's Arrival," though that's a memorable part of the movie.


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## sabrinathecat (Jan 17, 2014)

Well, in terms of a song being obnoxious or overdone, the song from "The Graduate" definitely rank among the highest, most bloated, and just annoying after a while. It's like they decided to play "Hello Darkness My Old Friend" every 5 minutes or so, whenever there was a quiet moment without dialog. I'm not sure the movie would be better with a different song, but maybe putting in a couple others to break up the monotony would have been good.


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## trappedslider (Jan 17, 2014)

sabrinathecat said:


> Well, in terms of a song being obnoxious or overdone, the song from "The Graduate" definitely rank among the highest, most bloated, and just annoying after a while. It's like they decided to play "Hello Darkness My Old Friend" every 5 minutes or so, whenever there was a quiet moment without dialog. I'm not sure the movie would be better with a different song, but maybe putting in a couple others to break up the monotony would have been good.




FYI it's called Sound of Silence and from Wiki "When director Mike Nichols and Sam O'Steen were editing the film The Graduate, they initially timed some scenes to this song with the intention of substituting original music for the scenes. However, they eventually concluded that the song could not be adequately substituted and decided to purchase the rights for the song for the soundtrack. This was an unusual decision for the time, as the song had charted over a year earlier and recycling established music for film was not commonly done. However, the film's executive producer, Joseph E. Levine, approved of the creative decision. Nichols commissioned Simon and Garfunkel to compose additional original music for the film. With the practice of using well known songs for films becoming commonplace, "The Sound of Silence" has since been used for other films, such as Kingpin in 1996, Old School in 2003, and Watchmen in 2009. It appeared on the fourth season of the television series Arrested Development in 2013. On March 21, 2013, the song was added to the National Recording Registry in the Library of Congress for long-term preservation"


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## Jhaelen (Jan 17, 2014)

I forgot to mention the most recent episode of Mad Men I'd watched: It prominently featured "Tomorrow Never Knows" a song from the Beatles album 'Revolver'. And I have to say, it's definitely the best Beatles song, I've ever heard! This had been the first time I had heard this particular song, and if omre of their songs were like this, I'd definitely be a fan.

The episode itself didn't strike me as particularly notable, but then I think the show maintains a pretty high quality standard.


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## Ahnehnois (Jan 17, 2014)

I've always found it eerie how the Lord of the Rings movies came with a score that seemed to perfectly capture the tone of the books. For all the bajillion dollars they spent on the visuals, I think it's the operatic quality of the score that gets the audience to take it seriously.


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## billd91 (Jan 17, 2014)

Jhaelen said:


> I forgot to mention the most recent episode of Mad Men I'd watched: It prominently featured "Tomorrow Never Knows" a song from the Beatles album 'Revolver'. And I have to say, it's definitely the best Beatles song, I've ever heard! This had been the first time I had heard this particular song, and if omre of their songs were like this, I'd definitely be a fan.
> 
> The episode itself didn't strike me as particularly notable, but then I think the show maintains a pretty high quality standard.




As a side note, *Revolver* and *Rubber Soul* are probably my two favorite Beatles albums. I like them much better than the white album or *Abbey Road*.


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## Zombie_Babies (Jan 17, 2014)

It just hit me that The Big Lebowski wouldn't be what it is without the music chosen.  Works really well.

Oh, and I agree with whoever it was that mentioned Conan the Barbarian.  The music is perfect.  My friend owns the soundtrack and I can't count how many D&D sessions we played with it as our background.  It really sets the mood.


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## sabrinathecat (Jan 17, 2014)

Thank you for the information.


trappedslider said:


> FYI it's called Sound of Silence and from Wiki "When director Mike Nichols and Sam O'Steen were editing the film The Graduate, they initially timed some scenes to this song with the intention of substituting original music for the scenes. However, they eventually concluded that the song could not be adequately substituted and decided to purchase the rights for the song for the soundtrack. This was an unusual decision for the time, as the song had charted over a year earlier and recycling established music for film was not commonly done. However, the film's executive producer, Joseph E. Levine, approved of the creative decision. Nichols commissioned Simon and Garfunkel to compose additional original music for the film. With the practice of using well known songs for films becoming commonplace, "The Sound of Silence" has since been used for other films, such as Kingpin in 1996, Old School in 2003, and Watchmen in 2009. It appeared on the fourth season of the television series Arrested Development in 2013. On March 21, 2013, the song was added to the National Recording Registry in the Library of Congress for long-term preservation"


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## Ed_Laprade (Jan 17, 2014)

Didn't think I'd have anything to add, then I remembered the '80s Flash Gordan movie. Pure hokeyness that would have been much worse without the queen songs. 

In a similar vein, Xanadu would be mostly uwatchable without the music.


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## Bedrockgames (Jan 18, 2014)

Ed_Laprade said:


> Didn't think I'd have anything to add, then I remembered the '80s Flash Gordan movie. Pure hokeyness that would have been much worse without the queen songs.
> 
> In a similar vein, Xanadu would be mostly uwatchable without the music.




Queen made flash gordon and the highlander.


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## Mallus (Jan 18, 2014)

Ed_Laprade said:


> Didn't think I'd have anything to add, then I remembered the '80s Flash Gordan movie. Pure hokeyness that would have been much worse without the queen songs.



On the other hand, even without the Queen soundtrack, _Flash Gordon_ still has Brian Blessed, Topol, Ornella Muti crying "Not the bore-worms!", and all the wonderful disco-Deco art direction, making it better than %95 of the films ever made.

Two films immediately come to mind when I think of songs/soundtracks. Danny Boyle's _Trainspotting_, which opens to the sounds of Iggy Pop's "Lust for Life", and closes with Underworld's "Born Slippy". The music in-between is good, too, like Pulp's savagely pleasant "Mile End". 

And Wes Anderson's _The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou_. It features a bunch of David Bowie songs sung in Portuguese by Seu Jorge, and an end credit homage to the end credits of Buckaroo Banzai, done to tune of Bowie's "Queen Bitch".


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## Zombie_Babies (Jan 20, 2014)

Mallus said:


> Two films immediately come to mind when I think of songs/soundtracks. Danny Boyle's _Trainspotting_, which opens to the sounds of Iggy Pop's "Lust for Life", and closes with Underworld's "Born Slippy". The music in-between is good, too, like Pulp's savagely pleasant "Mile End".
> 
> And Wes Anderson's _The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou_. It features a bunch of David Bowie songs sung in Portuguese by Seu Jorge, and an end credit homage to the end credits of Buckaroo Banzai, done to tune of Bowie's "Queen Bitch".




Damn bro, two great calls and two great movies.  I wish Trainspotting was done a bit better* but still amazing - and the soundtrack really was perfect.  Lou Reed's Perfect Day is about the best song ever chosen based on what movie it was in.  Srsly.  

*Had I read the book after seeing the film instead of the reverse I'd probably feel differently.  The movie is good but Welsh's book is amazing.


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## Fergurg (Jul 28, 2015)

I'm gonna go in another direction for a minute. The Madonna song "Die Another Day" sounds like a cacophonic mess - until you watch the opening credits to the movie Die Another Day, which goes with the song. Then, and only then, will its seemingly random starts and stops make sense.


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## Legatus Legionis (Jul 29, 2015)

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## MechaPilot (Jul 29, 2015)

I think it's important to remember that sound heavily sells movies.  I love Star Wars and Star Trek (I get different things from each of them), but both of them would really suffer if all of the space action scenes were bereft of sound effects to reflect the reality that sound doesn't travel in space.

I also have to echo the Flash Gordon and Highlander sentiment.

Flash Gordon by Queen is awesome.

_Flash
A-ah
He's a miracle.

Flash.
A-ah.
King of the impossible.

He's for every one of us.
Stand for every one of us.
He'll save with a mighty hand every man every woman every child with a mighty flash._

I get goosebumps every time I listen to it.


And the soundtrack in Highlander really sells the emotions of the characters.


Also, Die Hard.  I love the way Ode to Joy gets mixed into different themes in that movie.


Oh, and this one can't be left off the list.  The sound track for Heavy Metal is vital to the film.


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## delericho (Jul 29, 2015)

sabrinathecat said:


> Kevin Kiner did more to revitalize and bump up Star Wars with his update to The Clone Wars soundtrack than John Williams did with all three prequels.




Kiner's work on "The Clone Wars" is indeed great, and something I use at almost every Star Wars RPG game I run. I wish they would release some of the material from the show as well, to expand the available cues.

But I have to disagree with you about his doing more than JW in the prequels, if only for one thing: "Duel of the Fates".


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## MarkB (Jul 29, 2015)

One film that comes to mind is A Knight's Tale. The quirky choice of making a classic sports movie except that the sport in question is medieval jousting would have made it stand out in any case - but it's the contemporary songs in the soundtrack that really set it apart, giving it a unique flavour that works surprisingly well.


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## Legatus Legionis (Jul 29, 2015)

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## MarkB (Jul 29, 2015)

Legatus_Legionis said:


> Does anyone remember "Bat-Dance" by Prince for Tim Burton's Batman?
> 
> While the song never was in the movie, it was on Prince's soundtrack for the movie.
> 
> ...




I owned both albums for the movie, the Danny Elfman soundtrack and the Prince songs, and aside from Batdance, which really was cringeworthy, the songs were pretty good. Two of them feature prominently in the movie, serving as suitable soundtracks to the Joker's antics in the gallery and the parade.


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## megamania (Jul 29, 2015)

I don't think the original Crow would have been as good as it was without the music used.


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## megamania (Jul 29, 2015)

Legatus_Legionis said:


> Does anyone remember "Bat-Dance" by Prince for Tim Burton's Batman?
> 
> While the song never was in the movie, it was on Prince's soundtrack for the movie.
> 
> ...





What do you want?  It was Prince or whatever name / symbol he goes by now.


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## tuxgeo (Jul 30, 2015)

I believe Prince in once again calling himself "Prince," now that the _use-of-that-name_ controversy is no longer an issue (if it is).


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## tuxgeo (Jul 30, 2015)

Fergurg said:


> I'm gonna go in another direction for a minute. The Madonna song "Die Another Day" sounds like a cacophonic mess - until you watch the opening credits to the movie Die Another Day, which goes with the song. Then, and only then, will its seemingly random starts and stops make sense.




Referring back to the title of this thread -- I think the above quote indicates that Madonna's song could be viewed as being somewhat "senseless" without the context of the movie. 

So there's (finally!) one example for that category of song in this thread.


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## Kaodi (Jul 30, 2015)

I do think it applies to television equally. Would Batman: The Animated Series have been as good without the music? I think not.

Edit: Also might be an interesting question as to whether Power Rangers would have been as popular without the catchy theme songs.


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## MarkB (Jul 30, 2015)

It certainly applies to some of the iconic 80s shows - the distinctive music of shows like Airwolf and Knight Rider was definitely a significant part of their appeal. 

Even now, 30 years later (man, that's a depressing figure), hearing those themes evokes a nostalgic thrill - a fact that is apparently not lost on TV advert makers.


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## Raunalyn (Jul 30, 2015)

Someone mentioned Conan the Barbarian earlier. Without a doubt, Basil Poledouris's incredible score enhanced this movie, making an OK movie into something that was almost great (IMO).

The Crow movie would not have been as powerful without Graeme Revell's emotional score (the final scene with his second death...no words to describe the beauty of that scene). The soundtrack itself, with such greats as STP, The Cure, and My Life with the Thrill Kill Cult...once again, spot on.


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## mr_outsidevoice (Aug 1, 2015)

For the "What is this doing here?" category.
The movie legend had a song associated with it. there was a music video on MTV and everything.
"Is Your Love Strong Enough?"by Bryan Ferry. This song did not appear during the film.
Tangerine Dream handled the score. The song only showed up in the closing credits.


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## Legatus Legionis (Aug 3, 2015)

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## sabrinathecat (Sep 18, 2015)

delericho said:


> Kiner's work on "The Clone Wars" is indeed great, and something I use at almost every Star Wars RPG game I run. I wish they would release some of the material from the show as well, to expand the available cues.
> 
> But I have to disagree with you about his doing more than JW in the prequels, if only for one thing: "Duel of the Fates".




There is a release of Clone Wars Seasons 1-6. If nothing else, you can buy a download from Amazon.
To me, "Duel of the Fates" was like a hammer to the face--unsubtle attempt to impress me with a music cue because the action was devoid of emotion (kinda like an M Night Shama... whatever movie plot "twist"). Compared to the duel between Luke & Vader in RotJ, DotF was weak-sauce (just like the fight choreography).


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## delericho (Sep 18, 2015)

sabrinathecat said:


> There is a release of Clone Wars Seasons 1-6. If nothing else, you can buy a download from Amazon.




Yep, I noticed that some time after my post. That find made me very happy.


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## sabrinathecat (Sep 18, 2015)

delericho said:


> Yep, I noticed that some time after my post. That find made me very happy.



As was I.


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