What is everybodys favourite Movie score-Composer?

Thanx to all the replies about censorship it has really opened my eyes on the subject.

My favourite movie scores are as follows:

Basil Poledouris-Conan the Barbarian
Goblin-Dawn Of the Dead
Ennio Moriconne-Once upon a time in America
John Carpenter-Halloween

I also love most of the Soundtracks to Dario Argento's earlier stuff.

I thank my Dad who sadly isn't with me anymore for my love of movies.
He loved all the old Hammer movies and one of his prized possesions was Peter Cushings autograph.
I get a lot of stick of people when I say I love Horror movies.
They either think I'm some wierd Goth chick-Which I'm certainly not.
Or I dont know jack about movies because I'm female.
Oh well Im off for another game of Counterstrike.

[SoulReaper]

Basil Poledouris is definitely my favorite. Conan as well as Robocop, and Starship Troopers, among others.

Elliot Goldenthal- He did Heat and Alien 3.

[djk]

i love the ones Howard Shore did for most of David Cronenberg's movies. The Brood, Scanners, Dead Ringers, Videodrome, eXistenZ, and my favorite, Crash. creepiest shit i've ever heard. you can get three of them on the CD "Dead Ringers music from the films of David Cronenberg".

oh yeah, all the Angelo Badalamenti and Barry Adamson stuff they did with David Lynch. very haunting.

i also like that theme music from Carpenter's Assault on Precinct 13. was that done by John Carpenter too?

[clortho]

Danny Elfman - Nearly everything he does

Clortho

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I am the Keymaster
clortho@hotmail.com

I like:

Horner

Williams

Barry

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Istagi *Feather Head*
Moderator of the Now Playing Forum
DDS-351

Let's get the big names out there

-John Williams
-Alan Silvestri
-Elmer Bernstein
-John Barry
-James Newton Howard
-James Horner
-Jerry Goldsmith
(and probably my favorite)
-Danny Elfman

Did I miss any of the big time/prolific composers? Composers need their own section on the IMDB; these guys don't get anywhere near enough credit for the job they do...

AB

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"Why is it that if someone tells you that there are 1 billion stars in the universe you will believe them, but if they tell you a wall has wet paint you will have to touch it to be sure?"

Favorite film composer? Jerry Goldsmith
And My favorites from him are..
Planet of the Apes
Chinatown
Star Trek TMP
The Omen
Alien
Lion in the Winter
Mom & Dad save the World
Logans Run
Patton

many many more...

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-Dougpirana
" It's not my damn planet, MONKEY BOY!"

one of my most favorite has to be bernard herrmann. the "north by northwest" overture is one of the best openning credits sequences ever. plus the all-string score to "psycho" is just fantastic...

[Will Munney]

Bernard Herrmann is my favorite as well. His Taxi Driver score is brilliant, along with Psycho, and The 7th Voyage of Sinbad.

I'm also a fan of most of the big names:
Goldsmith
Badalemnti (his Lynch stuff and City of Lost Children)
Williams
Poledouris
Barry (Midnight Cowboy has a wonderful score that noone ever talks about)
Morricone (His music for Days of Heaven meshes perfectly with Malick's images)
Elfman
Carter Burwell

I think it would be a grave mistake not to mention Ennio Morricone in this thread. This guy's Sergio Leone "Spaghetti Western" soundtracks helped revolutionize the way music and sound were used in films.

His soundtrack work includes:

- A Fistful Of Dollars
- For A Few Dollars More
- The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly
- Once Upon A Time In The West
- Once Upon A Time In America
- Days Of Heaven
- The Thing
- The Untouchables

Not bad, eh?

I know i will come off as the shallow guy whose never seen a film made pre Star Wars, doesn't know who Scorcese is etc, but really can anyone compete with John Williams. The Whole Liet Motif thing (giving characters themes that change as the mood changes) and the fantastic main themes. Endlessly versatile he has simply created the best movie soundtracks ever. Listen in awe as Williams does:
Wonder and awe - Jurassic Park
Adventure and Derring Do - Indy Jones
Scary - Jaws
Sentimental - ET
Wierd - Close Encounters
Majesty and Power - Superman
Sadness and Mourning -Saving Private Ryan
Military Might - Imperial March
The Star Wars theme - Star Wars

I also love the soundtracks to Blues Brothers, Back to the Future, Sergio Leone Westerns, North By NorthWest, Halloween, The Omen, Psycho, Blade Runner and Batman.
Feel free to criticise.

[Sykes]

Bernard Herrmann:

Citizen Kane
The Devil and Daniel Webster (A superb and overlooked score)
The Magnificent Ambersons
Jane Eyre
The Trouble With Harry
Vertigo
North by Northwest
Psycho
Taxi Driver

And many other masterful compositions.

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"Editing is the foundation of the film art." --V.I. Pudovkin.

I didn't know Randy was part of a family business...

First the cousins...

-Randy Newman (son of Irving)
-Thomas Newman (son of Alfred)
-David Newman (son of Alfred)

and now their uncles/fathers
-Irving Newman (Hollywood physician & occasionaly songwriter)
-Alfred Newman
-Emil Newman
-Lionel Newman
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As for Homerbert's contention that none can compete with Williams, I'd have to disagree. I think most of the ones on my original list can stand with Williams, if none could stand above him.

At some point the idea of "best" becomes rather academic (excepting personal preference, of course). Kinda like Olympic competitors being separated by mere tenths or hundredths of a second. If you can compete on that level, you're a master and 1st, 2nd, or 3rd doesn't make much difference, does it? Or am I out of my mind again?

AB


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"Why is it that if someone tells you that there are 1 billion stars in the universe you will believe them, but if they tell you a wall has wet paint you will have to touch it to be sure?"

John Williams reinvents music scores every time he creates one.

Don't you just hate that crappy electronica stuff in movies like Witness. I sure do...

My favorite score-composer: Zbigniew Preisner...best known for his work on Krzystof Kieslowski's films.....very emotional music.

--Blue, White, Red, Double Life of Veronique, Decalogue, Secret Garden, Feast of July, Damage, and others.


Honorable Mentions:
---James Horner: Braveheart
---Mychael Danna: Sweet Hereafter
---Michael Convertino: Mother Night
---Elliot Goldenthal: Michael Collins

[Dehrian]

None of you have named Max Steiner.

Bernard Herrmann, John Williams, and Jerry Goldsmith also round out my list. Can't stand Horner.

[Dominik Pfleghaar]

I almost can't believe nobody ever mentions Michael Kamen.

Check out this list of movie scores by Michael Kamen!

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Unca Dom, DDS-088
dvdfile.com administrator
pfleghaar@dvdfile.com

[jb523]

Bernard Herrman:
films already mentioned

Toru Takemitsu:
Black Rain,
Ran,
Dodes'kaden,
Woman of the Dunes,
Kwaidan

Sergei Prokofiev:
Alexander Nevsky,
and Lieutenant Kije (The film seems impossible to find, but the score makes an outstanding stand-alone piece)

Joseph Kosma:
Grand Illusion,
Children of Paradise,

and two honorary mentions: Mahler, who is not a film composer, but whose music has on more than a few occasions been used with extreme eloquence, and Shostakovich, who wrote great scores for films that I've never seen (the scores are more famous than the films in many cases).

Michael Kamen, John Williams, Danny Elfman, Ennio Morricone, and many others, to be sure, have put out many very appropriate scores, but none of them would I ever be inclined to listen to without the benefit of the film.

[docg]

I think Thomas Newman (American Beauty, The Horse Whisperer, The Shawshank Redemption) & John Williams (do I really have to list them) are the best composers today. Close second: Jerry Goldsmith, Danny Elfman, Randy Newman, and Hans Zimmer.

FYI, John Williams and lietmotif? He definitely wasn't the first to use this. Composers in the classical era (17th, 18th, 19th century) as well as Old Hollywood quite frequently wrote in lietmotif.

[grunter]

Somehow when I read the topic line for this thread, I just knew it'd end up being the typical John Williams' spooge-o-rama.

Granted, Williams has created some of films' most memorable scores. But then again, the "most memorable" part gets a huge boost from those films occupying ALL rungs of the highest-grossing list. When John Williams is "on" - he's definitely "on." No one can touch him. But when he's "off" - as in the atrocious, reactive, murky "score" to "The Phantom Menace" - he can almost singlehandedly torpedo a film. I maintain that had John Williams done his job on "Star Wars: Episode I" - then the film wouldn't quite have attained the kryptonite-like stink it's received from fans and critics alike. Aside from the traditional "Star Wars" opening theme fanfare, that score was alarmingly pedantic. And please - I beg of you - don't go into some hissy fit about how I didn't listen closely enough to the subtle-to-the-point-of-not-really-existing leitmotif of the Emperor's March in the Anakin theme. Sorry, but that was just too little, too late -- and it SIMPLY IS NOT NOTICEABLE in the final cut of the film. For 90% of "The Phantom Menace" soundtrack, it sounds like John Williams simply recorded his "Lost World" soundtrack backwards in little bits and pieces. And as for "Duel of Fates" - one track, by itself, cannot save an entire soundtrack or an entire film.

As for who I would place in the pantheon of great film composers? Michael Nyman's scores for Peter Greenway's films are devastatingly powerful, hypnotic and just plain forlorn and lovely. His "Fish Beach" theme from "Drowning by Numbers" has been officially adopted as the "soundtrack to my (admittedly hum-drum) existence." Similarly, Angelo Badalamenti's scores for David Lynch's films are also untouchable. His fiddle theme to "The Straight Story" captured the trundling mood of that film perfectly. And his "Pink Room" track from the "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me" collection is the raunchiest, sexiest, dirtiest instrumental I've ever heard.

[jb523]

First of all, it's spelled Leitmotif. Second, if you can name one 17th century composer who used it, I will be very impressed. While the idea was certainly not entirely original at the time, it was Wagner that was most famous for using it, and for using it to the degree that he did. Similarly, John Williams is famous for using Leitmotif in a manner similar to Wagner's use of it in Der Ring (often included as one of several similarities between the trilogy and the Opera cycle). That is one of the things that makes Star Wars an excellent example of a good film score--while the music itself is barely listenable on its own (it's simultaneously shallow, transparent and emotionless), it is incredibly appropriate in the way it was used.

A last comment is in regards to the so-called Classical period. There are 2 Classical periods, one of which is the Viennese Classical period, which began in the early 18th century and ended with Beethoven establishing the beginnings of the Romantic tradition in the very start of the 19th, and the other is the more general term that encompasses all music that is part of a long chain extending from the Renaissance and hasn't ended yet. Both uses of the term are entirely inappropriate, but they managed to stick, and there aren't any other terms to use.

[docg]

I appologize for not thoroughly spell & date checking my post. I only sought to make a simple point but alas in steps the pedantic one of the discussion board (there's always a couple). I'm also sorry that you can't enjoy John Williams' score for the Star Wars trilogy however "appropriate" it is. I find it truly sad that you find it emotionless, especially considering your taste for Toru Takemitsu's score for Black Rain.