BOT's TOP 100 Film Scores: Fifth Edition [SUBMISSIONS ARE NOW CLOSED!] [THANKS TO ALL WHO PARTICIPATED!]

[4815162342 is Francis]

It is time for the fifth edition of BOT's Top 100 Film Scores of All Time!

 

One of the most important aspects for many films is its score, the musical background that helps push the action and atmosphere of a scene forward. The music of a film can invigorate, excite, inspire joy, grief, fear, and terror, it helps bring the emotions and tensions out in a scene. It can be powerfully evocative and grab your attention and pull it along, or it can be more subtle and quiet, slowly luring you in. Talking about film music is a recurring topic in many threads on this forum, and it's once again time to see what the consensus for this place is concerning what film scores are our top choice. Especially with the turnover in members and their changing opinions.
 
The rules for eligibility are simple:
 
1) The score must be from a theatrically released motion picture that was released worldwide prior to January 1, 2021. So no 2021 films are eligible.
 
2) The score must have a majority of its material composed for the motion picture. This disqualifies films with a majority of their music being pre-existing material, such as, for example, adaptations of Broadway musicals, Tarantino films using licensed songs and music pieces, films using predominantly classical music (like 2001: A Space Odyssey), etc.

 

3) Musicals originally made for the screen are eligible. I will leave it to the individual member's discretion to decide whether music written as themes for a song that also plays freestanding from lyrics can be considered part of the "original" score

 

 

You can submit lists of 10, 25, 50, 75, or 100. The lists are weighted so that the options with more listings have greater value for each ranking. The scoring for the 5 options is as follows:

 

List of 10:
1- 100
2- 90
3- 75
4- 60
5- 50
6- 40
7- 30
8- 20
9- 10
10- 1

 

 

List of 25

 

Spoiler

1- 100 2. 90 3. 85 4. 75 5. 65 6-8- 55 9-12- 50 13-16- 40 17-20- 25 21- 20 22- 15 23- 10 24- 5 25- 1

 

List of 50

 

Spoiler

1- 100 2- 96 3- 92 4- 88 5- 84 6- 80 7- 76 8- 72 9- 68 10- 64 11-15- 60 16-20- 55 21-25- 50 26-30- 40 31-35- 30 36-40- 20 41-43- 15 44-46- 10 47- 8 48- 5 49- 3 50- 1

 

List of 75

 

Spoiler

1- 100 2- 98 3- 96 4- 94 5- 92 6- 90 7- 88 8- 86 9- 84 10- 82 11- 80 12- 78 13- 76 14- 74 15- 72 16- 70 17- 68 18- 66 19- 64 20- 60 21-25- 55 26-30- 50 31-35- 45 36-40- 40 41-45- 35 46-50- 30 51-55- 25 56-60- 20 61-64- 15 65-68- 12 69-71- 10 72- 8 73- 5 74- 3 75- 1

 

List of 100

 

1- 100

2- 99

3- 98

...

100- 1

 

 

If you do end up submitting a list that falls outside one of the above categories, PLEASE NUMBER ALL ENTRIES so I can keep track of how many in case I need to ad hoc an improvised scoring system

 

 

Lists can be posted in this thread if you want to share, but I would ask that you PM them to me so I can easily keep track of them all in one bunch rather than sift through a thread to see if I missed anyone. Also feel free to use this thread to promote the scores you really love and discuss the merits or demerits of them with others.

 

 

Final Deadline for submissions is now Sunday July 4, 2021 at 11:59 PM PST.

Edited July 5, 2021 by 4815162342

[4815162342 is Francis]

2019's Top 100:

 

Spoiler

 

1. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring

 

2. Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope

 

3. The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

 

4. Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back

 

5. Raiders of the Lost Ark

 

6. Jaws

 

7. Lawrence of Arabia

 

8. Titanic

 

9. Superman

 

10. Spirited Away

 

11. The Godfather

 

12. Schindler’s List

 

13. Jurassic Park

 

14. Vertigo

 

15. Blade Runner

 

16. Psycho

 

17. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

 

18. Halloween

 

19. Once Upon a Time in the West

 

20. The Magnificent Seven (1960)

 

21. Apollo 13

 

22. Rocky

 

23. Gladiator

 

24. E.T.: The Extraterrestrial

 

25. Conan the Barbarian

 

26. Star Trek: The Motion Picture

 

27. Inception

 

28. Mad Max: Fury Road

 

29. Princess Mononoke

 

30. Up

 

31. Pan's Labyrinth

 

32. Chinatown

 

33. How to Train Your Dragon

 

34. The Adventures of Robin Hood

 

35. Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl

 

36. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service

 

37. Gone with the Wind

 

38. The Natural

 

39. Back to the Future

 

40. Avatar

 

41. The Incredibles

 

42. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

 

43. The Social Network

 

44. Wall-E

 

45. Chariots of Fire

 

46. Tron Legacy

 

47. The Dark Knight

 

48. Once Upon a Time in America

 

49. The Lion King

 

50. Edward Scissorhands

 

51. The Last of the Mohicans

 

52. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

 

53. The Third Man

 

54. The Godfather Part II

 

55. The Grand Budapest Hotel

 

56. The Shawshank Redemption

 

57. Interstellar

 

58. Casablanca

 

59. Alexander Nevsky

 

60. Forrest Gump

 

61. Requiem for a Dream

 

62. Braveheart-

 

63. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone

 

64. Sunset Boulevard

 

65. RoboCop (1987)

 

66. Dr. Zhivago

 

67. Planet of the Apes (1968)

 

68. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford

 

69. Terminator 2: Judgment Day

 

70. Close Encounters of the Third Kind

 

71. Batman (1989)

 

72. Goldfinger

 

73. Beauty and the Beast (1991)

 

74. The Great Escape

 

75. Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi

 

76. Ben-Hur

 

77. Escape From New York

 

78. Spartacus

 

79. La La Land

 

80. The Mission

 

81. North by Northwest

 

82. Koyaanisqatsi

 

83. Sunshine

 

84. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End

 

85. The Ten Commandments

 

86. The Right Stuff

 

87. Henry V

 

88. If Beale Street Could Talk

 

89. The Pink Panther (1963)

 

90. Suspiria (1977)

 

91. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

 

92. The Hunt for Red October

 

93. The Terminator

 

94. Laura

 

95. Aliens

 

96. Marvel’s The Avengers

 

97. Breakfast at Tiffany’s

 

98. King Kong (1933)

 

99. The Wizard of Oz

 

100. Akira

 

Honorable Mentions

Aladdin (1992)

Batman Begins

Cloud Atlas

The Ghost and Mrs. Muir

My Neighbor Totoro

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind

On Golden Pond

On the Waterfront

Spider-Man 2

The Thin Red Line

 

 

[Tower]

This will be my first time trying this one, so it will be quite of work getting a list together.

 

Looking at the previous list though, I can see an obvious omission of the fantastic score in Gremlins 2:

 

 

 

[Plain Old Tele]

FYC:

 

[Jake Gittes]

FYC

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Plain Old Tele]

^^ These are all really good. 

[DAR]

Just a few Fyc

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[John Marston]

hopefully the list isn't all recent movies. 

[DAR]

Franchises I’m going to limit to one film(hopefully)

[Ethan Hunt]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[4815162342 is Francis]

5 hours ago, John Marston said:

hopefully the list isn't all recent movies. 

 

It usually is not.

[4815162342 is Francis]

I have had to extend the deadline due to limited initial participation.

 

@Cap @Eric could this be moved to the main subforum and stickied?

 

thanks

[Fancyarcher]

My just about final list. I tried to be different this time, and mostly stuck to just limiting myself to one score per franchise. 

 

Spoiler

1.    The Empire Strikes Back – John Williams
2.    Fellowship of the Ring – Howard Shore
3.    Days of Heaven – Ennio Morricone
4.    Lawrence of Arabia – Maurice Jarre
5.    The Ten Commandments – Elmer Bernstein
6.    Schindler’s List – John Williams 
7.    Spirited Away – Joe Hisashi 
8.    To Kill A Mockingbird – Elmer Bernstein 
9.    Vertigo – Bernard Herrmann 
10.    Mishima – Phillip Glass 
11.    On Her Majesty’s Secret Service – John Barry 
12.    The Dark Crystal – Trevor Jones 
13.    On Golden Pond – Dave Grusin 
14.    The Piano – Michael Nyman 
15.    Malcolm X – Terrence Blanchard 
16.    Once Upon A Time in The West – Ennio Morricone 
17.    Lifeforce – Henry Mancini
18.    The Right Stuff – Bill Conti 
19.    Heavy Metal – Elmer Bernstein 
20.    Flesh and Blood – Basil Poledouris 
21.    Beauty and The Beast – Alan Menken 
22.    The Ghost and Mrs. Muir – Bernard Herrmann 
23.    Avalon – Randy Newman 
24.    Beauty and The Beast – Alan Menken 
25.    E.T. The Extra Terrestrial – John Williams 
26.    If Beale Street Could Talk – Nicolas Britell 
27.    Chinatown – Jerry Goldsmith
28.    Laura – David Raksin
29.    The Grand Budapest Hotel – Alexandre Desplat 
30.    Koyaanisqasti – Phillip Glass 
31.    The Lion King – Hans Zimmer 
32.    Escape From New York – John Carpenter 
33.    In the Mood for Love – Michael Galasso & Shigeru Umebayashi 
34.    The Land Before Time – James Horner
35.    Thief – Tangerine Dream 
36.    Princess Mononoke – Joe Hisashi 
37.    The Secret of NIMH – Jerry Goldsmith 
38.    Phantom Thread – Johnny Greenwood
39.    Forrest Gump – Alan Silvestri 
40.    Up – Michael Giacchino 
41.    Spartacus – Alex North 
42.    Return to Oz – David Shire 
43.    It’s A Wonderful Life – Dimitri Tiomkin 
44.    The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly – Ennio Morricone 
45.    Enter the Dragon – Lalo Schifrin
46.    Under the Skin – Mica Levi
47.    Raiders of the Lost Ark – John Williams 
48.    The Straight Story – Angelo Badalamenti 
49.    The Godfather – Nino Rota 
50.    Pan’s Labyrinth – Javier Navarrete 
51.    Conan The Barbarian – Basil Poledouris 
52.    The Third Man – Anton Karras 
53.    Psycho – Bernard Herrmann 
54.    Edward Scissorhands – Danny Elfman 
55.    The Shadow – Jerry Goldsmith 
56.    Stargate – David Arnold 
57.    The Handmaiden -Yeong-Wook Jo
58.    Touch of Evil – Henry Mancini 
59.    Ran – Toru Takemistku
60.    Hook – John Williams 
61.    The Incredibles – Michael Giacchino 
62.    The Age of Innocence – Elmer Bernstein 
63.    Dances with Wolves – John Barry
64.    Young Sherlock Holmes – Bruce Broughton 
65.    The Adventures of Robin Hood – Erich Wolfgang Korngald
66.    A.I. Artificial Intelligence – John Williams 
67.    The Godfather Part II – Nina Rota 
68.    25th Hour – Terrence Blanchard 
69.    The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad – Bernard Herrmann 
70.    The Wind Rises – Joe Hisashi 
71.    Cleopatra - Alex North 
72.    Apollo 13th – James Horner
73.    Gremlins II: The New Batch – Jerry Goldsmith 
74.    Breakfast at Tiffany’s – Henry Mancini
75.    Much Ado About Nothing – Patrick Doyle 
76.    Independence Day – David Arnold 
77.    Interview with A Vampire – Elliot Goldenthal 
78.    Batman: Mask of the Phantasm – Shirley Walker
79.    Unbreakable – James Newton Howard 
80.    Elevator to the Gallows – Miles Davis 
81.    Prince Valiant – Franz Waxman 
82.    The Wind and The Lion – Jerry Goldsmith 
83.    The Conversation – David Shire
84.    Wall-E – Thomas Newman 
85.    Hellraiser II – Christopher Young
86.    Blade Runner – Vangelis 
87.    Batman Returns – Danny Elfman
88.    Tron Legacy – Daft Punk
89.    Birth – Alexandre Desplat 
90.    Crimson Tide – Hans Zimmer 
91.    Sicario – Johann Johannsson 
92.    The Last Temptation of Christ – Peter Gabriel 
93.    Clash of the Titans – Leonard Rosenthal 
94.    Who Framed Roger Rabbit – Alan Silvestri 
95.    Truck Turner – Isaac Hayes 
96.    Battle Royale - Masamichi Amano
97.    Big Fish – Danny Elfman 
98.    Gettsyburg – Randy Edelman 
99.    Hamlet – Patrick Doyle 
100.    Suspiria - Goblin

 

[titanic2187]

For sure Titanic will be my number 1 and Spirited away as number 2. Need to re-listen to some score. 

[Jake Gittes]

1 hour ago, Fancyarcher said:

My just about final list. I tried to be different this time, and mostly stuck to just limiting myself to one score per franchise. 

 

  Hide contents

33.    In the Mood for Love – Michael Galasso & Shigeru Umebayashi 

 

This isn't ineligible since Galasso's music is original as far as I can tell, but the Umebayashi piece was first written for another film. That may affect your placement.

[Rorschach]

I'm currently going through all the Studio Ghibli films right now, and I can already tell my list is gonna be chalk full of a bunch of them lol.

[Fancyarcher]

3 hours ago, Jake Gittes said:

This isn't ineligible since Galasso's music is original as far as I can tell, but the Umebayashi piece was first written for another film. That may affect your placement.

Thanks for that information, I actually had no idea about Umebayashi's music not being original. That will definitely probably affect my original placement of it a bit, even if Galasso's parts are mostly what I love about Mood's score in general.

Edited May 11, 2021 by Fancyarcher

[Walt Disney]

My Vote:

 

1.      Back to the Future

2.      Star Wars

3.      Forrest Gump

4.      Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark

5.      Rocky

6.      Superman

7.      The Karate Kid (1984)

8.      Gone with the Wind

9.      Goldfinger

10.  Terminator 2: Judgment Day

11.  Robocop

12.  Batman (1989)

13.  Captain America: The First Avenger

14.  Star Wars Episode V: The Empires Strikes Back

15.  Marvel’s The Avengers

16.  Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

17.  Avengers: Infinity War

18.  Rambo

19.  The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

20.  Top Gun

21.  Halloween

22.  Avengers: End Game

23.  Jurassic Park

24.  Iron Man 3

25.  Rocky IV

26.  The Natural

27.  The Godfather

28.  A League of Their Own

29.  Police Academy

30.  Beverly Hills Cop

31.  Flash Gordon

32.  The Truman Show

33.  Casablanca

34.  West Side Story

35.  E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial

36.  The Wizard of Oz

37.  L.A. Confidential

38.  Masters of the Universe

39.  Love Story

40.  The Exorcist

41.  Chariots of Fire

42.  Apollo 13

43.  The Godfather Part II

44.  March of the Wooden Soldiers

45.  Dr. No

46.  Star Trek: The Motion Picture

47.  Stripes

48.  Peter Pan

49.  Home Alone

50.  Hook

51.  Jaws

52.  Psycho

53.  The Rock

54.  Maverick

55.  The Mighty Ducks

56.  Mary Poppins

57.  Saving Private Ryan

58.  Gladiator

59.  Pinocchio

60.  American Beauty

61.  Aladdin

62.  The Lion King

63.  Ghostbusters

64.  The Magnificent Seven

65.  Judge Dredd

66.  Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi

67.  Ghost

68.  Terms of Endearment

69.  Chinatown

70.  Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace

71.  Dumbo

72.  Catch Me if You Can

73.  Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

74.  Superman II

75.  The Shawshank Redemption

76.  An Officer and a Gentleman

77.  Men in Black

78.  Rocky III

79.  Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

80.  Beauty and the Beast

81.  The Pink Panther

82.  The Terminator

83.  Doctor Strange

84.  The Bridge on the River Kwai

85.  Crimson Tide

86.  Song of the South

87.  Willow

88.  Miracle on 34^th Street

89.  The Ten Commandments

90.  The Sound of Music

91.  My Fair Lady

92.  Cinderella

93.  Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

94.  Braveheart

95.  Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone

96.  Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

97.  Patton

98.  The Little Mermaid

99.  Sleeping Beauty

100.                      Amistad

[Borobudur]

I will only submit a list with 25.

[4815162342 is Francis]

8 hours ago, Borobudur said:

I will only submit a list with 25.

 

That is perfectly fine. Please remember to PM it to me