BOT's Top 100 Film Scores Countdown (2021): Fast Five Edition (TOP 10 WEDNESDAY EVENING EST)

[4815162342]

43. Alexander Nevsky (1938)

 

Original Music by Sergei Prokofiev

 

 

357 Points

Top 10 Placements: 1
Top 5 Placements: 1
#1 Rankings: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #50
2017- #50
2019- #59
 

 

Reaching the current apex of its Countdown journey is the film score to the Russian historical epic that was totally not a propaganda film rallying Soviets against the totally not Teutons to the west. The first of legendary Soviet director Sergei Eisenstein's dramatic movies to use sound, Prokofiev collaborated heavily with his director, with some of the film score being composed to match the film, and some scenes of the film were crafted to fit with music Prokofiev had already written. The resulting match between images and music is considered by some to be one of the gold standards of cinema. Prokofiev would later arrange the music he composed as a standalone cantata, Alexander Nevsky, Op. 78.

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42. The Natural (1984)

 

Original Music by Randy Newman

 

 

358 Points 

Top 10 Placements: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #68
2017- #73
2019- #38
 

 

Dropping a few spots from its 2019 high is Randy Newman's work for one of the iconic sports movies in American cinema. Newman's work for the early 20th-Century set film has been compared to the style and feel of Aaron Copland. The film score was composed late in production, as the studio was scrambling to get it finished and out in theaters, and it took many tries before Newman figured out the central theme to the score, which has become one of the iconic musical themes in cinema. It was nominated for an Oscar, but lost out to Maurice Jarre's A Passage to India.

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41. The Great Escape (1963)

 

Original Music by Elmer Bernstein

 

 

360 Points

Top 5 Placements: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #59
2017- #64
2019- #74
 

 

After a steady progression of slipping further and further back, Elmer Bernstein's rousing film score for the POW Escape flick rises over 30 places to just miss the Top 40. The score utilizes a militaristic march as its main theme and uses it heavily throughout to reflect the determined and relentless nature of its protagonists, who tirelessly work at developing an implementing a massive breakout from their POW camp. The film score was so popular on release that Elmer Bernstein was purportedly able to live off its royalties alone for the rest of his life.

[Cap]

21 hours ago, 4815162342 said:

With the first half of the Countdown in the books, here are some stats:

 

 

Composer Appearances:

 

  Hide contents

John Williams- 1

 

Watching this skyrocket in the Top 25 is gonna be L O L. 

[4815162342]

40. The Social Network (2010)

 

Original Music by Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross

 

 

379 Points

Top 10 Placements: 2

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #29
2017- #29
2019- #43
 

 

 

We kick off the final set for the night with the discordant, off-kilter film score that set the tone for David Fincher's acclaimed work. The use of the Nine Inch Nails artists really gives the film a musical atmosphere that portrays the creative genius, disruption, and isolation of its protagonist. Reznor initially declined Fincher's offer to work on the film, though he eventually changed his mind, though he was also initially concerned by the film at first seeming to have a "John Hughes" vibe as he put it. The score for the film received widespread acclaim and has always been highly regarded here by BOTers.

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39. Escape From New York (1981)

 

Original Music by John Carpenter

 

 

382 Points

 

 

Prior Placements:
2017- #89
2019- #77
 

 

 

In one of the biggest positive movements of the 100, the music to John Carpenter's iconic dystopia makes a huge leap into the Top 40 of almost 40 places. Carpenter, who scored many of his own films, collaborated with sound designer Alan Howarth. Howarth used equipment including ARP and Prophet-5 synthesizers and a Linn LM-1 drum machine, as well as an acoustic piano and Fender guitars, to create the palette of sounds used in the score, while Carpenter composed the melodies. Carpenter was inspired by groups such as Tangerine Dream and The Police when composing the music for the film, and his electronic score seamlessly creates a tense and grimy mood in keeping with the setting of Manhattan turned into a massive prison.

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38. Casablanca (1942)

 

Original Music by Max Steiner

 

384 Points

 

 

Prior Placements:
2017- #62
2019- #58
 

 

The WW2-set romance classic is another film with a notable jump from 2019's position. Steiner originally wanted to have his film score devoid of references to the song "As Time Goes By", which had been used in both the original play and in the filming of the movie itself. Because reshoots were impossible because Bergman had cut her hair short for her next film role, Steiner was forced to utilize the song as a reference point for much of the film score, along with the French anthem La Marseillaise. Steiner actually quite disliked the song, but later admitted that it "must have had something to attract so much attention." It took almost 55 years for the film's soundtrack to get an album release. Steiner's work was nominated for an Oscar (one of 16 nominees that year!) but lost out to Alfred Newman's The Song of Bernadette.

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37. Beauty and the Beast (1991)

 

Original Music by Alan Menken

 

 

387 Points

Top 10 Placements: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #40
2017- #33
2019- #73
 

 

After a massive drop in 2019, the first animated film to get a Best Picture nomination has rebounded quite well. The score is composed to have a close relationship with many of the songs Menken co-wrote for the movie, building off them to create a more tense, action-infused, or dramatic air as the conflicts slowly escalate. Much of the film score was written during the movie's pre-production process. Menken's work is without a doubt one of the most famous musical compositions for an animated movie, and would win the Oscar for Original Score, beating out movies such as Bugsy and JFK.

[4815162342]

36. Chinatown (1974)

 

Original Music by Jerry Goldsmith

 

 

389 Points

Top 5 Placements: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #48
2017- #36
2019- #32
 

 

 

Aside from its 2015 appearance, Jerry Goldsmith's work for the LA-set film noir has hovered around the same spot on the 100. Jerry Goldsmith was not the original composer for the film. It had been Phillip Lambro, but when his work was rejected at the last minute by producer Robert Evans, Goldsmith was brought in and had to compose the entire score within only 10 days. Goldsmith's score definitely feels quintessentially noir, with an emphasis on mood, emotion, and tension, and featuring trumpet solos by MGM's first trumpet Uan Rasey. Rasey later said that  Goldsmith "told [him] to play it sexy — but like it's not good sex". The score was nominated at the Oscars and would later be ranked 9th on AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores

[titanic2187]

20 hours ago, 4815162342 said:

46. Braveheart (1995)

 

Original Music by James Horner

 

 

342 Points

 

Braveheart is a rare film that I have a complete opposite view between its quality overall and soundtrack. Wasn't really peeved by the film itself, especially that "FREEDOM!!!“ doesn't sit well with me under Trumpism era but I love the score. I feel like 90s is the horner's artistic peak of his career.    

[4815162342]

35. Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl (2003)

 

Original Music by Klaus Badelt

 

 

403 Points

Top 10 Placements: 3

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #36
2017- #39
2019- #35
 

 

 

We start today with one of the most consistent performers on the Film Score List. Never higher than 35th, never lower than 39th. No matter who submits and list or how many people submit, this film always finds its way to where it is supposed to be. Though Klaus Badelt is credited as the official composer for the film, he worked under the supervision of Hans Zimmer, and seven other people are credited with composing "additional music". The original composer was supposed to be Alan Silvestri (and yeah, that would have been a different score), but that hire fell apart after creative differences. Apparently, production schedule for the score was so rushed, that the track titles for the album where made before a single note was composed, resulting in many of the tracks not really fitting their respective title.

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34. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969)

 

Original Music by John Barry

 

 

420 Points

Top 10 Placements: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:
2019- #36
 

 

After storming high onto the Countdown in 2019, the George Lazenby Bond flick inches a couple spots higher. For the sixth Bond film in a row he worked on, composer John Barry opted to use more electronic instruments and a more aggressive style for the music compared to his prior work. Part of his rationale was that in order to help the audience put Sean Connery's Bond out of their minds, the music needed to do some extra heavy lifting. The brassy main instrumental main theme for the film, one of the few non-song tracks to play over a Bond film's opening credits, was used heavily in the movie as a substitute for the classic Bond theme originally made for Dr. No and Barry's prior 007 motif used in multiple earlier films. Barry's work for OHMSS has certainly started to leave its foothold with BOT, though it is a question if it would maintain the same popularity in more expansive quantity of list submissions.

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33. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)

 

Original Music by Howard Shore

 

 

423 Points

Top 5 Placements: 1
#1 Rankings: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #6
2017- #9
2019- #17
 

 

Similar to The Two Towers, this fantasy epic slowly seems to be losing its grip on power with the Top 100, dropping from two consecutive top 10s to 17th, and now 33rd. Rounding out his work on the trilogy, Howard Shore estimated he had to write seven minutes of music a day to keep up with the pace of post-production and the sheer amount of footage filmed for the movie. The movie brings into the forefront themes that had only been hinted at in the prior installments, such as the martial and proud motif for Gondor. The score was the most expansive of the trilogy and required the most orchestration and at times innovation. One piece of music required an instrument invented and crafted especially for the film: a fiddle with four pairs of strings instead of single strings. Shore's work for ROTK would win an Oscar, as part of the film's 11 for 11 sweep.

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32. Gone with the Wind (1939)

 

Original Music by Max Steiner

 

 

436 Points

Top 10 Placements: 2
Top 5 Placements: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:

2015- #30
2017- #22
2019- #37
 

 

Though this movie has fluctuated a bit between lists, it has returned to about where it was when I took over the list duties in 2015. Producer David O. Selznick wanted to use Steiner, whom he had collaborated with before, but had to rent him from Warner Bros., where he was under contract. Steiner spent 12 weeks composing the score, which at over 2-and-a-half hours was by far one of the longest film scores composed at the time (and still to date), broken into nearly a hundred isolated pieces. The score is built on the backbone of a few major musical themes, the one most remembered from the film being the one for the plantation Tara. Steiner's work was nominated for an Oscar, but lost out to The Wizard of Oz, which came in tied at 294th on the Score List.

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31. Princess Mononoke (1997)

 

Original Music by Joe Hisaishi

 

 

438 Points

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #92
2017- #93
2019- #29
 

 

After two appearances in the low 90s, the music to Hayao Miyazaki's environmental epic has now jumped to about 30th on the Countdown. Hisaishi continued his frequent collaboration with Miyazaki, and builds the film score on central themes for the protagonist Ashitaka and the wild girl of the forest San, and also features ambient and discordant music to reflect the growing corruption of the forest as it becomes overtaken by blight in response to the human invasion of it for industrial purposes. Hisaishi also quotes several pieces of classical music in the score, such as Dmitri Shostakovich's 5th symphony. Princess Mononoke is one of just a couple Miyazaki films to have made an impact on the Top 100, and it will be curious to see if changes in list demographics will affect that.

[The Panda]

19 hours ago, 4815162342 said:

43. Alexander Nevsky (1938)

 

Original Music by Sergei Prokofiev

 

 

357 Points

Top 10 Placements: 1
Top 5 Placements: 1
#1 Rankings: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #50
2017- #50
2019- #59
 

 

Reaching the current apex of its Countdown journey is the film score to the Russian historical epic that was totally not a propaganda film rallying Soviets against the totally not Teutons to the west. The first of legendary Soviet director Sergei Eisenstein's dramatic movies to use sound, Prokofiev collaborated heavily with his director, with some of the film score being composed to match the film, and some scenes of the film were crafted to fit with music Prokofiev had already written. The resulting match between images and music is considered by some to be one of the gold standards of cinema. Prokofiev would later arrange the music he composed as a standalone cantata, Alexander Nevsky, Op. 78.

The countdown has now peaked. No reason to announce anything else because it doesn’t get better.

[The Panda]

 

More of you need to go and watch this movie. One of the very rare scores that is masterful even without the context of the film (although the movie is practically the definition of epic as well)

Edited July 18, 2021 by The Panda

[4815162342]

30. Rocky (1976)

 

Original Music by Bill Conti

 

 

450 Points

Top 5 Placements: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #20
2017- #20
2019- #22
 

 

Though it had previously nestled in right at the Top 20, the pugilistic film about the Italian Stallion drops several places this time around. David Shire, the husband of lead actress Talia Shire, was the first choice to score the film, but had to drop out, so the director turned to Bill Conti, whom he had previously worked with. This was done outside of the studio and informally, since the budget for the music, the composer, the musicians, the recording, renting a studio, etc. was only $25,000.00. Much of the score is based around the iconic tune "Gonna Fly Now" written for the movie, and the music serves the atmosphere of the hard-working determined guy who only wants a shot to prove himself. While Gonna Fly Now was nominated for an Oscar, the score itself was not.

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29. Apollo 13 (1995)

 

Original Music by James Horner

 

 

451 Points

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #92
2017- #90
2019- #21
 

 

 

Similar to Princess Mononoke, this film spent a couple countdowns toiling in the 90s before making a huge leap in 2019. James Horner builds upon his mid-90s run to appear again in the 100, this time with a score centered around a soaring, triumphant theme for the titular spacecraft, representing the proud aspiration of reaching for the stars, and the victory of bringing the ship's crew home against difficult odds. The film score features solos by vocalist Annie Lennox and Tim Morrison on the trumpet, who contribute to many of the score's tracks. Just as with Braveheart the same year, Horner's work was nominated for an Oscar, but lost out.

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28. Psycho (1960)

 

Original Music by Bernard Herrmann

 

 

476 Points

Top 10 Placements: 1

 

 

Prior Placements:
2015- #35
2017- #31
2019- #16
 

 

After a jump inside the Top 20 in 2019, Bernard Herrmann's most famous work for Alfred Hitchcock drops back a dozen places. Of course one of the most famous musical motifs in film history almost did not happen, as initially Herrmann refused to work on the film with a reduced budget. Herrmann ended up using the lowered music budget to his advantage by writing for a string orchestra rather than a full symphonic ensemble, contrary to Hitchcock's original desire for a jazz-based score. Similarly, Hitchcock's original desire was for the iconic shower murder to be without music at all, but relented after Herrmann played the musical cue for the director. Psycho's music really had a lot of what ifs that could have resulted in things playing out quite differently for the movie and for cinema music history.