Music is something that can connect people across generations. It sounds different to each person and can evoke feelings and memories in a way that is otherwise unmatched in human experience. The thought of "Do you remember where you were when you heard that for the first time?" can bring on deep waves of nostalgia. The same goes for music related to movies. Hearing a song and trying to place it years later can be a fun exercise, as music brings movie scenes to life.
That doesn't only have to include songs chosen for the movie or sung by characters in the film. The film's musical score is a central part of the moviegoing experience. It lets audiences know when to get excited and perhaps when to be apprehensive about what's going to be on screen. From sweeping scores to tamer, minimalistic ones, the music for a movie can be iconic. That's why it's important to give credit where the Academy Awards did not.
Here are the best 10 film scores to not win an Academy Award.
The Academy Awards have given out awards for movie scores since 1935 and have been awarding original scores, the overall scoring of films, and different genres of scores throughout that time. The name of the award has changed over the years.
10 'The Theory of Everything' (2014)
Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson showcased blends of orchestral music with electronic sounds to create a number of his personal works. He produced solo albums before starting work in film and television. His first major Hollywood film was Denis Villeneuve's Prisoners in 2013. The next year, he composed the score for James Marsh's The Theory of Everything, the biopic about Stephen Hawking's life starring Eddie Redmayne.
Jóhannsson played up the celestial themes that Hawking frequently theorized about with a dreamlike score featuring many strings and his signature mix of electronic and orchestral. Parts of the soundtrack feel like they flutter, conveying Hawking and his wife Jane's relationship. The score was nominated for Best Original Score but lost to Alexander Desplat's score for The Grand Budapest Hotel. Jóhannson was nominated the next year for an Oscar for Sicario, but lost to Ennio Morricone's score for The Hateful Eight. Jóhannson passed away in 2018 at the age of 48.
9 'Vertigo' (1958)
Bernard Herrmann was a frequent collaborator of Alfred Hitchcock, having worked with the famous director three times before Vertigo was released and five times after. The film stars James Stewart as a former police officer who, due to an on-duty accident, has developed a fear of heights and triggered vertigo. He is hired as a private investigator to investigate a friend's wife, played by Kim Novak.
Herrmann's score relies on a dizzying array of cyclical sounds to portray the spells that Stewart's character experienced. The movie makes the audience rethink the plot over and over again to try and get to the bottom of the Technicolor mystery. The score really dives into that obsession, revisiting sections in different ways that evoke familiarity each time you hear them. The film wasn't even nominated for an Oscar, but as the popularity of Vertigo has grown over the years, the recognition for Herrmann's score has as well.
8 'The Dark Knight' (2008)
For 2005's Batman Begins, Christopher Nolan asked Hans Zimmer to compose the score. Zimmer reached out to James Newton Howard to see if he wanted to collaborate on the score, as the pair had always talked about working together. Nolan agreed to this, and the two worked together but created separate themes to portray the dichotomy of Bruce Wayne and Batman. The pair teamed up again for the sequel, The Dark Knight, in 2008.
Howard and Zimmer composed the score without seeing the movie first and once again focused on the characters rather than how they looked on screen. Howard composed around Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart), and Zimmer focused on the battle between Batman (Christian Bale) and The Joker (Heath Ledger). What transpired was two notes used for The Joker that were just slightly different, creating an agitating sound, mixed with some pop and electronic sounds. Dent's portion was done with brass to portray the hope in his mission, but the sound becomes more warped as the movie goes on, showing his character's change. The heavy score thumps along to show the energy and direness of the themes of the film. The soundtrack was not nominated for an Oscar, but Zimmer has won two Oscars and been nominated 12 times, and Howard has been nominated nine times without a win yet.
7 'The Magnificent Seven' (1960)
Anyone who has seen The Magnificent Seven has heard one of the more recognizable scores of its era. Directed by John Sturges, the film is a remake of Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai and stars an ensemble cast of famous actors, all at the peak of their careers. Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, Robert Vaughn, Brad Dexter, James Coburn, and Horst Buchholz play gunslingers hired by villagers to protect a small town from a group of Mexican bandits, led by Eli Wallach.
The Western was scored by Elmer Bernstein, one of the most well-known composers in Hollywood history. This sweeping score featured a main theme that was so catchy, it was reused in commercials, TV series, and other movies due to its widespread recognition. The larger-than-life bombastic nature of the music played up Hollywood's ideals of the Wild West, heightening the gunfights and changing how composers scored Western films. Previously known for slower themes, Bernstein's score is energetic and lively, bringing a new dimension to the genre. The film lost the Oscar for Best Music Score of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture to Ernest Gold's score for Exodus.
6 'The Pink Panther' (1964)
Henry Mancini's theme song for The Pink Panther became so famous, it was a top 10 Billboard chart hit and was nominated for Best Pop Instrumental Performance at the Grammys. The tenor saxophone and smooth jazz composition in the theme song are widely recognizable, even if people haven't seen the original film or any of the ten others in the franchise. The movie, directed by Blake Edwards, stars David Niven as a jewel thief trying to steal The Pink Panther diamond with Peter Sellers' Inspector Clouseau hot on his trail.
The comedy was a massive hit, as was Mancini's score. The soundtrack album reached No. 8 on the Billboard pop album charts. The soundtrack offers pleasant jazz and lounge vibes while heightening during some of the film's sillier chase moments. Despite its worldwide fame, it lost the Best Music Score - Substantially Original Oscar to the Sherman Brothers for Mary Poppins.
5 'Planet of the Apes' (1968)
Planet of the Apes grabbed America's attention, just as writer Rod Serling's hit TV series The Twilight Zone had. One of the most well-known science fiction films of its time, the movie featured Charlton Heston as part of an astronaut crew in the distant future that crash lands on a planet where apes are the dominant species and humans live as lesser beings. The movie made $33M at the box office, besting its production budget times six.
The score was done by Jerry Goldsmith, who tapped into the uneasiness audiences felt seeing themselves as second fiddle on screen by portraying primitive and unsettling sounds. He and his orchestra experimented with unique instruments, such as steel mixing trays, horns without mouthpieces, and oddly tuned pianos to create an alien-like soundtrack. The score matches the scenes well, going from spooky to fast-paced to tension and silence. It lost the Best Original Score for a Motion Picture (Not a Musical) Academy Award to John Barry's The Lion in Winter score.
4 'Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone' (2001)
The first notes of Hedwig's Theme have become some of the most recognized introductory notes worldwide. John Williams' score for Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone breathed life into the global phenomenon like nothing before. Williams is no stranger to iconic theme songs, having created some of the best-known themes in cinema history, ranging from Star Wars to Jaws to Jurassic Park and E.T. The main theme for the Harry Potter franchise ranks up there with his best.
The sprawling orchestral score for the franchise's first film features leitmotifs of character-specific themes, a staple of Williams. It is heavy on crescendos and big, bold movements, playing up the royalty and mysticism of the wizard world. The score also features the widely recognizable Harry's Wondrous World, which helps listeners understand more about this special boy than he even knows about himself at the point in the movie when it comes in. Williams has won five Academy Awards on 54 nominations, but Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone lost its chance for an Oscar to Howard Shore's score for The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring.
3 'Interstellar' (2014)
2014 was an incredible year for movie scores. The Theory of Everything, The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Imitation Game (also by Alexandre Desplat), Mr. Turner (Gary Yershon), and Interstellar were all nominated for Best Original Score. Interstellar's score was composed by Hans Zimmer, once again working with Christopher Nolan. The film stars Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Casey Affleck, and Michael Caine, and is about a group of astronauts who travel through a wormhole to look for a new home for Earth's inhabitants.
Nolan didn't tell Zimmer what the film was about, other than saying it was about a father leaving his child behind to go to work. What makes the score so unique and one that resonates so much with audiences is its use of the organ, specifically the 1926 four-manual Harrison & Harrison organ in the Temple Church in London. Zimmer used that as the primary instrument in the score, blending organ music with strings throughout to create a haunting effect. The passing of time is represented by ticking in the score, blending the music and the story. It has become one of the most used themes to underscore social media videos in recent years, and organ performances of the score across the world have resulted in packed churches.
2 'Gone with the Wind' (1939)
Max Steiner's score for Gone with the Wind was one of the longest ones he ever worked on. Coming in at over two and a half hours, there was a lot that needed to be packed into the epic romance film. But one thing that he didn't include was a love theme for the two main stars, Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable. The sweeping historical drama is one of the most famous films of all time and for good reason, leaning in no small part on Steiner's music for it.
The film is set during the Civil War and takes place in the American South with Leigh's Scarlett O'Hara, the daughter of a Georgia plantation owner, looking for love before finding it in the form of Gable's Rhett Butler. Steiner's score is bombastic and loud, portraying patriotic themes and drawing on Americana and songs from that era. The theme song most well-known from the movie is about the plantation the movie is mainly set on. Five orchestrators helped with the score, and the highs and lows of O'Hara's life portrayed on screen are mirrored with the lulls and crashes of the music. It lost the Best Original Score Oscar to The Wizard of Oz's score by Herbert Stothart.
1 'Psycho' (1960)
Bernard Herrmann's score for Psycho matched the budget for the film. Another work with Alfred Hitchcock, the movie had a lower budget than other movies that the two had collaborated on. Because of this, Herrmann made the decision to only write for a string orchestra rather than a full orchestra suite for the score. What was created is one of the most eerie and suspenseful musical scores ever.
Starring Janet Leigh and Anthony Perkins, the movie follows a woman who has a chance encounter with a motel owner and the aftermath of that meeting. The horror film was a box office smash, and audiences fell in love with the dread and suspense built up by the score. The entire score builds up the tension, even in moments that don't seem tense. The most iconic scene is a blitz of strings, filling the audience with shock and dread. Hitchcock raved about Herrmann's score, and fans have highlighted it as arguably the aspect that makes the movie. Amazingly, the movie was not nominated for an Oscar for its score.
Your Rating close 10 stars 9 stars 8 stars 7 stars 6 stars 5 stars 4 stars 3 stars 2 stars 1 star Rate Now 0/10 Like Follow Followed Psycho R Horror Mystery Thriller 9.0/10 Release Date September 8, 1960 Runtime 109 minutes Director Alfred Hitchcock Writers Joseph Stefano, Robert Bloch Sequel(s) Psycho 2 Cast See All Janet Leigh Martin Balsam
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