Recently I watched Peter Strickland’s artsy lesbian lover drama The Duke of Burgundy. What was notable, besides the content and the imagery, was the soundtrack by Cat’s Eyes. The opening credits to the film provide a pretty good idea of what the movie’s music is like, and if you were wondering, I do think it is quite good.
That got me thinking. Movies have committed composers that work expressly to make music for movies, like Hans Zimmer, James Horner, or Alexandre Desplat, to name a few (I didn’t even mention John Williams or Bernard Herrman, or Ennio Morricone). These guys are all talented people. But why is it that certain films have music from bands that don’t normally work in music?
Here’s an example: a favorite of mine, Blue Valentine, has a soundtrack mostly compromised of Grizzly Bear instrumentals from Yellow House and Veckatimest. The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby had music from Sun Luxe. Mica Levi did Under the Skin. PT Anderson has a working relationship with Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood, and J.C. Chandor has one with Edward Sharp and the Magnetic Zeroes’ Alex Ebert. Even Pink Floyd worked with Antonioni for Zabriskie Point.
What’s the correlation? A lot of bands work with independent film, it seems, and a lot of studio films cycle between many of the same composers (of course there are outliers, like Zabriskie Point and Daft Punk for Tron: Legacy). No one is better than the other; both styles share highs and lows. It also seems to be commonplace for some movies to have an original song made for the picture, like Rihanna’s work for the disposable Home, or John Legend and Common’s work for the important Selma.
Personally, my favorite film soundtracks include Bernard Herrman’s score for Hitchcock’s Vertigo and Psycho, and for Scorsese’s Taxi Driver. There’s also Morriconne for Once Upon a Time in America, and of course John Williams for Star Wars and Indiana Jones. Recently, I loved Grizzly Bear’s work with Cianfrance for Blue Valentine, and Jonny Greenwood’s for Paul Thomas Anderson’s last three efforts.
It seems that all the movies I listed in the paragraph above seem be great movies. That is no coincidence. A great score/soundtrack is vital in the making of a great film. And many of the all-time greats have a great soundtrack that certainly assist in making them so memorable. So next time you watch a movie, keep your eyes and ears open.
Wu Chainz 