While talking with my sister recently, I found out my nephew loves the movie "Curious George", which is great because I do too. It also turns out his favorite part of George's adventure is the soundtrack which is a compilation of Jack Johnson songs that set his two-year-old legs to dancing and jumping around the house.
Thinking of this I can't help but smile or think of how important background music can be in movies. It sets a mood or can foreshadow and sometimes it just sounds great. So in honor of my nephew and his love of a good soundtrack, here are my five favorite movie soundtracks.
5. Drowning Mona First off, if you haven't seen this gem featuring Bette Midler and Danny Devito, remedy that post haste. The soundtrack is brilliant featuring a few hits by Three Dog Night, Mungo Jerry and even the Popcorn song. It's just a nice group of summer-feeling songs that tie the movie together nicely.
4. The Sopranos I know this isn't a movie, but the soundtrack accompanying this show make it possibly the greatest series ever. Just to add some scope, there are books just about the music chosen for this show. I'm not aware of any other soundtracks that have gotten that much attention, so this deserves a nod.
3. Fight Club The Fight Club soundtrack is almost exclusively done by the Dust Brothers who musically capture the murky, messed up world that director David Fincher creates. They do a great job of capturing the mood of a man fed up with a materialistic world. It's a gritty setting that requires an equally-gritty soundtrack, and the Dust Brothers deliver. Besides, I don't think Tyler Durden would listen to corporate rock.
2. The Departed The movie that finally won Scorcese an Oscar also has one of the greatest soundtracks I've ever heard, accompanied by some very interesting sound mixing in the film itself. This soundtrack features songs from The Rolling Stones and a Van Morrison remake of the Pink Floyd classic, "Comfortably Numb". But the song that gives "The Departed" its edge is "Shipping Up to Boston" by The Dropkick Murphys. It lends the old-school Irish roughneck feeling perfectly to a movie about the Irish mob in current-day Boston. "The Departed" was a fantastic movie, and the soundtrack really helps push it along and keep the mood right where it should be.
1. The Royal Tenenbaums This was a really tough choice for me between "The Royal Tenenbaums" and "Rushmore" soundtracks. Both films were by Wes Anderson, and they both have such fantastic music accompanying the stories. I think Anderson may be the best current film-maker at creating a musical score. He is incredibly talented at knowing what songs will perfectly compliment his characters and the points in the story ("Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard in Tenenbaums or "Ooh La La" at the end of "Rushmore" for example). But what eventually made the scales tip in Tenenbaums' favor was partially that it's my favorite Anderson movie and it's also where I first heard the musician, Elliott Smith. I sometimes watch this movie simply to hear the soundtrack and enjoy the musical choices that go along with the Tenenbaum clan.
Well, there it is. Friends of mine will probably notice some of my favorite movies are well-represented here. There's a reason for that and now you know part of it. There are a lot of great soundtracks out there and I couldn't or wouldn't mention all of them right now such as the obvious (Star Wars) or ones I haven't liked since I was ten (Men In Black).
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