John Williams Tagged Articles at Cinematical

This month is all about villains on Cinematical, and thankfully, October seems flush with folks who fit the bill: horror movies, often released in anticipation (if not exploitation) of Halloween, usually offer at least one person, creature or entity that qualifies as an adversary to be fled from or feared. But the sad truth is that not a whole lot of them have particularly great theme music, which brings us to this week's Cinematical Seven.

To be fair, these folks don't often have the luxury of choosing said music themselves, so if they get a crappy rock song or some kind of dumbass lullabye, it's not their fault. But after revisiting a number of classic horror series and the movie monsters they immortalized, we've put together what we think is a pretty good collection of themes that folks can and will still find scary. (And while some of this music may or may not be specifically associated with the individual character or creature, the guideline to which we held ourselves was the association of the music with that particular monster.)

Suffice it to say there are a number of other great horror movie themes, and we're just scratching the surface with a list of seven, but check our list of some of the most famous, memorable, and yeah, terrifying, with or without some dude in a mask bearing down on the bathroom door where you've found temporary safe haven.

Like any film fan, I love soundtracks. When I was a young teen, I bought nothing but film soundtracks because I thought it was cooler than buying popular music. I wasn't discriminating, and bought soundtracks whenever I had enjoyed a film or a bit of flute music that played. This resulted in my owning a few appalling choices like The Man in the Iron Mask, but hey, we've all bought embarrassing albums.

But over the years, I have found that some really lovely pieces of music have been wasted on middling films. I thought I'd list a few of them here so they receive a small moment of recognition -- and in order that you'll share a few lost themes with me. Or you can just chide me for liking really obvious, sweeping pieces.

If there's a piece that defines what I'm talking about, it's probably that oft-used theme to DragonHeart -- the film wasn't great, the piece might even be a little cheesy, but it gets used for every trailer with mountains or a sword in it. I think they even played it at President Obama's Inauguration:

Okay, there are bad trailers, and then there are unbelievably horrific trailers. Surfing around today, I spotted the original Star Wars trailer (according to those who posted it) from 1977 over on YouTube. This ... thing -- featuring one of the longest, most drawn-out voiceovers in history -- is a piece of work to say the least. I was practically left speechless after watching it, and that rarely happens. Not only does it stay away from John Williams' classic score, but the material featured in the voiceover sounds like it was written by a 10 year-old trying to convince his teacher that he read a book when, in reality, he lost it on the bus. I mean, do lines like, "A story about a boy, a girl and a universe" make any sense whatsoever?

Granted, we're going all the way back to 1977 here (the year I was born), but you're telling me this was the best that 20th Century Fox could come up with at the time? "A big, sprawling space saga of rebellion and romance?" Seriously? "It's an epic of heroes, and villains, and aliens from a thousand worlds?" What does that even mean? Who came up with this stuff? I have to say, if this is what they were using to get people into theaters, I'm surprised Star Wars went on to sell any tickets at all, let alone go down as one of the greatest movies in history. Nevertheless, these old, grimy trailers are fun to watch ... if only to compare them to the trailers playing today. My, how far we've come in thirty years ...

[via Movie City Views]

Okay, so far I'm not doing so well with my picks. I've lost three straight, but I feel a surge coming on. I swear, I feel it. The musical score awards are always so hard to predict. John Williams picks it up here for Memoirs of a Geisha. Good score, but I loved the one from Brokeback Mountain. Sorry, they got robbed here. How about we always give it to Williams and just skip this award next year?

However, Best Original Song goes to Brokeback Mountain. I picked that one baby! I'm back in this one. Hey, and we get a dedication to Martin Luther King Jr. Would King have liked Brokeback Mountain if he were alive today? I want you to ponder that one while we go to break...