One of the most important elements in a movie in my opinion is the score. The use of music, especially when it is an original soundtrack of songs made by one or two composers specifically for that movie, is instrumental in creating what film auteurs like to call atmosphere. In other words what kind of tone does the filmmaker and team want to create? Is it a cheerful tone? An eerie one? Sensual? Lonely? What about fear or rage? Movies are meant to take the audience, emotionally and psychologically, into their world and its tone is the chief engager of this process…which makes a film’s music choice vital.
Johnny Greenwood, Hans Zimmer, Alexandre Desplat and Thomas Newman are among the best music composers around. This past year had a number of fantastic films that featured great directing, editing, and acting. The music had to match this excellence and it did. Unfortunately, Mica Levi (Under the Skin), Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross (Gone Girl), and SQURL & Josef Van Wissem (Only Lovers Left Alive) all got snubbed from this years Academy Awards. All of tonight’s nominees are worthy but I believe that three of the best film scores from 2014 are missing. The music from these movies completely created an atmosphere that took me into these fictionalized worlds.
I’ve chosen a track from the three movies (Gone Girl, Under the Skin, and Only Lovers Left Alive) that should have gotten Oscar nominations for their original motion picture soundtracks. Check all these movies out ON DVD/ON DEMAND.
