GREATEST MOVIE SONGS
High Society. Many good songs
What is a Great Movie Song?
You’re watching a film. A song comes on the soundtrack - either heard or sung. And it’s memorable. And perfect. And right for the film, the time and the place. Might not be your favourite song but there - in the moment, watching the film - it is.
Here is my list of the greatest film songs:
Isn’t This a Lovely Day - Top Hat
Sometimes - Lost in Translation
Get Back - Let it Be
You’re Sensational - High Society
Bela Lugosi’s Dead - The Hunger
Sweet Transvestite - The Rocky Horror Picture Show
There She Goes - The Parent Trap
As Time Goes By - Casablanca
The Hills Are Alive - The Sound of Music
Theme from Laura - Laura
Now, let’s get into this list and why. It’s all subjective of course!
Isn’t this a Lovely Day (Top Hat) - 1935
“The weather is frightening. The thunder and lightening seem to be having their way…”
If there’s a better song, I don’t know it. There’s probably not a day that passes where I don’t sing a couple of bars from this Irving Berlin classic. I even have the movie poster hanging in my bedroom. In the film, Fred and Ginger are caught in a rainstorm and take refuge in a bandstand. As they sing and dance to this clever song, the rain outside pours. Their little shelter becomes a cocoon of flirtation, courtship and a growing new love. To a great melody. We probably all wish for or remember instances like this. They weren’t complicated, Hollywood musicals of the 30’s. They went to the point. And what a lovely - make believe - world that was.
Sometimes, My Bloody Valentine - Lost in Translation 2001
Top five favourite movie. What’s not to like? Bill Murray. Bill Murray singing ‘More than This’ in a Japanese karaoke bar. Scarlett Johansson. Yes, Scarlett. A chaste romantic film. Clever. Laid back. The whirlwind of romance away from home. They go out with her friends. A club. A chase. A party. A karaoke bar. They drink and smoke and then get a taxi home. The early morning ennui following a night out. Dozy. Comfortable. With someone special. And this song plays. A surprisingly tender tune for a song with cranked up guitars. It floats along with the hazy reality of a blissful 3am with a girl. In a taxi. On the way back.
Get Back, The Beatles with Billy Preston - Let it Be (1970)
Not the single. The final song from the movie.
The Beatles going down fighting. A cold January in 1969. The Beatles are nearly broken up and somewhat lethargic about their latest album. They decide to play one last impromptu concert on the roof of their building because they can’t be arsed going anywhere or organising anything else. So they play their latest songs across London to the unsuspecting office workers. The police get called after half an hour bringing this rooftop concert to an end. But there’s one more song. Get Back. John and George’s amp gets turned off after the first verse. And then ‘fuck it’ they switch it back on and their guitars come back with added urgency. This is it. The last song ever played live by the greatest group ever. It’s scrappy, it’s raw but it’s the fucking Beatles man. Iconic.
You’re Sensational, Frank Sinatra - High Society (1956)
“I’ve no proof. When people say, “You’re more or less aloof.”
Ah, Cole Porter… What a song writer. Famously, he wrote both the music and the witty and intelligent lyrics to his songs. High Society is one of my happy places. Happy memories of the family watching a good movie back in the 70’s. Of course, I like The Philadelphia Story too, but I grew up with the colour, musical version. From Louis Armstrong kicking it off on the bus, the hip jazz lingo, Bing Crosby being Bing, right through to the loveliness that was Grace Kelly. It’s a classic movie with a ‘sensational’ score. So many great moments; Bing and Grace harmonising on ‘True Love’, “now that’s jazz”, Frank and Bing duetting drunk, the French farce breakfast outside on the patio. And the effortless class of ‘You’re Sensational’. I know I say it lot, but hardly a day goes by without my singing or humming the opening lines quoted above.
Bela Lugosi’s Dead, The Hunger (1983)
This is the classic opening for Tony Scott’s stylistic vampire movie The Hunger. The music is strange, other worldly and the perfect accompaniment to an unsettling, hip nightclub where Catherine Deneuve and David Bowie go out a’hunting for victims. Long coats, shades, cigarettes; the foundations of Goth are right there up on screen. Of course, in real life, Goths were just smelly losers in bad clothes and worse make-up hiding their acne. But in their mind, they were Peter Murphy, the chisel cheeked lead singer of Bauhaus who dominates this first scene from behind the bars of a cage (see below). Right song. Right movie. Well framed and shot. Hence, on the list!
Sweet Transvestite, Tim Curry - Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)
Cracking song in one weird musical. Great was the day I found this movie. Suddenly everyone in sixth form was a sweet transvestite as both an insult, a compliment and - at the Christmas disco - a costume. I liked this song so much, I got my group in the 90’s to learn it and we’d chuck it in every now and then to get the crowd going. Or to stop them going. Whatever. At our final gig, at the Hare and Hounds in Brighton in early 1996, this was the last song we ever played. Pissed. Out of tune. Camping it up. And then I pulled a strop and sacked the band and went solo. There’s a metaphor in there somewhere. Good song though.
There She Goes, The La’s - The Parent Trap (1998)
One of the greats. Of course this song stands on its own. Lee Mavers’ beautiful, beautiful indie twinkling guitar ditty packs three minutes of audio gold. And here, in a mainstream kids movie, it’s framed perfectly. As Lynsay Lohan’s American twin is driven around London - in a vintage Rolls Royce of course - images of London flash by as There She Goes blasts out. The two go together like an American travel agent’s perfect ad of quirky, historical, sunny London. With a iconic soundtrack. The 90’s were always like this. Editor’s pedantic note: The song came out in the 80’s.
As Time Goes By, Dooley Wilson - Casablanca (1943)
Yeah, I know. A bit route one. Too obvious. What’s your favourite band? The Beatles. Favourite piece of classic music? Beethoven’s Fifth. Favourite movie song? As Time Goes By, Casablanca. They’re culturally ubiquitous for a reason, no? They’re the Stairways to Heaven of their field. Same here. I’ve tried to give a wide range of movie songs in this piece but - hey! - indulge me one indulgence. Dooley Wilson’s classic (If she can stand it, I can. Play it!) has to be on any list. Great movie? Tick. Iconic movie stars? Double Tick (Ingrid Bergman. Wow!). And a song for the ages totally appropriate to the scene, the movie and forever.
The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music, Julie Andrews - The Sound of Music (1965)
I went with Julie running around the Austrian Alps singing about mountains. And music. What makes it so special though, apart from the song, of course, is the vertiginous helicopter shots, the gradual build up before Julie finally comes into view. It is a triumph of movies both musically and cinematographically. Once seen, never forgot. Job done. The song’s not bad either!
Theme From Laura (1944)- David Raskin
Film noir, a missing girl, an obsessed detective and suspenseful but melodic music powered by lush strings. And so appropriate. Some say the film reveals itself too soon but frankly, the more Gene Tierney the better. There’s something about those 40’s detective movies and the marriage they contracted with the music which compounds the constituent parts. The music from Laura had a long afterlife, of course. Sinatra does a great version which often appears on my playlists. But my favourite? Julie London’s understated version. But, great song apart, watch the movie and marvel at the orchestral score.
There’s More?
Yes, lots. How about The Worst Beatles Tracks? How about the Greatest Movies of the 1970’s. Or maybe curate your own experience from my features page and find more nuggets than a KFC fan-fest.
