In honor of the Academy Awards and the inevitable Best Director win for Martin Scorsese (if he doesn't win I'm not watching a movie ever again), I've complied this list of current directors who best utilize source music and who create eclectic soundtracks.
5. Michael Mann: He was the filmmaker who ushered in the then new MTV aesthetic to network television with Miami Vice. He then made the first Hannibal Lecter film, Manhunter, which has one of the best climaxes, where the killer is being hunted down to Iron Butterfly's "In A Gadda Da Vida." What a good director and movie soundtrack will do is reinvent a song or make you hear it in a new light. He utilized Moby's cover of Joy Division's "New Dawn Fades" for Heat, ended The Insider with Massive Attack's "Safe From Harm," set a major action scene in Collateral with Paul Oakenfold's "Ready Steady Go" and recently, in Miami Vice, started the movie with Jay-Z/Linkin Park's "Encore."
4. Danny Boyle: We can all agree that Trainspotting has one of the best soundtracks ever. It defined the 90s Cool Britannica sound. It's a Who's Who of Brit Pop. The ending with Underworld's "Born Slippy" remix is iconic. Since then, he hasn't made a film of that caliber. Even when he failed with A Life Less Ordinary or The Beach, the use of music is stellar. He's redeemed himself with Millions (with a memorable montage to The Clash's "Hitsville U.K."). I'm curious about his new sci-fi adventure, Sunshine, and if it will have a kick-ass soundtrack.
3. Wes Anderson: With Anderson's films, the script and the songs go hand and hand. I'm kind of partial to The Life Aquatic with the Portuguese versions of David Bowie songs. Let's not forget that electric moog score by Devo's Mark Mothersbaugh, who scores all his films. He's partial to classic 60s British rock, like The Who, Creation and The Kinks in Rushmore and The Beatles in The Royal Tenebaums.
2. Quentin Tarantino: His soundtracks take on a life of their own. Everyone of the tracks get rediscovered and used in other movies and commercials. Furthermore, they get remixed and sampled by rap and techno artists. Like when Tarantino casts forgotten actors, he picks songs that are long forgotten. "Stuck in the Middle," "Jungle Fever" "Across a 110th St." and "Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down" -- the list go on. I'm seriously jonsing to see what he has up his sleeves for Death Proof.
1. Martin Scorsese: The Departed, Goodfelles, Casino, Mean Streets, Raging Bull or Taxi Driver. Enough said. Which one has the best? For me, it's his most underrated film, Casino. It's wall-to-wall music from old standards to funk to jazz to disco to glam rock, it gave a three-hour film a constant rhythm. The Departed would be second on that list, even though he returns to that Rolling Stone's well again.
Honorable mentions: Spike Lee, Paul Thomas Anderson, Richard Linkletter, Cameron Crowe and Oliver Stone.
For Danny Boyle - Eventhough it had no commercial songs on it, the soundtrack to 28 Days Later is pretty awesome.
Posted by: Bianca | February 16, 2007 at 02:09 PM