Bad movies made better by good film music

Wow, that´s true, how can one forget that interview. I think Horner was honest to the bone (or he didn´t want to talk to Yared anymore).

Besides, composers never know really; a director can direct a crappy film, but who says his next project won´t be THE film? If that´s the case, the composer will love to work for him again.
So, as you say, the thing is being the more professional possible, do the job and wait for the next call.

To me the movie is mega-crap; but i didn't appreciate the score way more either.



Although i haven't personally seen it yet, from what i gather from people's input, this actually can't be said 'cause there is little to very minimal use of the music in the film, despite the excellent score album they've put together.




Agree. I'd rephrase to: brilliant score for a crap movie

I don't think a bad film can be made good just because of the music. To me, a good film is one which excels in all technical and narrative aspects and therefore I don't feel that the music can save one. However if this is just a case of "bad film / good music" then...

LADY IN THE WATER
WYATT EARP
THE POSTMAN
WATERWORLD

I'll add more when I think of them.

That is so true, LOL!!

Exactly. I can't even remember how many shitty movies i went through just because i loved the score. And as for a good score making the movie better, i strongly disagree that it actually can't happen. Maybe the key-phrase is the "making it better" one here but if you think of the musical score as a very strong technical and aesthetic aspect of the movie, then it CAN have a huge impact on the overall quality of the movie and of course it CAN enhance it; just like good direction or good photography would enhance it in a similar way. Do you actually disagree with that?

Starship Troopers is BRILLIANT!

I actually agree with Demetris - a score can never really improve the film, it can only improve the chances of you seeing it.

Actually, you can force yourself to look at the whole instead of just the story, character dialogue and background music separately. I do this with all my watching. At the end, if a movie sucked its because I hated most or all aspects of the movie. If there is one redeeming quality in the movie, that can make the overall experience more watchable. That's true for me at least.

I just sat through the drivel called Ultraviolet... Not exactly engaging sci-fi film with horrible effects and flat one-dimensional characters, however the look of it all is great, I don't know how they created that soft saturated look, colors look phenominal in this movie. And I quite liked Klaus Badelt's score as well. Didn't expect to really, but there were some cool moments. So there you have two good elements against many bad ones, it makes the movie just a little less awful, I would have turned it off after twenty minutes if not for these elements... But I do not intend to see it again.

So in the end it all depends on the person and his personal ideas of how movies should be interpreted. Film music fans will definitely take the music into account, everybody else will just ignore it completely when evaluating what they just saw.

Photography, visual effects, acting, music, etc can indeed make a film more watchable but if most of these boxes aren't ticked where necessary or if they don't compliment each other very well, it isn't a good movie in my books. So it does make sense that music can improve a movie but not to the extent where it becomes good. That's all I was trying to say.

It is a difficult argument because, personally, I like all the elements in a film to work together to provide the overall experience. Great acting to convince, beautiful photography at which to gaze, a story to provoke and of course a suitable musical accompaniment. It's also amazing how much better the music can be when the other boxes are ticked.

Yeah I'm really confusing myself over this. Unnecessarily.



Let's just get some more examples...

Well there is one example of a film I absolutely hate and the music still did nothing to enhance the experience. I do love the scores by themselves though.

Agree with you there, too. Great satire on the war film and a simple tongue-in-cheek action film.

-Erik-

I think the question is not such whether music can make a bad film good, but what proportion of a film's success comes from its music. I would count THE RED VIOLIN as an average film, a bit silly in some respects, but if you are keyed into Corigliano's score, it's absolutely riveting. That score goes a long way towards bestowing some sense of conviction and timelessness on an otherwise unremarkable piece.

And I think STARSHIP TROOPERS is great too. I love that the actors hardly seem to be in on it, particularly the younger ones.