PROFESSOR'S PICKS: 7 Best Songs Written for (Non-Musical) Film

This being a blog about film, I generally keep my observations focused on movies, but today we're going to expand the menu just a little.

Most of the stuff I write here, I write with some film music playing in the background, usually a film score or a Broadway cast recording (right now I'm on a bit of a Raul Esparza kick, everyone deserves to hear his rendition of "Come to Your Senses" from this year's Miscast concert). I've been doing this for a while, yet I only recently had the idea to actually write about some of the songs that inform my writing process. The songs I can never get out of my head.

To keep things mostly on-brand, I'm going to be writing about music that features in films, preferably songs written for their respective movies. Just to make things interesting (and to keep the door open for a future installment ... maybe) I'm choosing to restrict the songs listed here to those written for non-musical films, and I'm choosing to define "musicals" as films that have spontaneous singing within the narrative. So for the intents of this piece, I'm not counting movies like "A Star is Born" as musicals.

We'll start with probably the most famous track on this list.

1. "My Heart Will Go On" - Titanic

This song famously plays over the end credits over James Cameron's Titanic, an epic love story set against the backdrop of the tragic sinking of the RMS Titanic. Like the film it crowns, the song strikes emotions that are both powerful and tender. Like most anything that reaches popular terminal velocity, the song's legacy has been somewhat sullied by the parody that inevitably follows overexposure. Just so, anytime I can get myself to look past the zeitgeist and see the song itself, I can't help but be blown away by the song's power.

Most of the parties involved were hesitant about making the song to begin with. Cameron himself couldn't imagine playing a song over the credits of such an emotionally harrowing film. "Could you imagine a pop song during the credits for Schindler's List?" But James Horner wrote the song in secret with Will Jennings providing the lyrics. Even performer Celine Dion took some convincing, as she didn't want to be known for only singing movie theme songs. Horner reportedly hid the demo from Cameron until he was sure the notoriously volatile filmmaker was in a good mood, and the rest is history. For a song that nobody wanted to make, it's hard to imagine an ending to the film that doesn't immediately sweep us into the embrace of the song's heavenly opening notes.

2. "Halfway Home" - The Earthling

This lesser-known gem of Australian cinema sees William Holden playing a loner, Patrick Foley, afflicted with terminal cancer. Hoping to live out the last of his days in peaceful solitude, he disappears into the wilderness of the Australian outback. But this plan is complicated when a husband and wife vacationing in the outback tumble from a cliff, leaving their young son, Sean, stranded in the outback. Suddenly, Foley is Sean's only chance for survival. Against his nature, Foley takes the kid under his wing. In opening his heart, Foley discovers something he hadn't known in a long time: love.

I'm deliberately showcasing this song directly after "My Heart Will Go On." We have libraries full of romantic ballads, and female friendship has "Wind Beneath My Wings." Where are the songs that give space for the love that two men can have for one another? You can probably find them if you dig (I mean ... there's the completely incidental "If I Didn't Have You" from Monsters Inc), but there aren't nearly as many to go around.

3. "You Are What Love Means to Me" - Tender Mercies

The film follows Robert Duvall playing a former country singer, Mac Sledge, trying to piece his life back together after alcoholism has ruined both his career and his marriage. Mac finds love again with a widow named Rosa Lee and her young son. Despite Mac's transformation, the film almost ends on a sad note. Even after putting his life back together, Mac's daughter from his first marriage, with whom he was just starting to mend a relationship, is killed in a car accident.

After a devastating funeral, Mac confesses to his Rosa Lee that he "doesn't trust happiness." After all, finding love with her and her son didn't stop him from losing his daughter. Mac's inability to ascribe meaning to his life or suffering becomes his last word in the film. In some ways, the film is nicer for not trying to dismiss Mac's pain or confusion with some Oscar-winning dialogue.

Just so, it does offer the viewer something of an answer. The film ends with Mac playing ball with his stepson out in the field. Rosa Lee watches the scene unfold from the kitchen window, a voyeur to her own paradise. All the while, this song plays in the background. We see peace and happiness passing through Mac, even if he doesn't "believe" in it.

4. "Into the West" - The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King

The Lord of the Rings is one of the most epic adventure sagas in film, and yet it's strangely fitting to end the series with what I can only describe as an epic lullaby.

This is one of those songs where it works from a number of different perspectives. Maybe this is Gandalf's message to Frodo as they sail off. Maybe this is Frodo's final admonition to Sam before he says goodbye forever. (Seriously, Frodo. What a jerk move!) Or maybe the song is for us, the audience. Maybe these characters are collectively easing us back into the world offscreen with the soothing tones of a lullaby, as though this world of magic and brotherhood is the waking world, and the world off-screen the dream.

5. "The Call" - The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian

I heard this song when I saw the movie in theaters in the waning days of my own youth, and it's only from this side of adulthood that I can appreciate how this song describes maturation.

It's sometimes easier to imagine that childhood is divided from everything that comes after by a large brick wall. Once you've made the jump, the past is a forgotten land. I've come to realize that identity doesn't work that way. Maturity doesn't work that way. The transition is gradual and quiet. If there is a single moment where any of us become adults, it's not a moment most of us can discern. Because of that, we take the jump for granted. It isn't until we're far into the country of adulthood that we realize what we've lost.

I feel like with most media surrounding the passage from childhood to adulthood, there's an impulse to implore the audience to never lose sight of childlike zest for life. This song doesn't do that. This song gives childhood its due credit. Maybe childhood outlasts our own ability to screw it up or neglect it. The song assures us that the part of us we leave behind in childhood is never really out of reach. And when we're ready to give it place in our adult existence, it all comes back to us. No need to say goodbye.

I'm not wise enough to say for certain if this is actually how growing up works, but it's certainly a more novel perspective.

6. "Stand Up" - Harriet

In addition to playing the title character in the 2019 Harriet Tubman biopic, British singer and actress Cynthia Erivo wrote and performed the film's end credits number, Stand Up. We can look forward to seeing Erivo as Elphaba in the upcoming film adaptations of Wicked (as well as the Blue Fairy in Disney's Pinocchio remake.)

The song is a rousing power anthem, and Erivo carries the song with such force. The live performance at the Oscars was my favorite performance of the evening. (And this was the same ceremony that featured a legion of Elsas singing "Into the Unknown.")

7. "Moon River" - Breakfast at Tiffany's

Audrey Hepburn reportedly fought tooth and nail to keep this song in the film when executives wanted to drop it, and the world is better off for it. The song's haunting melody and poetic lyrics make it my favorite song on this list.

The film follows the blossoming romance between eccentric call-girl, Holly Golightly, and the soft-spoken aspiring author, Paul Varjak. Holly spends the entire film hiding behind her extravagance, flaunting her free spirit in a desperate attempt to convince herself and her world that she isn't bound to anything or anyone, no matter how much she wishes she could belong with Paul.

"Moon River" captures this paradox within Holly. The song speaks to a yearning for liberation and escape, yet through its inescapable romanticness, the song confesses an even deeper longing. The desire to flow down Moon River with someone you love.

_________

In film, good songs supplement the stories in which they are told while also carrying a life of their own. In some cases, a memorable song can help guide viewers to a new favorite movie--I was listening to "My Heart Will Go On" years before I was allowed to watch Titanic.

There are obviously many more worthy songs than I can write about here. Goodness, there are many more songs than I'll ever have the capacity to discover. But let this tribute suffice for a moment.

--The Professor

Honorable Mentions

"You'll Be in My Heart" - Tarzan

"Fall On Me" - The Nutcracker and the Four Realms

"Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head" - Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

"I'm Still Here" - Treasure Planet

"Falling Slowly" - Once

"Never Forget" - Murder on the Orient Express

"Is That Alright?" - A Star is Born

"I See You" - Avatar

Comments

Toy Story 4: Pixar's Tribute to Regression

It was about this time last year that I came across the one person who actually hated Toy Story 3 . I was reading Jason Sperb’s book “Flickers of Film: Nostalgia in the Age of Digital Cinema” as part of my research for my essay on Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Pokemon: Detective Pikachu . It was in one of his chapters on the Pixar phenomenon that he shared his observation from the ending of Toy Story 3 , essentially casting the film as this nostalgia mousetrap for adults: “ If Andy lets go of his childhood nostalgia and moves on, then Toy Story fans don’t really have to , as the narrative recognition in the potential value in such an act is sufficient. Actually moving on becomes indefinitely deferred in an endless cycle of consumption (rewatching the movies, purchasing new versions of the movie, purchasing more and more Toy Story-related merchandise, rewatching them yet again with the next generat...

REVIEW: HOPPERS

In the 1950s under the threat of nuclear warfare, Hollywood premiered such exercises as The Day the Earth Stood Still or War of the Worlds where an alien power would pass judgment on humankind, holding its fate in its hands. Here in the 2020s under the shadow of such threats as climate change, Hollywood sends to be our judge ... beavers. Let me back up ... Daniel Chong's new film from Pixar Animation, Hoppers , sees Mabel (Piper Curda), a college student whose self-appointed mission is to preserve the glade where she used to find sanctuary with her now deceased grandmother. Her biggest opponent is hometown boy and beloved mayor, Jerry (Jon Hamm), who has designs to plow over the glade in order to open his new freeway--estimated to save travelers four whole minutes of commuting. Mabel gets her golden opportunity when she uncovers secret technology pioneered by her professor which allows a human to rem...

REVIEW: Disclosure Day

Maybe it was self-control that compelled Spielberg to build his whole movie around aliens but give the aliens themselves as little screentime as possible. (Or, for all I know, he did it on a dare.) But this is only one of the risks taken by his latest film. This first encounter picture is distanced from something like Independence Day and more toward something like 2001: A Space Odyssey --and it's even closer to something like Arrival . The film sees a cyber-security worker, Daniel Kilner (Josh O'Connor) who defects with the intent to reveal what he knows to the world: the government has had repeated, secret encounters with extraterrestrial life. He has a team of underground sympathizers, lead by Hugo Wakefield (Colmon Domingo), but he also has agent Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth) out to stop the truth at any cost. Kilner's only chance getting the truth out there is in joining up with Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt), a newscast personali...

(Almost) A Love Letter to the "Percy Jackson" Movies

Maybe it's just living through a pandemic-stained world rife where each election feels like a last-ditch effort to rescue liberty from the oblivion, but I'm sometimes nostalgic for the days when the most traumatic thing in my life was a poor adaptation of a favorite book. My generation will remember the film adaptation of the popular YA fantasy book Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan with something like embarrassment, if not outright lividity. The book follows a young teen, Percy Jackson, who discovers that the gods of ancient Greece not only exist, but also sire modern day heroes. As a child of one of these gods, Percy is continually drawn into their Olympian-sized conflicts wherein he gets to prove himself every bit as much a hero as Hercules. Each installment of the five-book series reads like a theme-park ride through Greek mythology as the teens travel across the country battling ancient m...

Some Much Needed Love for Megamind

Following this year's Oscars ceremony, filmmakers Phil Lord and Chris Miller, directors of The Lego Movie , penned an op-ed for Variety bemoaning the stigma around animated films. They report taking issue with Naomi Scott, one of the presenters for best animated film, saying that animated films are some of the most formative experiences a kid has, and that kids tend to watch these films over and over, further noting "I think some of the parents out there know exactly what I'm talking about." Lord and Miller seemed to take this as implying that adults can't appreciate animated films, saying "Surely no one set out to diminish animated films, but it’s high time we set out to elevate them." I didn't personally find Scott's observation that kids make their parents watch the same animated films over and over again innately demeaning--certainly not any more than Schumer joking that her toddler made he...

REVIEW: Song Sung Blue

I came into Craig Brewer's Song Sung Blue with little context for the real-life couple at the center of this movie, for Neil Diamond, or for the world of celebrity impersonators interpreters. There are no doubt subterranean connotations to the specific songs that they chose to sing at certain moments in the narrative that are lost on me. I have no doubt, though, that the intended audience will find this movie before long. But the film was still viable enough that even a relative neophyte like me could still find himself humming along to this musical drama. The film documents the real-life couple of Mike and Claire Sardina, celebrity impersonators who fall in love, marry, and form a tribute band for legendary singer, Neil Diamond. We track their relationship from its beginning through their career aspirations and the crossroads in their marriage, including a violent accident that changes their family forever. Again, I don...

REVIEW: Soul

Pixar's latest film, Soul , dropped on Disney+ Christmas day, another regrettable casualty of the virus. This time around, we follow a hopeful musician bursting with enthusiasm. Music is an oddly appropriate metaphor for the film: both certainly touch the outer rim of mankind's emotional faculty, but good luck summarizing the experience to your friends. Joe Gardner is a music teacher at a public school whose enthusiasm for music is spilling out of the walls of his classroom. Opportunity strikes Joe the same day that misfortune does, and a fatal accident lands him in a celestial plane of existence known as "The Great Before," where souls are developed and finessed before being sent to earth to experience human existence. Joe is saddled with mentoring 22, a soul sapling who has settled in The Great Before for several hundred years and has no intention of ever giving mortality a chance. But in 22, Joe sees a chance to return back to earth and fulfill his purpose if he ca...

The Notebook Has No Excuses

The thing about film is … the more you think about it, the less sense it makes. Film tells us, even in a society obsessed with wealth and gain, “Remember, George, no man is a failure who has friends.” Film warns us that the most unnatural evil lies in wait at the Overlook Hotel and peeks out when all the guests leave for the winter–and that the heart of it resides in room 237–knowing we'll trip over ourselves wanting to open that door. Film is what makes us believe that the vessel for the deepest human emotion could be contained in a cartoon clownfish taking his unhatched cartoon son and holding him in his cartoon fin and telling him he will never let anything happen to him. Nights of Cabiria (1957) Even when it tries to plant its feet aggressively in realism, film winds up being an inherently emotional realm. We feel safer to view and express all manners of passions or desires here in the space where the rules of propriety just don’t matter anymore. So a fa...

Charade: The Shortest Distance Between Two Words

It can feel hackneyed, and even a little lazy, to echo that oft-repeated sentiment that “they really just don’t make ‘em like they used to.” That kind of nostalgic wallowing has us forget that, yeah, even the old masters sometimes produced real stinkers. And it’s also not fair to the many storytellers today who, working against ever turbulent conditions, still manage to create something deeply profound and worthy of the deepest reverences … But there are absolutely times where it’s really easy to believe this anyways. Let me explain by describing my recent experience watching Argylle for the first time earlier this year. The film was designed as a spin-off from the “Kingsmen” franchise and saw poor Bryce Dallas Howard playing Elly, a reclusive spy novelist, whose life is turned upside down when a host of malicious agents converge on her demanding that she write her final book because the events in her novels have predicted real w...

REVIEW: Masters of the Universe

I have very little context for anything He-Man. But that shouldn't count against Mattel's new Masters of the Universe film. I had very little context for the first "Thor" movie, and even less for Guardians of the Galaxy . But those faced no trouble becoming, and remaining, major pillars of pop culture for me. With Masters of the Universe , there are pieces here that are vaguely (and occasionally not-so-vaguely) reminiscent of both of these properties. But these are surface connections. In the short time since those movies entered the arena, Hollywood has already forgotten why we even fell in love with these epic adventures in the first place. Adam is the crown prince of the mythical Eternia, a universe that was razed by the evil Skeletor the same day the king and queen sent Adam off to earth to protect him from Skeletor's rage. In the fifteen years since, Adam has thought of nothing else (and a...

Films and Feelings

Search This Blog