Actually, I just became aware that a lot of war movies have earned Oscar nominations or awards for their original score. Heck, last year we saw TWO war movies up for Best Original Score. Then there's the critically acclaimed Platoon, Bridge on the River Kwai, and etc. It's almost a rule--if the studios make a decent war movie and slap a score to it, the movie's bound to be nominated!

So which war movies have the best scores?

My opinions-

Apocalypse Now
The Blue Max
Bridge on the River Kwai
Courage Under Fire
Empire of the Sun
Full Metal Jacket
Gettysburg
G.I. Jane
Glory
Good Morning Vietnam
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Ice Station Zebra
King Rat
Memphis Belle
Midway
1941
Paradise Road
Patton
Platoon
Red Dawn
The Sand Pebbles
Saving Private Ryan
Schindler's List
The Thin Red Line
Tora! Tora! Tora!

As for me, my favorites include Patton, Empire of the Sun, Glory and 1941 (for fun!).

PeterK

Hamburger Hill, on the other hand, seemed a little distracting to me, but, like all of Philip Glass' stuff, it had a very original sound.

The Tuskegee Airmen has a great sweeping symphonic score. Beautiful and patriotic.

Star Wars (how could anybody have forgotten that one, I mean the name itself gives it away)
The Last Starfighter
Battlestar Galagtica
The longest day
Hamburger Hill

That's all for now,

Small Soldiers
The Blue Max
Patton
MacArthur

Gee... that's all Goldsmith. How funny.

Jeron

Alamo
Charge of the Light Brigade (Max Steiner)
Das Boote
El Cid
Henry V (Sir William Walton's version)
Is Paris Burning
Longest Day
Objective Burma
Pride and the Passion*
633 Squadron
The Sea Hawk
Spartacus
Taras Bulba
They Died With Their Boots On
The Vikings
Warlord
Where Eagles Dare

*Not currently available

My favorites? The Alamo, The Longest Day, 633 Squadron.

And let me say something about The Longest Day vs. Saving Private Ryan -- the former (even though its just a three-minute theme) is a better piece of music than the latter.

I can hum the whole tune from memory, but can't remember three bars of any track from Saving Private Ryan -- not even Hymn. Sorry, Paul Anka's "The Longest Day March" is much more memorable and will still be around when everybody's forgotten about Williams' score.

Marc, Saving Private Ryan is a very complex score for a complex war movie. While the Longest Day was nothing more than a propaganda movie for the heroism of the Allied Forces, Saving Private Ryan centered more on the horrors of such a war.

In essence, it is fitting that many will have a problem remembering the theme from SPR versus TLD since we usually rember only the heroic and pleasent events of past wars than the real human tragedys.

I myself, find hymn very melodic and can hum it in a second. And since when does a score need to be hummable to be good?

NP: Angela's Ashes-Special Edition (without dialoge)-(*****/****)

--Crono/Kyp
Writer/Director/Producer

No offense, but I disagree. Reluctantly, I'm going to take this off topic a little, but you've struck a sore spot with me.

SPR is about as complex as 1-hour episode of "Combat" with a lot of gore and maudlin sentimentality thrown in for effect. I'm not saying the "Combat" episodes weren't good, I'm just saying that SPR didn't add anything to a genre that wasn't said better and more succinctly 20 years ago. What you had was your generic WWII platoon that was a "Combat" staple and which had its antecedents in "Wake Island," Back to Battaan," "Objective Burma," Sands of Iwo Jima," and even "Go For Broke." For variety, Speilberg added a squirming coward named Upham.

I had a BIG problem with the bait and switch with the eyes of the old man at the beginning of film turning into Hanks'character's eyes and then Private Ryan's eyes turning into the old man's eyes at the end. I thought this was a little dishonest.

As far as gritty realism is concerned, the bullets wouldn't have "pinged" off a wooden-sided LCVP and a P-51 firing .50 caliber machine guns wouldn't have made much more of an effect on a Tiger tank than Hanks' .45 caliber pistol.

And what in the world was a medic doing charging a machine gun nest? Seemed like a cheesy plot device to get a sympathetic "innocent" killed off for a few tears from the audience.

SPR was manipulative and Williams' score was forgetable. Ten years from now, if there is some futuristic "Name that Tune" game on TV, "The Longest Day March" will be immediately recognizable to everyone in the audience while "Hymn to the Fallen" will stump the experts.

I'm glad you like it, Scott. But I was very disappointed. I've only played that CD twice. It failed to move me either time. I consider it a waste of my money.

Marc (feeling a little opinionated today)

Agree fully

Didnt bug me but you have a point.

Umm....no. The p-51 is a tankbuster, equipped with far more than just a .50 calibur machien gun(which will actually do quite a bit of **** to anything, including a tank). Ive seen a .50 calibur gun fired, and it went through like 5 walls(of course im exaggerating, but hey...) As for the pinging sound...what scene was this?

The medic: in a platoon of 8, no one else around, with one person with no combat experience...everyone who knows what they are doing charges.

Possibly...i dont remember either off the top of my head

I had qualms with the movie, and teh score other than the hymn was quite boring. But the accuracy?? Pick your gripes my man.

A P-51 was not a tank buster, it was a high-altitude fighter -- built to fight other fighters. It was equiped with six .50 caliber machineguns, nothing more. A 37mm cannon could not penetrate the armor of a Tiger tank. Even our Sherman's carrying 75mm cannon had to manuever to a Tiger's rear to make a kill. (For comparison, .50 caliber is equivilent to 12.79 caliber.)

A true tank-buster was the Hawker Tempest with 40 mm cannon in underwing pods. Even it would have to come in from behind to make a kill. The American aircraft that could possibly take-on a Tiger tank's armor would be a P-47 with 5-inch rockets slung under the wings. The only problem is the half the defending Americans and the bridge would have been taken out by a salvo of 5-inch rockets.

Although P-51s did a lot of ground strafing, their targets were mostly other aircraft, trains, trucks, Rommel's staff car (actually a Spitfire got this one), etc. P-47s were used as ground support for the army. I will conceed artistic license and the fact that St. Stephen couldn't get a flying P-47 (it's more likely he choose the P-51 because it is an icon -- see "Empire of the Sun").

As for the pinging on the sides of the LCVP -- this was the scene where the boats were taking the soldiers into the beach. The boats are called LCVPs (Landing Craft, Vehicle, Personnel). Bullets were pinging off the sides and raised ramp on the way in and as they were "debarking."

In a combat situation everyone has a job. They are all trained to do certain things. A medic hangs back and takes care of those who are wounded. That is his job, he carries no offensive weapons. His survival is almost as important as the survival of the platoon's officer or top sergeant. He can save lives -- and often did. Yes, there were instances where medics were involved in combat situations where they took offensive actions -- they are notable for their rarity. They are also notable for the fact that if they didn't take some kind of offensive action, lives would have been lost. If they needed cannon fodder, that little panty-waste Upham should have been sent in.

SPR was billed as the most realistic war movie ever made. When you brag about this, accuracy is not just important, it's essential.

Marc

Patton

without a doubt. Honorable mention is SPR.

I have seen a .50 calibur fired tho, and the penetration was extreme.

You mean they made those boats out of wood? what the hell were they thinking?? One would think theyd use metal. They are used to take troops into fire, youd think they would have some order of protection.

I agree with the medic thing, they should have sent in that cowardly **** upham But i can see why everyone would have been used.

Thanks for the tech info marc. Ill of course have to check on it(ive been learning never to take someone at their word for little details like this, frequently get wrong info. Like what i said in my last post for instance, hehe) How/why do you know all this anyway?

Been studying war for more than 30 years. Not just WWII but everything from the Persians vs Greeks (300 Spartans) right on up to WWII. (For some reason though, I can't get interested in the period between the end of the English Civil War (Cromwell) and the beginning of the Napoleonic Wars (Pride and the Passion, War and Peace, Waterloo).

Made a somewhat rash statement on the LCVPs, mainly because I was at work and not near my references at home. The LCVP ramp was armored, so any bullets hitting it would have pinged. Once the ramp was down, however, the sound would have changed.

As far as the scores to the movies mentioned above, I only like the 300 Spartans March and Pride and the Passion.

For a rundown of 37 mistakes in SPR go to http://www.movie-mistakes.co.uk/

Marc

[This message has been edited by Marc Flake (edited 11 January 2000).]

I can't think of any others right now which I would consider "favorites."

As to SPR, I didn't think it was a very ground-breaking movie, and I surprised myself by not crying. I didn't like all of the movie, but I liked it enough to think it was okay.

On the other hand, there was an old (presumably) war vet sitting behind me who was crying the entire time. At one point he turned to his wife and said: "This is just how it was." That incident had more effect on me than the actual movie did.

One thing I did notice though... at the end, when Tom Hanks tells young Private Ryan "Earn this," I don't think he was speaking only to Private Ryan. That was definitely a message to the audience.

My two cents.

First off: Marc are you trying to tell me that The Longest Day was technically more accurate than Saving Private Ryan?

Are we also saying that SPR was boring but The thin Red Line was not? (they're both essentially the same).

I'm not an expert in war, would never claim that. So I ain't gonna get into that discussion but if we want to get that realistic for a movie lets get some people on death row use them as actors on our next "realistic" war movie and really kill them. Now, that's realism.

Scott

NP: The Blue Max(****/****) Not a good movie, not realistic enough.

SPR was definitely not boring. My gripe is that is was promoted as being the most realistic war movie ever produced. Live by the sword, die by the sword. If a movie is set up to be realistic, it needs to be accurrate.

I'm not saying I didn't have a visceral response to this movie, I did. But I think it is highly overrated (as is the score). It is not only dishonest in its attempt to be "realistic," it is also dishonest as a story, using hackneyed plot devices to maniplate the audience.

That P-51 swooping down to save everyone at the end was sickeningly Crightonesque. You may as well as had Godzilla show up and melt the tanks with his breath. This tired, deus ex machina plot device was necessary because Speilberg unecessarily backed his characters into an inescapable, hopeless corner that was historically inaccurate.

There wasn't a Tiger tank within a 100 miles of Normandy -- Hitler kept them around the Pas de Calais area where he thought the "real" invasion would take place. Except for one instance, the paratroopers weren't tasked with defending bridges, but taking them. In that one instance, a German parachute brigade attacked, without armor support. It was a heroic stand by the Americans, as they were outnumbered.

Also, James brought up Hanks' last line. As I recall, I could barely hear it over the battle noise -- a significant flaw when those two words are the core of the movie. Fortunately, a friend of mine who also didn't hear it the first time saw the movie a second time and let me know what was said.

Really, I'm glad you all liked the movie. I still think The Longest Day was better (it only had one mistake compared to the more than 30 mistakes in SPR). And the only gripe veterans had about it was that the combat scenes weren't realistic. In essence, no Hollywood combat scene was realistic until Braveheart, then SPR (and maybe Starship Troopers).

But TLD wasn't promoted as being "realistic." It was promoted as being historically accurate -- and it was certainly more accurate than SPR.

And while I'm on my soap box about TLD, if you call it "propaganda," you certainly have to paint SPR with the same paint brush. It was unmistakeably anti-war propaganda at its finest.

There is a difference between being realistic and being historically accuarete. You are griping about the latter, as far as realism goes, if war is anything like the first minutes of SPR, then that's realism enough for me.

The Longest Day had only one mistake, give me a break. Perhaps in historycal accuracy but not in realism. I've seen the Longest Day a few times and as far as realism is concerned, there is no comparism.

I know that there were many military advisers on Saving Privat Ryan so they must have done something rigth, and if there were 30 mistakes, oh well I still was emotionally captivated.

I'm not going to argue over the score yet I have to say one more last thing: If you honestly couldn't hear Hank's last words then you need to get your hearing checked or go to a better theater with better sound.

Again, it was a JOKE!

Scott

I respect your opinion about Saving Private Ryan although I do think you might be a tad hard on the movie. Be that as it may, I hate the idea of you having been insulted or hurt by what I have said.

If I have offended you in any way, I beg your forginveness and would like to assure you, it was never meant that way.

I can agree with all of your points and appreciate that you pointed them out. I was just trying to say that I think it is almost impossable to make a one hundred percent realistic movie.

Anyway, I hope you haven't hired a hit man on me yet, and if you have could you recall him?

Sincerely,
Scott

PS: I shall from heron in watch my comments very carefully.

Here's one more attempt -- and I'll try not to repeat myself.

It's not "just a movie." Whether we acknowledge it or not, movies are part of our mythology. These are our *stories told 'round the campfire* -- an image utilized by Speilberg himself for "Amazing Stories." And SPR made several violations of the storytelling compact.

My gripe wasn't that SPR wasn't realistic. I'm not a freak for realistic movies. Heck, after war movies, sci-fi is my favorite genre. But Speilberg didn't follow through on his compact with the viewer. Those intense first 20 minutes was a statement that everything that follows will be as faithful to real-life as possible. I went to see the movie with the expectation that I was going to see a movie on combat that was as realistic as possible. I trusted him. As far as I was concerned, he violated that compact, that trust, several times through the film.

As a writer, as a person who studies storytelling, toward the end, I began worrying how Speilberg was going to pull off a satisfying ending with tanks and Nazi's closing in in overwhelming numbers. Again, I trusted him to come up with a plot ending that was as true to WWII combat as the opening 20 minutes. Then this plane comes in from out of nowhere and blows up a tank with weapons that would hardly have caused a dent in it. If you compare the first 20 minutes with the last 20 minutes, it's like two different movies, two different types of stories.

I have other, deeper problems with SPR as far as how it treats WWII mythology. The stories of WWII are as much a part of the US lexicon as the West and the Civil War. Treating the coward Upham as a sympathetic figure really made me boil. As far as I was concerned he was responsible for the deaths of at least four American soldiers, including Hanks' character. In fact, I thought that was how Speilberg was going to "pull his rabbit out of the hat" at the end of the movie. Upham could have "found his courage" and executed a classic flanking manuever on the Germans attacking the bridge, possibly even surprising them enough to cause a withdrawal. Instead, Speilberg has this character murdering an unarmed prisoner when the battle is over. I have never understodd why other veterans haven't spoken up about this -- maybe its because no one asked.

I hope this helps all of you to understand my position. I'm not a stickler for realism, unless that is what was promised. It was clearly promised in SPR and, as far as I was concerned, that promise was clearly broken.

Just so you don't think you're the only one on the board old enough to have seen "Zulu" on the big screen, I did also, but at a completely unfamous theater in New Jersey. I was about 16 at the time, and remember thinking, "Wow, this is the best movie I've ever seen in my life." And I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that 36 years later, a part of me probably still feels that way. . .

And although I'm not a huge John Barry fan, this will always be to me THE all-time best adventure score.

I think that Franz Waxman's score to DESTINATION TOKYO is just amazing. I don't like the arrangement of the 2 versions available on CD and insist that you go back to the original tracks (rent the thing) to hear what I mean.

Marco Polo is going to release Waxman's OBJECTIVE BURMA soon--it too isn't bad but I prefer DT.

Then off the top of my head:

Walton-Wartime Sketchbook

Clifton Parker-Sink the Bismarck! & Damn the Defiant!

Malcolm Arnold-The Bridge on the River Kwai & The Key

Jarre-Lawrence of Arabia

Tiomkin-Guns of Navarone

Rozsa-Sahara, Five Graves to Cairo & The Green Berets

Bliss-Things to Come

I have to agree with everyone else about Blue Max, Patton, Goodwin scores, Williams, The Alamo, Starship Troopers, etc.

I am absolutely ashamed of myself for not including this in my first posting--where was my head?

A very favorite war score of mine is the music Norman Dello Joio composed for AIR POWER, a TV documentary series from the 50s. Absolutely great music, IMHO. There are two versions available on CD, a 50s recording on Albany, and a recent recording on Koch International (with Morton Gould's fine music from TV's Holocaust). Both are recommended.

Following this idea are TV scores to:

Richard Rodgers-Victory at Sea
Lalo Schifrin-Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
Leonard Rosenman-Combat
and on a lighter note,
Jerry Fielding-Hogan's Heroes

More good & great war scores include:

Walton (again)--Spitfire & Battle of Britain (Rejected).

Hugo Friedhofer--spectacular Main Titles to The Young Lions, In Love & War, & Richtofen & Brown.

Victor Young--For Whom the Bell Tolls

Bernstein--Men in War (a great Anthony Mann film, whose score I prefer to The Great Escape)

Roy Budd--Zepplin

Nods of agreement to Das Boot and Ice Station Zebra mentioned in earlier postings.

and speaking of Legrand--Castle Keep

Steiner--Operation Pacific, Helen of Troy & GWTW (?)

Goldsmith--Inchon & In Harm's Way

Laurence Rosenthal--Brass Target

Gerald Fried--Too Late the Hero & Paths of Glory

Frank DeVol--Attack! & The Dirty Dozen

Leith Stevens--War of the Worlds (?)

Yasushi Akatagawa--Fires on the Plain

Benjamin Frankel--Battle of the Bulge

Laurie Johnson--short and satirical Dr. Strangelove