Host Special: Film Scores & Soundtracks that Resonate (With Us)

All of our hosts - Candice, Sandra, and Tara - come together again for another host special. This time they explore the fascinating world of film scores and soundtracks, highlighting the differences between the two, chatting about iconic composers and film scores, and how music shapes our emotional experience of stories on screen. Are there songs that always bring to mind certain movies when you hear them? Which soundtracks struck a chord with our hosts? Tune in to hear more about the music that brings movies to life!

Transcript

VO  •  00:10
Welcome to Media Makers Spotlight from Women in Film and Video in Washington, D.C. We bring you conversations with industry professionals for behind the screens, insight and inspiration. 

Candice Bloch  •  00:24
Thanks for joining us. Welcome to another of our host specials where all three of us hosts get together and talk about a particular topic. I'm Candice Block and I'm joined by... Sandra Abrams. And Tara Jabari. Yay! So we're all here and today, this particular episode is going to be about film scores and soundtracks. Now, some of you might think that's the same thing, but they're technically not the same. I do, I do. Tell me, Candice. Tell me, Candice. I like to think it's kind of like the square rectangle situation where a soundtrack includes the score, but a score is typically instrumental and composed music that's made specifically for the film to like heighten the emotions. and it's, you know, it goes with the plot of the film. A soundtrack is like a curated collection of pre-existing songs or songs made for that. It's going to have vocals and sometimes dialogue and, you know, all these different things that come together to make that. So ultimately, it's all like the music that accompanies the moving pictures of it. But a score is where you get like composers and there's specific film scores. Whereas a soundtrack is where you get, you know, like a pop song or something that was put on a soundtrack. So soundtrack and scores, but you could get a soundtrack that has like some of the composed parts to it. So does that, does that answer it? Does that explain more, Sandra? 

Sandra Abrams  •  01:51
Yes. Thank you, Candice. That was very helpful. I'll probably still get it confused, but thank you. That's okay. 

Candice Bloch  •  01:58
I think most people do and that's fine. When you get right into talking about scores, there's obviously names that a lot of us have heard of some of the more popular composers. and I was actually talking with a friend earlier about this and composers like if if you're composing for film you get more known to the general public you know but most people don't know composer names necessarily or the wider public doesn't know because films are a lot more accessible than usually like symphonies and you know like different orchestral performances where composers are doing their work so yay for movies and tv giving that another avenue and then also So that said, I'm pretty sure there's some really famous names that some of you will remember. Kicking it right off, some of the most famous film scores of all time are like Star Wars, Jaws, E.T., Jurassic Park, Schindler's List. I'm blaming all those because those are John Williams. Those are all John Williams. Another really famous composer, Hans Zimmer. He's done Lion King, Gladiator, Inception, Interstellar, Dune. Like there's so many from all of these different composers. But there's some really other famous ones like Lord of the Rings was composed by Howard Shore. There's Alan Silvestri did Forrest Gump and Back to the Future. Right. James Horner did Braveheart. There's Cliff Martinez did like a really electronic one for Drive. There's all kinds. But just some names like the ones that you hear the most. Like, honestly, I think I can't even count how many times John Williams has been nominated for. 

Sandra Abrams  •  03:35
Five times, I think. Or go ahead. 

Tara Jabari  •  03:39
Way more than that. Yeah, he won five. I think he's been nominated 56 times. Yeah, it's something insane like that. Yeah. I just watched his documentary last week in preparation for this. Yeah, tell us about how that doc was. It was good. And, you know, my family being very musical, my mother, my aunt, they're all classical pianists. And then my cousin, who we interviewed, and he's a music composer. But one of the things was it was nice to hear George Lucas, who is quite famously not easy to work with, mostly because he's not very communicative. It's not that he's crabby or anything like that or a diva or harassing anyone. He just doesn't like to work with other people. Talking about working with John Williams was nice because he'd say John Williams doesn't get too invested in his composing. Where, for instance, he's like when he gave me a music piece for a scene and I was like, it's not what I was envisioning. And John Williams was like, OK, well, can you tell me a little bit more? And we were talking about it. And he's like, OK, let's meet tomorrow. And then that would be the piece that becomes whatever we are associating it with. And he's like, and that is what was really lovely. He is very collaborative and he will listen to the director, who is who you're supposed to listen to. But he also will listen to the musicians, the different instrumental musicians that he wants to collaborate with and all sorts of stuff. So that was really nice to hear. And a big point, Steven Spielberg says pretty early on in the documentary that if you want to know how important a film's score is, and probably a soundtrack, but a film's score is watch a film muted. And then you'll realize it. And it's a good point because if you watch Jaws, you know, the famous scene with her just swimming and you mute it, you're like, okay. 

Candice Bloch  •  05:50
Well, that's actually, I think I brought that up in another episode when we were talking about horror films. Like, that's really true. Like, if you are too scared in a movie, just mute it. And, like, 90% of the emotion goes away. Like, the music heightens and enhances the feelings that you're supposed to be feeling. And it kind of guides that. I actually have two fun facts about that, like, concept. The first of which is that, and I found this out by a really cool post from Movies or Therapy on Instagram. I love his account. But basically, there's a song that gets used a lot to heighten sadness in films. And it's Max Richter's On the Nature of Daylight. And it was released in 2004 on his Blue Notebooks album. And it was first used in Stranger Than Fiction. But then it was used in Shutter Island and Hero Dreams of Sushi and Arrival. And Arrival even made itself ineligible for best original score because they refused to not use that. They wanted that. It was so integral to it. I mean, it's been used in all sorts of things like EastEnders, Handmaid's Tale. probably one of the best episodes from The Last of Us, the long, long time episode. It's used in that as well. And it's also used in Hamnet in that sort of that kind of climactic emotional scene. And so it's just it's this one particular song and it's gotten used over and over. And I just think it's amazing. They're like, it's it evokes so much that it's so perfect for certain people that they they refuse, like they sacrificed having a best original score nomination, for example. So heard that song and if you hear it again you're like oh it really does it pulls at the heart 

Tara Jabari  •  07:32
strings and that was one of my questions i was going to ask you is does a score have to be original because the soundtrack obviously is not usually it's like oh we got the rights to this song from the rolling stones or and then this and this yeah that's why there's there's no like 

Candice Bloch  •  07:49
category for best soundtrack you know there's for best score and original score i don't really know too much of the particulars of that. I just know that generally speaking, I mean, I'm not an expert on this. I am not like a music expert. So do not take my word for it. Our host specials are primarily opinions with some facts strewn about that we Googled, you know, so it's like we're like, 

Sandra Abrams  •  08:11
we're like blame Wikipedia or something. That made me think of when you mentioned that, though, the film Ghost, it would not be the film Ghost without that song, you know, from the Righteous brothers you know I had the time of my life you know so you think about that song and then it's immediately you think of that film but it's not necessarily the entire new music score right it's 

Candice Bloch  •  08:36
just that that's a good point it's like yeah a song that associates now with the film well I was gonna say there's a lot of films I could even rattle some off because I was starting to make a list of of ones where it's like I'll name the movie and you tell me like one of the songs or hum one of the songs from it that it becomes associated with. Do you know what I mean? So it's like, yeah, that's become makes them a famous soundtrack. So there's literally like Top Gun has, you know, a couple of songs from that. Pretty Woman has Right Woman. You know, there's all kinds of like Titanic. 

Tara Jabari  •  09:10
We know the song is an original song for it. Right. 

Candice Bloch  •  09:16
Right. I mean, sometimes songs are created for films right but then yeah okay okay but it becomes like really associated like literally like singing in the rain my fair lady like these things are done for that um dirty dancing like oh yeah absolutely you only know those particular songs they're like really 

Sandra Abrams  •  09:32
here's some of the songs well also you know patrick swayze because he was very hot looking yeah but 

Candice Bloch  •  09:37
anyway go on well in dirty dancing patrick swayze sings she's like the wind like that's him singing that song and yeah he sings some other songs in that but there's so many and like that's the thing like there's different soundtracks and things that you know growing up or like there's i came from a not a musical necessarily family like tara but a movie loving family so we actually had like scores and soundtracks that we would listen to like i remember we listened to like robin hood prince of thieves and uh braveheart and different star wars things and indiana jones and stuff as just like the musical scores which like really enhance the appreciation of the films as well and then there's ones that are more recent that i love too like you know garden state and goodwill hunting are some of my favorite soundtracks and spider-man into the spider-verse has some great 

Sandra Abrams  •  10:26
songs and such good right like there's so many i mean and like yeah it's just so many i was just gonna flash dance right but there's also times when this soundtrack actually makes the movie And I'm thinking for Saturday Night Fever, you know, that would not be the film that it is without that soundtrack. 

Candice Bloch  •  10:47
The movie Across the Universe that uses all those like Beatles songs and everything like it's. Yeah, I mean, sometimes. Oh, speaking of Dirty Dancing. 

Tara Jabari  •  10:57
Have you guys seen that edit where it's them dancing on across the aisles to Kendrick Lamar's song? And it fits perfectly. 

Candice Bloch  •  11:09
That's what's great about music. Like if it's the right, if it's the same tempo or whatever. 

Tara Jabari  •  11:14
It's the weirdest thing. You don't think it will. And somebody figured it out. Or the Bill Hader SNL thing where he's a man in a box. There was like an Instagram account where he just dances to different music. And it just still works. 

Candice Bloch  •  11:29
That's like that whole thing about pop songs. Like how there's a very similar, I don't know musical terms. but a very similar like note progression or something. Yeah. And so you could, you could start with one, like you could play that basic part and just start singing over it and do like 50 different pop songs. 

Tara Jabari  •  11:49
And to the point of it, not that the sound, the music or the song would be too identifiable for the movie. I remember when the film Barbie was coming out, they immediately is like, no, the song Barbie will not be in it. Oh, like the Aqua Girl, like, I'm a... The Aqua Girl, yeah, they were like, it's not going to be in it. I already am going to tell you this now. Because they already knew it's such a famous song and it has its own message. And they're like, we have our own agenda with our own plot and stuff. We don't need that distraction. Which I was like, it's disappointing, but it's understandable because it would be a distraction if they brought it in. 

Candice Bloch  •  12:31
I mean, it depends on the mode of the film. And like, there are musicals, right? there's musicals like moulin rouge or mamma mia or even those ones that you're talking about was so clever right where it's like they incorporate it in specifically so like that is part of it you know is is the music is more even more integral because like yeah it's what the whole story is laid over you know and then you've got like all kinds of things like uh musical animated stuff like beauty and the Beast or The Lion King or whatever, where they've got soundtracks as well. And Shrek. And themes. Yeah. But then there's also like the songs that get like made. And then there's like the whole, all the trolls movies that were like, it's about music and stuff. And there's new songs that come out for that. And you have popular artists being asked to do songs for things. And oh, like speaking of Barbie, like Billie Eilish and Phineas were asked to make that sort of like the heartbeat of that film to make that original song for it. 

Tara Jabari  •  13:28
I had listened to another podcast, Buried with Films with Bright Goldstein. Maybe one day we'll get him on. He had Elizabeth Moss on. First of all, I would like to point out, she was saying that if you ever watch The Lion King, it only has six minutes that is just happy. And I was like, thank you very much. Oh, vindication for the animated episode for Terry. Anyway, they were saying, what's a special film and stuff. And so one of the films that really stood out to her is the Baz Luhrmann's Romeo and Juliet. And she said because of the soundtrack and it showed her how a soundtrack and the music could really elevate the story, particularly for her. She uses the example of when Romeo and Juliet will see each other for the first time with the fish tank and the song in the background. And if it wasn't that song and if it wasn't that voice and all that stuff, it really would not have been such a big. Oh, 

Sandra Abrams  •  14:32
now we understand love at first sight. Yeah, no, that makes me think of, you know, I really like Sophie Coppola did in 2006, Marie Antoinette. And she used a mix of classical music, but in guitar and electric music and of mixing that together for the music. And one of the songs is Bow Wow's I Want Candy. And there's a scene where she's trying on all the clothes and the jewelry and the shoes and that's playing. And it just made me go, I just love this, you know, and it had to do mostly with the music because the music really set the tone within that. But there was other artists within that film, but it just really helped elevate certain scenes. Whereas it could have been like, oh, yeah, Marie Antoinette, the queen trying on jewelry or whatever. But having that song. 

Candice Bloch  •  15:24
Yeah, that was, I remember when that came out and it was like, they talked about that, that the sort of deliberately anachronistic like vibe like that they created. And you hear that a lot in other things now. And it seems almost like less of a big deal now. But that one almost like set the style. It was the first to really do that. Yeah, to really lean into like popular songs for a period piece. But now you have like Bridgerton and stuff where they do their versions of popular songs in style. 

Sandra Abrams  •  15:51
Right. Well, that's Chris Bowers, who is the composer for the Bridgerton. He's the one that also won the Oscar, I think it was about two years ago, for that documentary for the musical instrument, this short feature that he won. But I predict he's probably got an Oscar in his future. 

Candice Bloch  •  16:12
So two things. One, about speaking of Oscars, just so we mention it, like this most recent Oscar was Ludwig Jornsen for Sinners. You pronounced his name. 

Sandra Abrams  •  16:26
I could not pronounce it. I looked at it and I said, oh my gosh. And he, because he won the Oscar for Oppenheimer as well. Yeah, he won for Oppenheimer and for Black Panther. Yeah, he has three. Yeah, that's right. I said, I can't talk about him because I couldn't pronounce his name. 

Candice Bloch  •  16:42
Yeah, I mean, it's one of those, you could do like the Americanized version of like Ludwig Jornsen or something, but I think it's more technically like Ludwig Jorensen or whatever. I might not be saying it right, but I tried. But yeah, and he does The Mandalorian as well, which was cool. So, I mean, with how much more cinematic TV is getting now, you get a lot of that, I guess, more crossover than you might have in the past. But one thing that I wanted to say is really cool, a fun thing that I remember watching like a little Vox report about the enhancing of the emotion and that stuff, is Christopher Nolan is really known for having like a very specific vision and what he wants to do in his films, right? So he's used this a few times, but in Dunkirk especially, in the Dunkirk score, he really wanted to use this auditory illusion with Shepard tones to like maintain this heightened sense of tension. It's this thing called the Shepard Reset Glissando. And what it does is it stacks different tones. So you're hearing like constant ascending pitch. And it like freaks your brain out. And it just, you basically never get that release. It's basically like a tone separated by an octave are layered on top of each other. And as the tones move up the scale, the highest tone gets quieter. The middle one stays loud the whole time and the lowest one gets louder. And then it like repeats. But as it's doing that, you're always hearing two tones rising in pitch at the same time. So it tricks your brain. So it's like this never ending loop. And in that little dock, it kind of equates it to like a barbershop pole where it's like not really going anywhere, but it has this illusion of like infinite motion. So yeah. And I just thought that was really cool that there's like to use the, to lean into like the science and like trick our brains. So it does, you never, it's like building tension. And like, so the not only are there like ticking clocks and all kinds of things that get us to feel more tense when we're watching stuff, but to like dive into that, I thought it was really, really cool to learn about these, these shepherd tones and this, that this trick has been used in different things. It's even used in like Mario and things like the video game and stuff like that sometimes. So yeah, really awesome. The stuff that like, and all the thought process that goes into bringing us that extra intense emotional layer to what we're watching. Yeah. I like that. 

Sandra Abrams  •  18:59
I was thinking that they have certain, there are certain things that you remember from the older films and what you were talking about made me think of Psycho. You know, when there's that scene, the shower scene, where you hear that music and that tension. That's what, as soon as you said that, that shower scene with Psycho popped into my brain because of that heightened sensibility. But, you know, that wasn't something that I think they thought about. What you brought about now seems a new twist on what they're doing. 

Candice Bloch  •  19:26
Yeah, and even like what Tara was saying before with Jaws, like there's very specific things that are designed. I mean, and like action and horror and suspense, like they're really good at that. Like that's one of the main tools that they use for increasing that like tension, you know, for things. Because it's also like with respect to like Jaws, again, that's kind of like how what happens in your head is scarier than if you were to see it. Definitely. So the soundtrack is almost saying, but think of something tense or think of something sad. Like it's like tweaking the emotion and then you can still think of other things. it just to me feels like it's not manipulating you but it kind of is it's like guiding your it's like we're we're gonna make this really sad so we're gonna play something that's gonna trigger sad stuff or we're gonna make this really hopeful and there's you know there's different sounds that are corresponding to all these different feelings like joy and like fear and tension those notes 

Tara Jabari  •  20:30
that have to and it goes back to your example of the same piece being used in all sorts of different from arrival to the last of us from all sorts of things they're like this this speaks it yeah it 

Candice Bloch  •  20:43
really it really is incredibly like heart-wrenching that song and there's songs from different soundtracks that get used again in like previews for other um movies and clips and things and soundtracks get used in social media to enhance things here and there. And it's like more than people might realize. I think it's too often underappreciated, like that most people will maybe know the main popular song on a movie or whatever, but they might not know any of the composers other than the couple that do everything, that do so many, like John Williams and stuff. And we're pointing out how crucial it is to the experience. 

Tara Jabari  •  21:25
I listen to a lot of soundtracks, original scores of some television shows, but some films too. One of my favorite, mostly for running. And I said, if you ever need to go running, listen to the soundtrack of spy films or spy shows like Alias. 

Candice Bloch  •  21:49
I used to use the Run Lola Run soundtrack is actually really good. 

Tara Jabari  •  21:52
Oh, that's a good one. Yeah, yeah. Because it's all music. Yeah. I heard that from other people, 

Candice Bloch  •  21:57
that particular one. Yes. Yeah, because it gets you like, you can keep a good pace. Like it's very like. Well, 

Tara Jabari  •  22:03
yeah. And in these spy ones, particularly, one of my favorites is John Powell's for the Bourne ultimatum called Tangiers, which I still have not been. So my goal is to go to Tangiers and actually listen to it and go running. But it goes like, you know, they're like, OK, you're on a steady pace. Oh, no, they're catching up. They found me. And then you got to really run. And then you're like, okay, they haven't found me. And then they get around. Like, it's a good way to get your heart rate up and then calm up and then calm, which is what you're trying to do on certain days of your training, probably. So I was like, that really helps. Alias is a great one. Game of Thrones always is a good one. 

Candice Bloch  •  22:45
Yeah. Like adventures and yeah, action. 

Tara Jabari  •  22:49
Pirates of the Caribbean was always a fun one to learn. You know, you're like running and then you're like hopping off a curb, but you're like, but I hopped to a different boat. Yeah. 

Candice Bloch  •  22:59
I mean, honestly, just kind of leaning into that, I'm remembering I watched so many interviews with different people in filmmaking, a lot of actors and everything. And so many of them will have like a soundtrack for that character or that production or something or certain songs that they'll listen to like ahead of a particular scene or something to get in the headspace for it. And so that's kind of another pointing out the power of music tied to emotion and all of that. And then films started with just music and pictures. Like, talkies, like, it's like came in later. Like, it's always had music, but talking is the extra, you know? So, I mean, it truly is like you just do some pictures and you put some sound and you're already like telling a whole story and making people cry or laugh or, you know, whatever. 

Sandra Abrams  •  23:48
I wanted to go back and just talk about a few oldies, but goodies. And the first was Breakfast at Tiffany's, which was Henry Mancini. And there is the famous song Moon River in there. And I read that, you know, apparently some studio execs said, let's cut this particular song. And Audrey Hepburn said, absolutely not. And then as it turns out, Henry Mancini ended up winning the Oscar, I think was 1963 for Best Musical Score for Breakfast at Tiffany's. And that film was directed by Blake Edwards. And then he went on to work with Blake Edwards and he did the music for Pink Panther. And I think we all know as soon as we hear that song, we know it's Pink Panther. It's Peter Sellers. 

Candice Bloch  •  24:34
Yeah, it's like you can't separate the two. 

Sandra Abrams  •  24:35
Like they have to go together. Right. 

Candice Bloch  •  24:36
Have to do the song. 

Sandra Abrams  •  24:38
Yeah, right. But one thing I thought was really interesting, I read that Alfred Hitchcock hired Henry Mancini to do the score for his movie Frenzy. And then Alfred Hitchcock fired Henry Mancini and said the music that he composed was too macabre. And I thought for anything to be too macabre for Alfred Hitchcock, when this man is known for the music from Psycho, I thought was like that can't possibly be true but I I just thought you know he you know there's again music that we always think of and again talking about tv shows I think in Mission Impossible we all know again that theme and then as soon as we hear it that theme was done in 1967 and then here it is 2026 and we're still as soon as we hear that we think of that movie yeah but we now ties it all together but it ties it all together after all these years and you have that with bond 

Candice Bloch  •  25:40
as well james i was just thinking about yeah it's like it becomes the consistency it always had to have that and and and it does i mean when you have i mean we have so many things that become longer series and you know like mentioned lord of the rings and you know there's like harry potter and all these like longer multi-movie things whether it's like the exact thing or the same composer or somebody to have that same like feel and tone to stitch it all together you know well 

Tara Jabari  •  26:07
that's when the in john williams did the first three harry potter films but he didn't do the rest of them and he is the sort of blueprint for the rest of the films we saw a trailer for the new Harry Potter show but I'd be like but are you gonna keep the opening thing the the little twinkles sound I don't know because it seems sad not to but yeah it is an interesting point music is such an important aspect of it and so do you guys listen to any pretty regularly like of the soundtracks anymore. 

Candice Bloch  •  26:48
Yeah. I used to listen to more. Like I really listened to the Garden State 

Sandra Abrams  •  26:56
soundtrack a lot. I love that movie. I'm going to have to go back and listen to it. Thank you for that reminder. No, 

Candice Bloch  •  27:02
that was great. I mean, and there's really good ones. I think honestly, part of the reason I don't listen as much now is there's so much more new stuff that it's like I'm constantly just watching new things or I'm catching it again if I'm like relaxing and there's a rerun of something or a film I'm watching again and then I'm kind of hearing it by watching the film again. But I do kind of miss that. That's actually a good point. I feel like maybe I should pop on a soundtrack or something while trying to while doing something. Maybe I actually will start 

Tara Jabari  •  27:35
running again to the Run Lola Run soundtrack or something. You should you should listen to Tangiers when you go running. I'm just saying. 

Candice Bloch  •  27:42
Yeah. 

Tara Jabari  •  27:43
I don't even remember what happens in that movie. I just know Tangiers by heart. Yeah. 

Candice Bloch  •  27:50
I should listen to some of the old ones that like my, my family kind of, that makes us feel about our childhood, you know? Like I asked my, to leading up to this, I asked my brother and my sister, I was like, hey, do you remember what soundtracks and movie scores we would listen to growing up? And like, because in my mind, I'm like, didn't we listen to like the Robin Hood one? And I just asked them blank and they both said that and I was like yes I wasn't crazy that is one that we listened to and like Braveheart and Working Girl and all these different great films so um we listen to a lot of 

Sandra Abrams  •  28:23
Broadway show tunes my because my parents would go from DC up to New York once in a while with another couple and they would go and see Broadway shows that's what I remember is all the Broadway shows which in some cases obviously you'll become films and you know I'm thinking about funny girl 

Tara Jabari  •  28:40
and yeah well I went to the New York Comic Con and I it was the little shop of horrors it was the cast and some old man there and I was like okay and I had to come in late and I was like all right who's this guy who keeps yapping on so they just kept letting him talk and talk and talk he's he seems very sweet um but i was just like okay side note thomas uh doherty is the guy who was the the main guy and i swear to god i think he and i made eye contact and i'm like sweet baby lord he is very handsome and so I was like hi um and all sorts of stuff but this Alan guy keeps talking and and then they're like and we're so you know I remember Howard and I'm like I know that name oh you know and all sorts of stuff in the end you know they move on and I go and I google Alan 

Sandra Abrams  •  29:44
Menken and Howard Ashman he did he did all the uh Disney right he's well known well I didn't 

Tara Jabari  •  29:51
realize that and I'm like what the hell this guy was my childhood so and I texted my friend and she's like it was wasted on you but yeah he did the little mermaid he did beauty and the beast which we have already mentioned on all sorts of stuff but he was talking about that the little shop of horrors was really his first him and Howard who had died in the early 90s unfortunately but they really wanted to work in musicals and in theater no one really was giving them a chance Little Shop of Horrors was their opening and as it kept getting successful and all sorts of stuff they were able to grow from that and eventually start the big musical movements of what Disney became in the 90s and how important musical and theater is in the art and the arts are for children and for people and all sorts of stuff. It was very, very interesting. And I just replayed the whole hour all over. And I'm like, oh yeah, that does make more sense now that I know who he is. He did have really nice gems. I just didn't understand who he was. 

Candice Bloch  •  31:03
Yeah, you missed that little opener to get the context. No, but that's so true. Our childhoods, as you were saying, There's especially, I mean, we're all different ages, but we all kind of went through different, you know, eras of these different films where, you know, you really, you remember it because of the songs that are associated with it more so than the visuals, you know, even on some of them. Like all these Disney films, it's like I could sing all the songs from it. And that's the thing, like musicals, obviously musicals are going to have great soundtracks. Let it go. Let it go. Right. frozen he's huge like then and there's also like hamilton you know like and things that where the soundtracks of these things become really big and people listen to them over and over and there's lots of lots of plays and films but um yeah i mean it's music is music and the songs that are made specifically for it are it's amazing because it's storytelling within the songs a lot too it's storytelling whether or not you have lyrics you know still that's very going back to before talkies that's why they would use the music yeah and like these these composed these songs you know like the the one that i said earlier where it's like people are like you're gonna make people cry if you use that song apparently like even in in that hamnet they were maybe gonna make that final scene quiet and then jesse buckley was like why don't we use this song or i i don't know the specifics but it really landed well and and then sometimes people will like not finish a film if like the song feels wrong in the right place you know what i mean it's so It's, I mean, there's like all the little elements that go into it, but I think something like making sure the song is right is even more integral than sometimes like, is the color grading exactly how we want it in that scene? Which helps too. I mean, it's all very important. I'm not trying to belittle it. 

Tara Jabari  •  32:55
But going back to Steven Spielberg's point, how integral is music? Watch something on mute and you'll understand because it really does shift the whole point of the mood of it. Is it scary? Is it tragic? Is it happy? Is it, you know, all sorts of stuff, right? So that's, I think it's, if anything, it's the finishing touch. Yeah. 

Candice Bloch  •  33:20
Music is like the emotional soul of a movie. 

Sandra Abrams  •  33:23
Yeah. You'll leave the theater singing those songs. I was thinking there's the 1942 Yankee Doodle Danny about George M. Cohen. And, you know, you'll leave the theater singing the song. 

Candice Bloch  •  33:34
Just like scent is really strong tied to like your personal memories. It's like sound is really will draw you right back into a movie and then the plot that went with it, you know. So, yeah. But anyway, speaking of that full circle, I think is that we full circled a bit for this. We shared some facts. We shared some things we've listened to. I hope people listen to more stuff or watch more stuff with more appreciation for the music. Or if you like a soundtrack, look up the composer and, you know, learn more about that or see if you can find the score as well as the songs that are most popular on it. And this has been fun. And we'll see what we end up. Sandra has a great idea for what we might do on our next host special. Do you want to share what we might tease what we might do next time? Let's do favorite lines from a film. So many great one liners. 

Tara Jabari  •  34:18
Yeah, very, very important one-liners. 

Candice Bloch  •  34:20
The one-liners, yeah. 

Tara Jabari  •  34:22
So we're going back, we did the finishing touch. Now we're going back to the original, the script. Yeah. 

Candice Bloch  •  34:29
I mean, it's all important, right? But right now we were just highlighting the audio. And yeah, all right. Well, thank you so much for listening and hopefully join us next time. And also check out all of our other episodes. Sometimes we are talking to composers, as Tara said. And, you know, we talk to people that help make the music happen. I also, I think in the, talking about the Billy Joel doc, I think he does his pop songs, but he also does some composing that is less. I'm sure. So he's got some more. 

Tara Jabari  •  34:55
Because also he listens to a lot of classical music. He listened to all sorts of stuff. Yeah. 

Candice Bloch  •  34:59
So sure. Yeah. Definitely respect all, all the genres of music. People give it all the love that it deserves to keep it going. 

Tara Jabari  •  35:07
Yep. Thank you all. All right. Bye everyone. Thanks very much. 

VO  •  35:11
Thanks for listening to Media Maker Spotlight from Women in Film and Video. To learn more about WIF, visit wif as in Frank, v as in Victor.org. This podcast is created by Sandra Abrams, Candice Block, Brandon Ferry, Tara Jabari, and Jerry Reinhardt. And edited by Michelle Kim with audio production and mix by Steve Lack, Audio. And Ed Saltzman. Subscribe to continue learning from more amazing media makers. Please visit MediaMakerSpotlight.com for more information.