Sauron,
The person who asked the question asked for soundtrack recommendations, not a reliable source for film history and criticism. And for that, the AFI lists aren't necessarily a bad place to start. But since you brought it up, I'll agree that the AFI lists aren't definitive. Heck, look how many changes there were between their
1998 Top 100 movies and the 2007 list! But I wouldn't go so far as to say that they are laughable.
I certainly haven't liked all of the films from the list which I've seen, but some of them are truly incredible. And let's not pretend that many of the entries in a top 100 list compiled by a discriminating film critic (like
this one) or pretentious college professor wouldn't be abstruse and inaccessible to the general viewer (but, then,
Citizen Kane topped the AFI list).
Let me share a little non-film example that comes to mind. My wife doesn't like Hershey's chocolates. She says they're too waxy. I like them just fine. She likes European chocolates. I can eat those too, but the difference to me isn't worth the extra expense. No problem. Does she have superior taste than me? No! A
resounding No!. Despite one of the subtexts of
Babette's Feast, NO! Such a statement supposes that she is able to derive more pleasure from her chocolates than I am from mine. That's ridiculous. That's a fantasy and a fallacy. I love chocolate just as much as she does, I'm just not as picky. That doesn't make her taste in chocolate superior. The only difference is that she
pretends she likes hers more because she doesn't like mine.
Bringing it back to film, I know people who enjoyed
Talladega Nights way more than some film majors I've known enjoyed Eisenstein's
Strike (which I, personally, liked). "Refined" taste is just a pretension, an opportunity for those who have a more elitist or esoteric approach to belittle or disdain those who don't. It's not refined, just restricted. That's not to say that their tastes aren't perfectly legitimate. They are. But they're not better or worse than anyone else's. They're just uniquely theirs, and nothing more. What does this have to do with the AFI list? Well, there are films that matter and films that don't. There seems to exist among "the cultured" an erroneous dichotomous key to determine whether something is meritorious:
- 1. Is it popular?
- Yes, it is popular..........................................................................................The film (book, chocolate, &c.) is not meritorious.
No, it is not popular.....................................................................................Proceed to Question #2
2. Does it have artistic value?
- Yes, it has artistic value..............................................................................The film (book, chocolate, &c.) is meritorious.
No, it has no artistic value...........................................................................The film (book, chocolate, &c.) is not meritorious.
Do you see the disconnect? #2 is a relevant question; #1 is not (and
certainly doesn't belong
before #2). The popularity of a film should have no bearing on a judgment of its artistic value. But there are some (I won't accuse you, since I don't know you) that follow exactly that flawed logic. In truth, a great work of art (in any medium) has to appeal to both the educated critics/fellow artists
and the masses. Whether a creative work matters or not ultimately comes down to two things: Was it the first? and/or Does it endure? Rather than choose sides (esoteric, artistic, high-brow films vs. exoteric, escapist, low-brow blockbusters), the AFI seems to have tried to determine which films will endure, not just which ones will appease those of a certain sensitivity. They're certainly not batting 100% (who could?), but what they're trying to do—distill the the vast numbers of films down to a digestible number of films which matter most—isn't silly. Certainly not as silly as you writers doing it for an obscure Q&A website...or me for doing it on the
message board of said obscure Q&A website.
Moving on to John Williams. I see why
you didn't mention John Williams (but that doesn't explain the other writers, most or all of whom are
not film majors, didn't*). Did you come up with that evaluation on your own? Or are you regurgitating (ripping off?) what your film teachers have opined before you? If you did it on your own, kudos and I hope I didn't offend by implying that you hadn't. But I've heard Dean Duncan express a similar sentiment, so I had to ask. Don't get me wrong, Dean's a great guy and I learned a lot from him. But even after his instruction, I was perfectly capable of enjoying a film that left him wringing his hands because of the lighting, or the acting, because it was sci-fi instead of "realist", &c. And I'm still capable of enjoying John Williams' music even though it makes Dean roll his eyes.
I have to disagree that Williams has "ripped off" his music. It's easy to see (hear) a similarity between two works and immediately conclude that it's a plagiarism, a rip-off, a derivative, or a pastiche. Maybe (sometimes) it is. But I tend to see it as a nod, a reference, an homage, an influence, an inspiration, or a tribute. Vanilla Ice's "Ice, Ice Baby" is a rip-off of "Under Pressure" by Queen and David Bowie. "Ghostbusters" by Ray Parker, Jr. is a rip-off of "I Want a New Drug" by Huey Lewis and the News. John Williams' music? Not necessarily. At least not so blatantly. Sometimes he was constrained by the directors he was working with to model his score after the temp tracks they were using (e.g. the musical motif for Tatooine is drawn from Stravinsky's
Rite of Spring).
Of course, they say the same thing about
Star Wars the film—it's derived from Kurosawa's
A Hidden Fortress (certainly not his best), Fritz Lang's
Metropolis (ditto), and David Lynch's
Dune (ditto again). But when I realized that Luke discovering his dead aunt and uncle was inspired by John Ford's
The Searchers I got chills. Just like I got chills the first time I picked up on Tchaikovsky's
Swan Lake in "The Imperial March" (Darth Vader's Theme). And the only scores that are heavy on
leitmotif are the ones that intend to evoke a mythology (akin to film's use of archetypes). But then, the reader didn't ask for soundtracks that were effective in the context of the film, they wanted something to listen to. So if they listened to
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, they'd have no idea what Indy was doing in the movie at that moment.
I own several hundred soundtracks (I only mentioned what I consider the
crème de la crème in my first post) and I've listened to several hundred more which I decline to own. That doesn't make me an "expert", but I'm certainly not lacking in breadth. There are scores John Williams has done which I enjoy, but I don't think merit a mention in the recommendation list (i.e.
Heidi, How to Steal a Million, The River, Jane Eyre, The Reivers, The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing, The Eiger Sanction, and
The Fury). And, truth be told, not everything John Williams has written was great.
Penelope, Not with My Wife You Don't!, The Poseidon Adventure, Sugarland Express, 1941, Heartbeeps,, &c. were rather droll and unmemorable. But since Whistler mentioned Philip Glass—has he done a
single soundtrack that
doesn't feature the same minimalist three-note passacaglia? (
The Truman Show excepted since it's mostly a sampling of other Glass scores compiled by Burkhard Dallwitz). (Another aside: I prefer his scores to
Candyman and
Mishima over anything else he's done). Or: is there
anything by James Horner that
doesn't feature the dramatic clashing of bells? Does anyone else notice that Hans Zimmer's
Pirates of the Caribbean is derived from his
Gladiator score? And (to be fair) John Williams'
Harry Potter themes sound an awful lot like the
Schindler's List them. I could go on, but I think you see the point.
I hope I haven't deprecated your lack of enthusiasm for John Williams. You don't like him? That's totally okay. No skin off my back. And, when we get right down to it, probably none off yours, either. But please don't approach me (or anyone, for that matter) with the mistaken idea that because I happen to like something that is popular that it must be the result of mindless groupthink. Or that because a work of art appeals to the "common people" that the author must be a hack. The greatest hack that ever lived is
still taught in high schools and universities all over the world (Shakespeare). There
is beauty and artistic merit in John Williams' music. You may not see it. Perhaps that's a choice. I
do see it. Ultimately, there's no such thing (when it comes to art, music, film, food, &c.) as "good taste" or "bad taste". There's just "your taste" and "my taste" and so on.
*After looking at the list a little more carefully, I notice that Humble Master recommended
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (by John Williams) and Sky Bones recommended
Memoirs of a Geisha (by John Williams).
Mea culpa and my apologies.
