Top 10 Saddest Film Scores

I see that a copyright discrepancy has lead to my Youtube video being muted. Oh well, I’d say it was “fair use” but oh well.

Since I put these videos up so people can hear the clips and hopefully listen to the entire OST, I’ll post a brief description of each song (I don’t know the order I used and didn’t feel like watching the video completely– so it’s in the order I gave in the credits).

Big Fish: Big Fish is a score by Danny Elfman which combines Americana/country style-strings and percussion with ethereal vibraphones and other synthesized sounds. The music is not very heavy on melody and motifs, the score is verymuch a true underscore: it creates a magical yet somber environment. Song pick: “Underwater”

The Corpse Bride: Another Elfman score, The Corpse Bride is very musical. The main theme is a bittersweet (and very beautiful) melody which serves as a strong motif throughout the score. Like Elfman’s scores, it uses fluttering winds and steady string modulations to create a nother-wordly background with the ’sad’ melody played out by piano/glockenspiel. Song Pick: “End Credits”

Edward Scissorhands: The last Elfman score, I put this at number one. The entire score is playful and fairy tale like, making heavy use of harps and bells, and uses an Elfman-style minor chord progression to turn it into a very morose fairytale..Song Pick: “Grande Finale”

Gladiator: This score has very intense, Pirates of the Caribbean-esque moments. But the beautiful and haunting songs which outline the tragedy of the hero’s past as well as the vigorously emotional score which serves as the climax at the debacle between Commodus and Lucilla make this score quite sad and quite deserving of mention. Song Pick: “Progeny” & “Am I Not Merciful?”

The Ring: The Ring is another Hans Zimmer score (the other being Gladiator). It’s music is ominous and creepy, in the Bernard Hermann sense, and has an overall feeling of relentless despair. Song Pick: “The Ferry”

Lord of the Rings: Particularly in the Two Towers, the entire score has moments of grandeur as well as those of darkness. Howard Shore makes use of tremolo strings to ignite fear and anxiety, and also powerful moments of horror. Song Pick: “A Storm is Coming” & “Gollum’s Song”

Passion of the Christ: Debny’s POTC score is quite analytically similar to Gladiator, but the music has a much different tone color. Still, cacophonous percussion on top of deeply anguished chords in strings and woodwinds and Arab-esque vocals (like “Am I Not Merciful”) create powerfully emotive scenes, and others which underscore evil or deplorable deeds are played by an eerie oboe and murmuring background music. Song Pick: “Resurrection”

The Godfather: The Godfather’s classic score, by Nino Rota, is not typical of the other’s on this list. Because the main “sad” songs are not very cinematic, they are very structured and typical of the era. The sorrowful yet infamous “Godfather” theme is repeated many times throughout the films’ scores and is often used quite skillfully to embellish the sadness of dramatic scenes. Song Pick: “End Credits (Godfather Theme)”