The Big Country


Film music, in my mind can eclipse many classic pieces as most are melodic, short and paint a picture more vivid that anything else could ever do.
Whilst gridlocked yesterday , I listened to this stirring score by Jerome Moross and after researching the film again was surprised to find out that it was one of Gregory Peck’s least favourite movies.

What is your favourite film score…….and why?


82 comments:

  1. One I always find stirringly heart-rending is Ennio Morricone's title music for the 1986 Film 'The Mission' (Robert de Niro, Jeremy irons). My emotions may be amplified by the fact that I first saw it in Paris, my then favourite city, in a particularly 'successful' visit there, just one of many during the 1980s, so it's doubly evocative for me.

    Btw: Another opening credits score I marvel at is that from Stanley Myers for the 1990 Anjelica Houston film 'The Witches' - completely original and spot-on appropriate for the subject matter. (Among Myers' numerous other credits his best known must be for 'The Deer Hunter', which includes the haunting 'Cavatina').

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    1. Raymondo gladyou were the first to comment . Excellent choices TheMission has some haunting themes for sure. Stanley Myers is a relative newbie for me.ineed to review the witches theme

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  2. The music for the opening scene of "Gladiator". Found it a brilliant build up excitement and tension.

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  3. The music for the Margaret Rutherford Miss Marple films, by Ron Goodwin. Just makes me smile and conjures up an image of bucolic England. xx

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    1. Yes, I agree. Ron Goodwin always delivered what he was asked to and fully deserved to be more celebrated. Just one example of his being the brilliant opening-titles song to an otherwise indifferent film 'Monte Carlo or Bust' - sung by none other than the unique and great Jimmy 'Schnozzle' Durante. It's better than all that follows!

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    2. 633 squadron. The battle of Britain. Where eagles dare

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    3. Yes. Goodwin created a long, long list - many of them just terrific.

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  4. Jane from Dorset7:54 am

    Great piece of music, terrible conductor!

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  5. The Big Bad and The Ugly film - reminds me of my dad - not that he was bad and ugly but whenever I hear the music which is often I recall him - He loved a western film x🐴🐎💥🌵

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    1. Just checked and it's another by Ennio Morricone -who Raybeard mentioned x

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    2. A first to use owrcusive sounds. Gunshots.claps mini voice overs

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  6. The music from the 1981 film Diva. It is so long ago I can scarcely remember it but I remember just adoring the music, and the film.

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    1. Oh Andrew yes ....the beautiful aria from LA Wally

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  7. Yorkshire Liz9:17 am

    Film music is always underrated. Anything by Bernard Hermann, John Barry. Roy Budd's jazz theme for. Get Carter. Lalo Schifrin's music for Bullitt. The irresistibly catchy theme to The Great Escape. William Walton's Spitfire music for First Of The Few. I could go on......

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    1. Bernard Herman . Another favourite of mine

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  8. There are just too many to list them all but always and anything by Hans Zimmer especially Now We Are Free from The Gladiator. And of course as mentioned by others anything by Ennio Morricone but especially The Mission.

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  9. Traveller10:41 am

    Again too many to choose just one but a couple come to mind: Chariots of Fire and Midnight Express.

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    1. Ah…..the 1980s had a style of their own

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  10. Lara's theme from Dr Zhivago. Makes me feel deeply emotional .

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    1. It’s sweeping , lyirical and quite wonderful

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    2. 'Somewhere my love, there will be skies of blue............' x

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  11. Film scores are often played on Classic FM - my usual morning listening.

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  12. Love the soundtrack from Local Hero by Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits fame.

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  13. Educating Rita. I bought the LP and played it over and over again. The music perfectly matched the storyline. Hairdresser wanting to better her life, husband who wanted a baby machine for a wife, they split up and Rita makes a new life. An emotional roller coaster which comes right in the end.

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    1. It’s funny how a soundtrack can mirror or sum up your life at the time

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    2. I think I have always had a somewhat independent streak in me. Moving around and wanting to make my life better.

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  14. Anonymous12:36 pm

    I love the theme music from The Big Country. I love the movie also, great movie. I'm not a big fan of Gregory Peck usually but I love him in 'Big Country'.
    The other movie I like him in is ' On the Beach' , also a great movie, although a bit on the dark side, not a movie to watch at Christmas!!🎄

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  15. I remember Classic FM playing Back to the Future during a school run. We pulled up at the school just as the music finished. The timing added to the happy start to the day. We also attended a live orchestral screening of the film at the Royal Albert Hall which was fun.

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  16. Last of the Mohicans or Gone With the Wind. Love the instruments in the Mohicans movie and I just love Gone With the Wind, period.

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    1. I'm absolutely with you on GWTW, Max Steiner's score and the film itself, though the latter now gets a lot of flak in its non-condemnatory depiction of slavery, which was a prevailing attitude of the time it was released (1939) - as well as in Margaret Mitchell's wonderful novel - , and even still when I first saw the film in the late 1950s. But the music score is truly a great one.

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    2. You beat me to it. I do love the music to the Last of the Mohicans

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    3. Steiner created another character with his music
      Tara became real under his direction

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  17. definitely The Last of the Mohicans, but also a 1983 film called Under Fire - music by Jerry Goldsmith

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    1. Last of thr mohicans was a stunning soundtrack I still have my dvd

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    2. I remember goldsmiths tracks from Star Trek and the omen ..just catching up with under fire . Thank u

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  18. John, your taste in music is much more refined than mine. There are soundtracks that are on repeat here - Message in a Bottle, Walk in the Woods, P.S. I Love You. I've been introduced to some great music through movie soundtracks.

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  19. Barbara Anne3:19 pm

    Chariots of Fire, The Name of the Rose, and Wind and the Lion. Sweet AMIL wore out a tape and CD from O BBrother Where A Thou.

    Hugs!

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  20. The first film score that really grabbed me by the ears was Nino Rota's score for "The Godfather." Also a big fan of John Williams' scores in the "Star Wars" movies.

    And hey, John, my blog post today is dedicated to you, lol --
    https://shewhoseeks.blogspot.com/2022/11/crocs-love-em-or-hate-em.html

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  21. Weird. The Big Country is our film of choice for this evening. We have a rather big dvd collection, all of it of substance. Haven't watched this one in ages. The music is excellent. What's your all time favourite film John?

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    1. Too many to mention but I will list a few

      All About Eve,
      The Towering Inferno
      Pans Labyrinth
      All about my mother
      Went The Day Well
      The Poseidon Adventure
      Beautiful Thing
      Weekend
      The Seven Samurai
      Gone With the Wind
      Central Station

      And hundreds more

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  22. The Lord of the Rings comes to mind and Jurassic Park... I've never even heard of the Big Country.. i will have to look it up. Hugs! deb

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    1. It’s a great western made better by the wonderful Jean Simmons

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  23. Anonymous4:59 pm

    Gladiator as mentioned, Out of Africa composed by John Barry, and English Patient composed by Gabriel Yared

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    1. The English Patient was beautifully scored.

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    2. Out of Africa always makes me tear up . Yared’s work is sublime

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  24. Just the other evening I watched the 1956 movie "The King and I" starring Deborah Kerr and Yul Brynner. It's an adaptation of the Broadway musical by Rogers and Hammerstein. The overture, I think, is thrilling in the way it captures Brynner's personality as the king. He played the king 4,625 times in stage performances from 1951 through 1985. What a man.

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    1. The procession of the royal children is the music I remember the/most

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    2. And the performance of "The Small House of Uncle Thomas" still amazes.

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    3. It has a wider message

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    4. The story goes that Mr Brynner, at least in his later London Palladium run (which I saw, though thought the film was better - not helped that in the performance I saw Virginia McKenna seemed to be having an 'off-day'.) he was impossible to work with as, even outside the theatre performances he insisted on always being addressed as and treated as his 'King' character. Mind you, he's hardly the first actor to make that particular demand. I know that Meryl Streep, when filming, tends to do likewise. However, she IS, as far as I know, the world's greatest on-screen actress!

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  25. Bali Hai is calling ...love anything from South Pacific .Also Madam Butterfly .

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    1. Not a lover of the South Pacific film , much preferred the stage version I saw in Sheffield

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  26. Got to be anything from Calamity Jane. A dear friend, sadly no longer with us, lived in a cafe, ran by her parents. It was actually adapted from an old Original Georgian Building and the Dining Room had fantastic high ceilings, which gave off a wonderful accustic sound. Joyous for two 10 year olds in love with Doris Day, belting out numbers and re-enacting the film score. Together with shouts from her Greek father, of 'keepa that ableedin' racket down you two'. Whip crack away, Tess x

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    1. “ Bless ma beautiful hide” …….

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  27. Tracy8:01 pm

    I can't say it is my very favourite film score, but A Fistful of Dollars was a big hit with me as an impressionable girl and started off two passions which have continued to this day (I'm 58) - Clint Eastwood and the wonderful Ennio Morricone. The combination of the two is cinematic heaven! I also love anything by John Barry and the sublime score for Master and Commander.

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    1. John Barry had some lovely pieces , Somewhere in time I think was he very best

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  28. Too many to list except Ladies in Lavender, Last of the Mohicans, Local Hero, Star Wars, West Side Story and on and on. Love Theme from El Cid too- gorgeous.

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    1. Miklós Ròzsa wrote the el cid music…magestic

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    2. He did a lot of the old Biblical epics- I have a CD of many of his memorable themes. So beautiful.

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  29. I remember leaving "Barry Lyndon" and wanting to find all the music I heard in it.

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  30. Schindler's list (John Williams), Blade Runner (Vangelis), Braveheart (James Horner)

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    1. Horner is another fav of mine …but williams is a true master

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    2. Traveller11:17 am

      Of course, how on earth did I not mention Bladerunner!

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  31. The Commitments. Would that count?

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    1. Barbara Anne12:43 am

      It counts with us. Love the movie and the music.

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  32. Anonymous4:57 am

    Raiders of the Lost Ark is one of my favorite film scores. -AK Coldweather

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  33. Anonymous6:40 am

    It’s TV series that I particularly remember. Midsommer murders is one, and Father Brown are two.

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  34. There are two films that I just loved the music, probably more, but I can't remember. 2 Days In The Valley and Guardians Of The Galaxy.

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  35. Anonymous3:22 pm

    Cinema Paradisio - can't get enough of it!

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