Which of the films has your favourite score?

That classic Jerry Goldsmith Main Title introduced in TMP leading into The Mountain is one of the most beautiful pieces in the franchise.

I just don't see how heavily riffing another film's score can be praised. Yes, it may be nicer to listen to as it's added a few more good tracks while keeping the great in the last film, but then it's more of a "best of" collection than anything in that way.

 

I don't get the complaints about TSFS sounding like TWOK. It's the same composer writing for the same franchise. But besides that, he did expand on many of the ideas in TWOK and TSFS ultimately is a different sounding score.

Neil

 

I did say 'despite'

 

I also like Star Trek III's liberal use of the Alexander Courage fanfare. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if I found out Horner used it more times than all the other films put together.

 

I completely agree. It's hard to choose between the first two scores. Both have so many strengths.

On the other hand, the ST IV soundtrack bugs me. Not that it's bad, per se. I just found it to be a repeat in many ways of the soundtrack for Ralph Bakshi's animated version of The Lord of the Rings (1978). I enjoyed Leonard Rosenman's score under LoTR, but didn't appreciate hearing it again under a Star Trek movie...

 

The Search For Spock would be my choice, with The Wrath of Khan second.

 

The two best themes in STIV were the chase themes, Chekov's Run and Hospital Chase. So Star Trek, in so many ways, when that wasn't even the intent.

 

Is it me or anyone else noticed that James Horner reused some arangements he did for TWOK in ALIENS?? When watching TWOK last week I recognized some parts of the ALIENS soundtrack in it.

Anyway, my vote goes undoubtedly to STTMP - There Is No Comparison!

 

James Horner spent much of his first decade or so doing movie scores reusing and rehashing themes and arrangements, sometimes applying them so well to specific scenes and films that those productions are the ones everyone remembers them for. Much of the STII and STIII music is heard in some form or other in films as diverse as Humanoids From The Deep, Aliens, and Krull, as well as both Trek films.

 

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. I consider it Goldsmith's best.

 

1. STTMP- Hard to beat this one. It sounds truly inspired.
2. STII-James Horner gets repetitive but here, he put all his best work into one movie.
3. ST09-Memorable music from the intro, and from the End credits are the highlights.
4. STVI- Dark and different was what was needed here. One of the best aspects of the movie.

 

TMP...A sense of awe and menace, wrapped in the alien and unknowable, with a sprinkling of optimism and hope for the future....still listen to it quite often...it gets you in a mood.

 

I voted for TFF. I like the Goldsmith theme, and thought it sounded slightly better here, and "The Mountain" was a nice addition. Probably the worst film, but my favorite score.

 

Cocoon reuses about 30 seconds' worth of the TWOK score (the bit where Spock repairs the engines) during the climactic Coast Guard chase scene too.

 

And that music wasn't even by Horner! It's from Sinfonia da Requiem by Benjamin Britten. Go to 11:38 in the video below.



Neil

 

Really love the undiscovered country score. Also like first contact, wrath of Kahn and the final frontier scores.

 

Wow!

 

As a followup (exactly ten posts later!) to my previous post, James Horner was also notorious through much of the eighties and nineties for borrowing themes from other composers. His opening credit theme for Aliens, for instance was the Khachaturian theme from 2001, reworked very little and slid into place in the later film.

 

You make it sound as if it was written for 2001. It wasn't. It was from the ballet, "Gayane", by Aram Khachaturian.

Neil

 

As much as I disliked most of the Star Trek films, I thought the one element all of the films got right and were appropriate were the composers assigned to their films. Scores were great, especially Star Trek: Generations score; it was everything the movie wasn't but I still get goosebumps listening to it on Youtube.