@William said:

 It would be very easy to make the case that Bach is the greatest musician and composer who ever lived. 

Yes - very very easy.

But of course you then get into genres and styles. Basically, more intelligent and studied music theorists and historians than I would say that all music is a sort of continuation of what goes before. Ergo, Mozart takes elements of Bach - Beethoven takes elements of Mozart, Haydn and Bach and so on and so forth.

It's also worth remembering that Bach did not invent the Baroque style - he and Handel were just complete masters of it in many different ways. One, seemingly not driven solely through the constraints of payment with an enormous bias toward so-called sacred composition - the other far more commercial in his outlook and certainly more than capable of writing sacred music for as much money as he could get. Either way - they were both 'true' geniuses.

So we now go from 300 years ago to today. Jaded people could be forgiven in not necessarily seeing that much in the way of any improvement.

Well, Bach had many opportunities to compose not exactly "commercial" music, but music that did support him, for example with the chuches where he was in charge of music. The cantatas were a "gig" in that he had to do one for each service.  So he wrote a ton of cantatas.

Handel seemed like quite a character, ending up as a big shot in England and writing for just about everything conceivable.  The most insane thing he wrote has got to be the original Fireworks Music, which was scored for 9 Trumpets, 9 Horns, Timpani, 12 Bassoons and 24 Oboes, all of which were listed as "Warlike Instruments."  

 All right, now that I diverted the intensive discussion of James (I"ll steal anything that moves!) Horner with Bach and Handel I feel much better...

Perhaps the greatest of all these scores for a bad movie is one I have mentioned before but is worth mentioning again - "Obsession" by Herrmann.  This was for the stupid Vertigo-ripoff film by Brian de Palma which made no sense and was essentially "let's take Vertigo and screw it up in many different ways!"   But the score by Herrmann is absolutely beautiful, with a full orchestra augmented by choir and pipe organ supplying intense drama and vivid imagery to compensate for the lame story. 

It might be worth recounting Herrmann's own advice (as recounted by John Williams);

When he was talking to a class of Composition for the Screen students he asked the class what kind of composers they wanted to be. The students answered "film composers". Herrmann said "Wrong - you want to be a GOOD composer".

I'm sure I haven't quoted it verbatim but you get the gist...

M

I like the idea of Handel becoming a BIG SHOT in England!!!!!   :D:D:D

Herrmann wrote that whistling piece for a film called Twisted Nerve - not a great film by any standards - but if you're  ever forced to go into a supermarket, you can whistle it while you're walking down the aisles and it really annoys the dirty scum. HAHAaaaaaaaa.

Standards are very different today. Last night I watched Whistle and I'll Come to You - a 40 minute BBC Omnibus program from 1968. Based on a story by MR James, a part - time ghost story writer - program makers today just don't seem to be able to access that class of material.

Yes, I have the soundtrack album for the Twisted Nerve.  It is excellent music though I have no idea of how good the film is. 

M. R. James is the greatest ghost story writer of all time, probably.  His stories were ultra-subtle and extremely creepy - the way you would think a real ghost would be. Like someone will see a figure, just standing on a street corner, and only realize much later that it was a ghost.  The Sixth Sense is definitely in the M. R. James tradition.  Also, the original Japanese versions of Ringu (The Ring) and Ju-on (The Grudge) which were absolutely DESTROYED by the damnable American dumbed-down remakes - in which all the M. R. James subtlety and therefore all the actual fear were lost -  and which no one seems to notice are bad and a travesty of something great. 

There are a couple of American films fairly recently that really throw me. Don't really know how to categorize them. Based on the films, I think the music works extremely well and these films are beautifully photographed in my opinion. These two films are in the bogey man genre - ummm I can't remember what they're called. I'll look it up.

Edit: I can't look them up because I don't know what they're called and don't recall any actors names....so - the second one takes place on a school bus that has it's tyres blown out.

@PaulR said:

There are a couple of American films fairly recently that really throw me. Don't really know how to categorize them. Based on the films, I think the music works extremely well and these films are beautifully photographed in my opinion. These two films are in the bogey man genre - ummm I can't remember what they're called. I'll look it up.

Edit: I can't look them up because I don't know what they're called and don't recall any actors names....so - the second one takes place on a school bus that has it's tyres blown out.

Complete guess based on the "bus" and "bogey man" mentions - Jeepers Creepers?

M

Yes Mosso - you got it in one!

Well glad to be of some help!

I didn't actually see the 2nd film. I did enjoy the first one, at least up until the point when we finally got a look at the "monster". After that I thought it became more like a run-of-the-mill monster flick. My tastes in horror are definitely influenced by a viewing of Alien as a youngster - the less you see of the monsters the better!

M

@mosso said:

Well glad to be of some help!

 My tastes in horror are definitely influenced by a viewing of Alien as a youngster - the less you see of the monsters the better!

M

Uh-oh - now you've gone and done it!  [:D][:P]

@mosso said:

I didn't actually see the 2nd film. I did enjoy the first one, at least up until the point when we finally got a look at the "monster". After that I thought it became more like a run-of-the-mill monster flick. My tastes in horror are definitely influenced by a viewing of Alien as a youngster - the less you see of the monsters the better!

M

So what did you think of Cloverfield?  As far as I remember, Cloverfield is musicless until the very ending credits.  If you haven't seen it, go check it out.  Very innovative.  In total, I think the monster is only visible for some thirty seconds. 

@mosso said:

I didn't actually see the 2nd film. I did enjoy the first one, at least up until the point when we finally got a look at the "monster". After that I thought it became more like a run-of-the-mill monster flick. My tastes in horror are definitely influenced by a viewing of Alien as a youngster - the less you see of the monsters the better!

M

So what did you think of Cloverfield?  As far as I remember, Cloverfield is musicless until the very ending credits.  If you haven't seen it, go check it out.  Very innovative.  In total, I think the monster is only visible for some thirty seconds. 

Yeah I already saw Cloverfield. It was basically the Blair Witch Godzilla Project (I'm pretty sure that's how they pitched it to the studios). I remember thinking the handheld camerawork helped it feel more "real" (although I know some people who said it gave them motion sickness) and the effects were, of course, great. I seem to remember the kids were kinda stupid (lots of the "let's split up" factor), but hey, isn't that par for the course where a horror movie is concerned?

I'm pretty sure all the same cliches apply to Alien. I just wasn't aware of them when I first saw it!

"Guy's - I've got a great idea! There's a vicious alien hiding in the air ducts so why doesn't just one of us go in there and flush 'em out?"

"I dunno Cap'n - won't it just, like, eat you?"

"Don't be daft - I've got a homemade flamethrower"

...and so on...

M

 You're right about not showing the monster.  Nowadays all they do is show the monster.   "Show me the monster!" screamed the producer.  I like the film that "Alien"  was stolen from - it was called "It the Terror from Beyond Space" and was much better than the later overblown, overly expensive potboiler everybody thought was so amazing. Oh look!  Sigourney Weaver's got her underwear on! Oh look - the alien popped out of the guy's chest!"  ZZZZZZzzzzzzz.........

In the days of Val Lewton, like in Cat People, Seventh Victim or I Walked with a Zombie, the whole idea was to use imagination instead of special FX.  Though they were trying to use their low budget frugally, it also applied to the way those stories were done in general, suggesting everything including the psychology, settings, etc.   By the way those films also have great scores by Roy Webb, a little known composer today.

You have to understand that I'm  so completely shallow, that Sigourney Weaver in her underwear is usually good enough for me. What's disappointing these days is that Ridley Scott tends to go for overblown CGI and that bores me to death. This 2012 thing looks like s h i t to me. However. John Carpenter's The Thing is absolutely great in my view. As is Escape from New York - the Snake Plissken character is perfect Americana of the 80's.

"What are you doing up there Snake?"

"Playing with myself - I"M GOING IN!"

I love it when Yanks are 'going in'. [:P][:D]

Yeah - Terror from Beyond Space is a great film ( I think they set fire and then electrocute the 'being' in that one - and that's always good for me) and Quatermass 50's tv took a lot from that. I remember being left alone in the house in the 50's when the only tv channel then was the one BBC channel - and the tv production of Quatermass came on (you would get Champion the Wonder Horse, Whirlybirds and then Quatermass in those days). Haven't recovered to this point. There are far too many tv channels nowadays, so one tends to get mass produced crap being delivered most of the time - including films that are simply made for dvd and tv.

I watched the 1940's production of Jane Eyre last night actually - that is brilliant and brilliantly produced and photographed. Music is by Bernard Herrmann (quite eccentric music) and it's well worth watching just to remind oneself of what it was like before pandering to uneducated morons became the norm. 

@PaulR said:

What's disappointing these days is that Ridley Scott tends to go for overblown CGI and that bores me to death. This 2012 thing looks like s h i t to me.

Ridley Scott didn't do 2012, and if you look at his list of recent movies, very few are FX heavy.

Carpenter's The Thing is the maybe the most truly scary "monster movie" ever made.  It uses the actual story by John Campbell, instead of the silly version that was so distorted in the 1950s film. Though the 50s film is also great, but mainly in its acting and dialogue and pacing, rather than being actually frightening.   But John Carpenter's film is simply the most hideous, damnable story imaginable,  done perfectly.  It is a thousand times better than Alien, but was a bomb at the box office.  Just like Big Trouble in Little China, which was a thousand times better than Indiana Jones and bombed.  Critics hated both flms - showing that critics are morons.  John Carpenter had some bad luck on those films, though they are now called "cult classics."  

On Jane Eyre,  that production is spectacular, over-the-top Uber-Romantic with Orson Welles fantastically good as usual.  It is aggravating that the story had to be cut down to feature length.  Like Olivier's Hamlet - they are both the best films ever made of those subjects, but unfortunately had to be done in a very abridged form.   Hamlet was cut in to about half length to fit the feature length format.  Too bad that Olivier could not be allowed to do the same full-length version that Branagh later did, not so well.

@William said:

 You're right about not showing the monster.  Nowadays all they do is show the monster.   "Show me the monster!" screamed the producer.  I like the film that "Alien"  was stolen from - it was called "It the Terror from Beyond Space" and was much better than the later overblown, overly expensive potboiler everybody thought was so amazing. Oh look!  Sigourney Weaver's got her underwear on! Oh look - the alien popped out of the guy's chest!"  ZZZZZZzzzzzzz.........

In the days of Val Lewton, like in Cat People, Seventh Victim or I Walked with a Zombie, the whole idea was to use imagination instead of special FX.  Though they were trying to use their low budget frugally, it also applied to the way those stories were done in general, suggesting everything including the psychology, settings, etc.   By the way those films also have great scores by Roy Webb, a little known composer today.

Actually, Alien was a fairly low budget movie for science fiction, it only cost 11 million.  It's funny to see criticism of Alien since it is considered by many to be one of the best scifi films ever made, and it is specifically praised for getting maximum suspense out of not showing the alien much and relying more on the psychology of the situations.  The Thing wasn't much lower budget, and it probably has a comparable amount of FX (and considerably more gore, which is what got it many of the bad reviews).  I haven't seen Big Trouble yet, but I'll have to check it out...but I'm skeptical it could be that much better than Raiders, which pretty much nailed that genre.

The Thing is a well deserved cult classic.  Also, the pulsating electronic score by Ennio Morricone and John Carpenter (uncredited) is one of my favorites.  Thanks to video and DVD The Thing did finally turn a profit and earned its rightful place in the lexicon of classic spook flicks.  On Halloween, here in the states, some isolated movie theaters run The Thing to sold out crowds. 

I'm afraid I'm going to have to respectfully disagree with you on Big Trouble in Little China William.  Although it was better than all of the stupid martial arts revival movies of the 80's and I generally liked the film, Big Trouble.. wasn't better than Indiana Jones.  I think it was just too gimmicky.  Maybe if they had kept the original screenplay and left it set in the old west instead of contemporary San Francisco it might have made a difference.  On second thought, Big Trouble... is better than Indiana Jones 4, The Curse of the Big Shinny Alien Skull, or whatever it's called.

There are two recent spook movies that I find refreshing in a pretty stale genre.  One is called Wind Chill which has some logic problems and unnecessary scenes but it's a good jump out of your seat old fashion ghost story.  The other one is a British production (I think) set in the Appalachian Mountains called The Decent.  It wasn't that scary and the ending was lame but it sure was creepy as hell.

Oh what were we discussing on this thread again?