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Inchon.
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Star Trek: TMP could be watched with another score. It wouldn't be nearly as good but it would be watchable. I dare say that Inchon is unwatchable without the superior score Goldsmith gave it. So which needed his score more? A film that was reasonably professional and had a followable story or a film that has no coherent story, no technical or acting expertise whatsoever and no other aspect to even make it bearable to watch?
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I think STAR TREK - THE MOTION PICTURE may well stand out.
It remains to this day my favorite STAR TREK movie, partly because of Goldsmith's grandiose score.
THE FINAL CONFLICT had a fantastic Goldsmith score indeed, but as Mr. Jack has mentioned, even with Goldsmith's score it was still a pretty bad movie. STAR TREK - THE MOTION PICTURE, on the other hand, was transformed into something grand.
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Inchon and Star Trek The Motion Picture are definite stand-outs.
Let me throw this one into the ring: Explorers.
Interesting... I have always liked EXPLORERS. Admittedly, I love Goldsmith's score as well, it is another clear favorite of mine.. hard to separate the two. :-)
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I remember once having a conversation about how Jerry Goldsmith "saved Star Trek: The Motion Picture, but it's still an awful movie."
At which point I had to say, "Well, if it's still an awful movie, then he didn't save it, did he?"
My point here is only that for a score to "save" a film, it actually has to make the film good. Or at least, good enough. It's an oxymoron to say a score saves a film and then say the film is still terrible. And if the score actually makes the film good, we're probably going to miss it from this conversation, because ... we think of it as good! And yet that would be exactly the right film for this conversation.
(i.e. "Explorers" might be a great answer.)
In John Barry world, such a film might actually be "Out Of Africa". We love that film. (Well, most people do.) But it was reportedly a dreary mess before the score was added. And yet we are unlikely to name that film, because it is thought of as good. Instead, we are likely to go for a "bad" film (a film the score didn't actually 'save'), like "Raise The Titanic".
Films like "The Final Conflict" and "Raise The Titanic" are not examples of films saved by their scores. They are examples of films we watch only because we enjoy the scores. Films like "Out Of Africa" are actually the examples of films where the scores 'saved' the film and therefore were the ones really needy for their respective composers.
In other words: the answer to the question possibly isn't a list of bad films but a list of good films.
So, what are the good films but might not have been without JG's score?
I submit that one is "The Omen", the best film in the Omen trilogy rather than the worst.
Actually, unlike this person I speak of, I love "Star Trek: The Motion Picture". The thing is, it's hard to tell whether I'd have loved it with another score or not, because once a film is successfully scored you just can't imagine it any other way. But, I might say this is another film that really needed JG because, like "Out Of Africa" it probably wouldn't have worked without it. But with it, it does.
Cheers
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I remember once having a conversation about how Jerry Goldsmith "saved Star Trek: The Motion Picture, but it's still an awful movie."
At which point I had to say, "Well, if it's still an awful movie, then he didn't save it, did he?"
My point here is only that for a score to "save" a film, it actually has to make the film good. Or at least, good enough. It's an oxymoron to say a score saves a film and then say the film is still terrible. And if the score actually makes the film good, we're probably going to miss it from this conversation, because ... we think of it as good! And yet that would be exactly the right film for this conversation.
Indeed, I agree with you. Which is why ST - TMP perhaps fits in here, and maybe EXPLORERS as well. I like both of these movies, and a lot of it has to do with the scores.
I love the score for THE FINAL CONFLICT, too, but not even that glorious music can fully convince me that I'm watching a good movie.
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