 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I have a personal definition of Fantasy that seems to be something along the lines of sword & sorcery, or anything involving knights/set in the middle ages even if it's historically based and no elements of magic in the film. I don't feel like Harry Potter fits, maybe because it's modernly-based, but looking at my criteria, I guess it does fit as I am unable to clearly define my inner understanding of what a fantasy film is, so what the heck, I'll include it. Hook should probably also fit, but I feel like its in a separate Swashbuckling category with other pirate films; with all due respect of course. Anyway, here are my top 8 fantasy scores (or top 14 if you're counting individual films)
Conan the Barbarian
How To Train Your Dragon (all 3)
Lord of the Rings (all 3)
Willow
Robin Hood Prince of Thieves
Harry Potter (The 3 John Williams ones)
Skyrim
Lair (Video game. Never played it, but I've always understood it to be about knights riding on Dragons)
Honorable mentions
All three Hobbit films, whatever their names are
Conan the Destroyer
Game of Thrones
King Arthur (Zimmer)
The Dark Crystal
Dawn of the Dragonslayer
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I guess that it doesn't really matter... science fiction or fantasy... because there is no proof that aliens exist - or that we can time travel?
Star Wars is "science fiction" because it's space ships, hardware and buttons. Cocoon is science fiction because it's aliens and spaceships, Back To the Future because it's time travel/alternate worlds etc. The line between science fiction and fantasy is certainly not clear cut, but still fairly easy to draw. Of course, Star Wars is not "hard sf" (no one claims it is), but it's space opera, and as such belongs to the genre of science fiction by tradition. It's basically like Damon Knight (IIRC) once said (something like): if it's robots, machines, spaceships, it's science fiction, if it's magic, elves, fairly tales, it's fantasy.
|
|
|
|
|
|
So many good choices and I don't want to just be on repeat.
Since Joe Hisaishi's Mononoke was mentioned, let's consider some more of the best fantasy scores ever, all from the same pen:
Spirited Away
Porco Rosso
Howl's Moving Castle
And these aren't too shabby either:
Totoro
Nausicaa
Kiki's Delivery Service
Ponyo
Castle in the Sky
The Tale of the Princess Kaguya
And then a sentimental favorite/guilty pleasure - Dungeons & Dragons by Justin Caine Burnett, a really enjoyable album for an uber-meh movie.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
1. LOTR: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, The Return of the King
2. Conan the Barbarian
3. Black Beauty
4. Edward Scissorhands
5. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
6. How to Train Your Dragon
7. The Mummy Returns
8. Mulan
9. The Secret of NIMH
10. Snow White and the Huntsman
Honorable mentions: Alice in Wonderland (Elfman), 47 Ronin (Eshkeri), later seasons of Game of Thrones, Legend (Tangerine Dream), Beauty and the Beast (Adenot), Princess Mononoke, Conan the Destroyer, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
I've excluded anything that's at all sci-fi or more obviously horror as well as any and all superhero scores (most of which are firmly in the sci-fi category though Wonder Woman and Thor could easily be considered fantasy and those five are all excellent scores). Hopefully there will be a superhero category at some point!
I considered but left off Big Trouble in Little China (I see Ny has listed it here and it's a perfectly valid choice, but I suppose the horror influences precluded me from including it).
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
10 slots could be easily filled by Italian soundtracks from the early '60s with many a peplum having phantasmagorical aspects, but I pared down my entries to half European/half English with several on either sides of the '60s.
Here they are in chronological order:
The Luck of the Irish by Cyril J. Mockridge
Alessandro Cicognini's 1954 Ulysses
The Lost World by Paul Sawtell & Bert Shefter
Il gigante di Metropolis by Armando Trovajoli
The Wonders of Aladdin by A.F. Lavagnino
Stanley Black's War-Gods of the Deep
More Than a Miracle by Piero Piccioni
Michel Magne's unused music for Barbarella
The Island at the Top of the World by Maurice Jarre
Alex North's Dragonslayer
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I’m surprised no one has mentioned Dimitri Tiomkin’s masterwork, LOST HORIZON (1937).
|
|
|
|
|
|
10. Tie -- Clash of the Titans (Rosenthal) / The NeverEnding Story (German version -- Doldinger)
9. Hook (Williams)
8. Highlander (Kamen)
7. Conan The Barbarian (Poledouris)
6. Krull (Horner)
5. Heavy Metal (Bernstein)
4. The Dark Crystal (Jones)
3. Legend (Goldsmith)
2. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Williams)
1. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Williams)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
