The film music of 2025.

Another year of composers sticking it to the man and writing memorable film music. Let's take a gander.

My favorite scores of 2025:

(Theodore Shapiro - Lakeshore)
Wonderfully sinuous music that played like a soundtrack for a much better version of this movie.
Favorite cues: “Into the Lion’s Den”, “I Know Who You Are”, “We Belong Together”

(Danny Elfman - Because)
With this latest adaptation, Elfman was in his element; dark, yet beautiful.
Favorite cues: “Detective Work”, “The Dance”, “Amen”

(Alan Silvestri - Netflix)
Whatever one could say about the movie, Silvestri throwing back to his Back to the Future heyday was greatly appreciated.
Favorite cues: “The Year the World Changed”, “See Where the Day Takes Us”, “The Day is Ours”

(Carter Burwell - Lakeshore)
Burwell provided this comedy with a mix of light pop and heavenly grandeur.
Favorite cues: “Wings Over L.A.”, “You’re Gonna Make Me Go Back?”, “A Life Worth Living”

(Howard Drossin - A24)
The kind of bold, upfront music that seems to have disappeared from cinema.
Favorite cues: "Somebody Got Trey", “We Got This”, “Free Yung Felon”

(John Powell - Back Lot)
Okay, so Powell wrote this score fifteen years ago, but that didn’t stop it from still kicking ass.
Favorite cues: “I Hit a Night Fury”, Test Driving Toothless”, “We Have Dragons”

(Nicholas Britell - Netflix)
A truly lovely effort and a career-best score from Britell.
Favorite cues: “Practicing the Score”, “Here in Italy/Driving With Alba”, “Jay Kelly Suite”

(Alexandre Desplat - Back Lot)
Desplat got to put his own stamp on the franchise with his rambunctious music.
Favorite cues: “Boat Chase”, “Crossing the River/T-Rex”, “Bella and the Beast”

(Brian Tyler - Lakeshore)
The third time was the charm for Tyler, pulling off some interesting new tricks.
Favorite cues: “Upstaged”, “A Twist in the Tail”, “The Vandenberg Family”

(Brian Tyler - Sony Classical)
Tyler responded well to the subject matter, crafting one of his most substantive works.
Favorite cues: “Begin”, “Goring and Hess”, “End Titles”

(Alan Silvestri - La La Land)
Silvestri’s too-cool-for-school music may have been even more fun than the (entertaining) movie.
Favorite cues: “Main Titles”, “Rob an Entire Country”, “The Vault”

(Benjamin Wallfisch - Netflix)
The highlight of an especially eclectic year for Wallfisch; a grand thriller score.
Favorite cues: “The Yacht”, “Carrie”, “The Gala”

Other good scores of 2025:

The Alto Knights (David Fleming), Desperate Journey (Ilan Eshkeri), Dog Man (Tom Howe), Downton Abbey: the Grand Finale (John Lunn), Dust Bunny (Isabella Summers), Final Destination: Bloodlines (Tim Wynn), Fountain of Youth (Chris Benstead), Frankenstein (Alexandre Desplat), One Battle After Another (Jonny Greenwood), Presence (Zack Ryan) and The SpongeBob Movie: Search for SquarePants (John Debney)

My favorite CDs of 2025:

Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein...and the Keystone Kops (Frank Skinner, William Lava, Herman Stein and Henry Mancini - Intrada) - Skinner’s scary/fun score for the classic horror-comedy was topped off with the Mickey-mousing madness of …Keystone Kops.

The Bruce Broughton Collection - Vol. 1 (Dragon's Domain) - A pair of solid TV-movie thriller scores that gave ample hints of the compositional force yet to hit the big screen.

The Celluloid Closet (Carter Burwell - Quartet) - Perhaps, the biggest shock of the year; a stirring score for the underrated documentary.

Class (Elmer Bernstein - Quartet) - The only 80s teen comedy on Bernstein’s resume was propelled by a nicely stirring main theme.

The Dark Crystal (Trevor Jones - La La Land) - Arguably Jones’s magnum opus, brought to powerful, melodic life in this complete release.

Flatliners (James Newton Howard - Intrada) - Howard brought together a lot of disparate elements for this thriller, resulting in one of his first great scores.

The Lalo Schifrin Collection - Vol. 1 (Dragon's Domain) - A collection of previously released minor classics joined by the debut of Day of the Animals. Enough said. Now bring on Love and Bullets and/or The Manitou!

A League of Their Own (Hans Zimmer - Intrada) - Zimmer’s first collaboration with Penny Marshall owed a debt to Randy Newman, but it was great fun, all the same.

The Secret of N.I.M.H. (Jerry Goldsmith - Intrada) - Every blessed note of this spellbinding score was finally made available, revealing the full breadth of Goldsmith’s storytelling prowess.

The Twelve Chairs (John Morris - Quartet) - Perhaps the most forgotten of Mel Brooks’ movies, given a Morris score that was equally joyous and melancholy, while showcasing Brooks’s wonderful theme song.

Other great CDs of 2025:

Beverly Hills Cop III (Nile Rodgers - La La Land)

Cape Fear (Bernard Herrmann - Quartet)

The Chairman (Jerry Goldsmith - Intrada)

Crimson Tide (Hans Zimmer - Intrada)

Devil in a Blue Dress (Elmer Bernstein - La La Land)

How Did You Get In? We Didn't See You Leave (Alan Silvestri - Music Box)

Starship Invasions (Gil Melle - Dragon's Domain)

Table for Five (John Morris - Dragon's Domain)

The Three Musketeers (Michael Kamen - Intrada)

Union Pacific: the Paramount Westerns Collection - Vol. 2 (various - La La Land)

Random thoughts:

- In listening to the scores for these year-end posts, I, inevitably, found myself running into a composer whose music filled me with such ennui, if not outright hatred, that I was pretty much forced to cut them off cold turkey. There were quite a few on that short list, but just missing it was recent Oscar winner Volker Bertelmann. His music is less bad than a lot of the people I run into, but there’s just no life to it. Just, you know, ‘punch in, provide 50 minutes to an hour of droning porridge and that’s it, let’s do it again, sometime’. He had a whopping six scores from the previous year many of which fell into the ‘porridge’ category. There was a little more life in the score for the animated movie Grand Prix of Europe, but nothing terribly memorable, but then came Ballad of a Small Player. It didn’t end up making the top 25, but holy piss, it’s like Bertelmann‘s battery got switched on. Why isn’t he writing music this lively all the time?

- Okay, according to Scott Bettencourt, none of these scores - among the top hundred of those I listened to for the year-end cram session - have received physical releases of any kind (and, no, LPs do not count because why the fuck would they?): The Alto Knights, The Amateur, Americana, Anaconda, Another Simple Favor, Avatar: Fire and Ash, The Bad Guys 2, Ballad of a Small Player, Bugonia, Captain America: Brave New World, The Conjuring: Last Rites, David, The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie, Desperate Journey, Dog Man, Dracula: a Love Tale, Dust Bunny, Eden, Ella McCay, The Electric State, Elio, Eternity, The Fantastic Four: First Steps, Final Destination: Bloodlines, Fixed, Fountain of Youth, Gabby's Dollhouse: the Movie, Good Fortune, Grand Prix of Europe, Highest 2 Lowest, Honey, Don't!, The Housemaid, I Know What You Did Last Summer, In Your Dreams, Jay Kelly, The King of Kings, The Legend of Ochi, Long Distance, A Loud House Christmas: Naughty or Nice, Marty Supreme, Materialists, A Minecraft Movie, The Naked Gun, Now You See Me: Now You Don't, Nuremberg, Oh, Hi!, One of Them Days, Paddington in Peru, The Phoenician Scheme, Predator: Badlands, Predator: Killer of Killers, Presence, Primitive War, The Roses, Rule Breakers, Sarah's Oil, Smurfs, Snow White, Soul on Fire, The SpongeBob Movie: Search for SquarePants, Stitch Head, Thunderbolts*, 28 Years Later, Until Dawn, Wake Up, Dead Man, The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep, William Tell, Wolf Man, The Woman in Cabin 10 and Zootopia 2. Clearly, something needs to change...or change back. Varese Sarabande, where art thou?**

- I can only wonder if it was a scheduling conflict that kept Terence Blanchard away from scoring Highest 2 Lowest for Spike Lee, but his orchestrator, Howard Drossin, stepped in and - I think - did a damn fine job. However, most people on the internet don’t quite agree with me, calling this, if you can believe it, ‘one of the worst scores I’ve ever heard!’*. There was an honest-to-blog Goldsmith riff in “Somebody Got Trey” and people are calling this one of the worst scores they’ve ever heard?! It’s just the sort of thing to put someone firmly on Team God, Please Flood This Worthless Fucking Planet.

- I finally figured out Benjamin Wallfisch. When he stays away from any kind of musical distortion, he’s one of our greatest living composers. I’ll definitely keep this in my back pocket if I ever get to work with him.

* - Unless they’ve heard the likes of these, those people can fuck all the way off with their ‘worst score ever!’ talk:

Dunkirk (Hans Zimmer)
Evilspeak (Roger Kellaway)
I Saw What You Did (Van Alexander)
Loverboy (Michel Colombier)
Mr. and Mrs. Smith (Edward Ward)
Sharky’s Machine (Doc Severinsen!!)
Star Trek: Generations (Dennis McCarthy)

** - Oh, and for shits and giggles, here's how I think the physical CD situation would've broken down in a better year:

Hollywood
The Amateur
Avatar: Fire and Ash
Captain America: Brave New World
The Fantastic Four: First Steps
Predator: Badlands
Predator: Killer of Killers
The Roses
Thunderbolts*

Lakeshore
Another Simple Favor
Bugonia
Good Fortune
Honey, Don't!
The Housemaid
Rule Breakers
Stitch Head

La La Land
The Bad Guys 2
The Naked Gun
Primitive War (because this is probably the only way a 90-minute album like this would ever see a physical release)

Milan
David
Eden
Eternity
The King of Kings
The Legend of Ochi
A Loud House Christmas: Naughty or Nice
Marty Supreme
Materialists
William Tell
The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep

Sony Classical
Anaconda
Fixed
I Know What You Did Last Summer
Nuremberg
Oh, Hi!
One of Them Days
Paddington in Peru
28 Years Later
Until Dawn

Varese Sarabande
Americana
Ballad of a Small Player
Desperate Journey
Dog Man
Dracula: a Love Tale
The Electric State
Ella McCay
Fountain of Youth
Gabby's Dollhouse: the Movie
Highest 2 Lowest
In Your Dreams
Jay Kelly
Long Distance
Now You See Me: Now You Don't
Smurfs
Soul on Fire
The SpongeBob Movie: Search for SquarePants
Wake Up, Dead Man
Wolf Man

Walt Disney
Elio
Snow White
Zootopia 2

WaterTower
The Alto Knights
The Conjuring: Last Rites
Final Destination: Bloodlines
Grand Prix of Europe
The Day the Earth Blew Up: a Looney Tunes Movie
A Minecraft Movie

I didn't include The Phoenician Scheme, Presence or Sarah's Oil, because the score content on those albums is less than 30 minutes. Paying $17.99 for a 20-minute album? Honey don't play dat.