Many different kinds of popular music can create dramatic moments in film, both diegetically and non-diegetically. The temporal aspects of most popular music, its steady beat and generally common time meter, affect the resulting film differently than classical film scoring does. Through creating new popular-style music for films (scoring), editing exiting popular music to fit a film, or editing filmic images to fit existing popular music (tracking), many different techniques and styles are possible. The Beatles, with their pop music films in the 1960s, changed how popular music worked in movies, as well as inherently changing the way film musicals functioned. Although there were earlier films that used popular music, such as King Creole (1958) and Rock Around the Clock (1956), the Beatles’ films were the first where pop music was not mixed with traditional film music techniques; the resulting films were a hybrid of documentary style with the drama of feature films. Different styles of music can accomplish different things; for example, psychedelic music is often used to signify surrealism or drug use, while rap music is used as a dramatic shock tactic and older popular music signifies an earlier time period. Regardless of the type of music or approach, pop music also invites a tension between creativity and commerce that did not previously exist with classical film music techniques.

Works: Joe Massot (director): Wonderwall (5, 19, 39-42, 53, 124); Roger Corman (director): The Trip (5, 34-36, 38, 42-43); Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg (directors): Performance (5, 41-42, 53, 93, 122); Albert and David Maysles (directors): Gimme Shelter (5, 63-64, 66-67, 72); Michael Wadleigh (director): Woodstock (5, 64, 66, 72); George Lucas (director): American Graffiti (5, 106, 138-41); Barry Shear (director): Across 110th Street (16, 79, 83, 86); Richard Lester (director): A Hard Day’s Night (19-25), Help! (19, 25-29); George Dunning (director): Yellow Submarine (19, 38-39); John Boorman (director): Catch Us If You Can (22); Mike Nichols (director): The Graduate (33); Woody Allen (director): What’s Up Tiger Lily (33); Richard Rush (director): Psych Out (35, 43); Dennis Hopper (director): Easy Rider (36-37, 53); Bob Rafelson (director): Head (37); Barbet Schroeder (director): More (45, 49-50, 52-56), La Vallée (45, 53, 56); Michelangelo Antonioni (director): Zabriskie Point (45, 52-53, 55, 58); Alan Parker (director): Pink Floyd - The Wall (45, 57); Peter Sykes (director): The Committee (45, 53-54, 58); Peter Whitehead (director): Tonite Let’s All Make Love in London (53); Roy Battersby (director): The Body (55); David Elfick (director): Crystal Voyager (56); Martin Scorsese (director): The Last Waltz (63, 73, 76); D. A. Pennebaker (director): Don’t Look Back (63-66, 72); Gordon Parks (director): Shaft (79, 81, 84, 86-88, 91); Melvin Van Peebles (director): Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song (79, 81, 84, 86-87); Gordon Parks Jr. (director): Super Fly (79, 81, 84, 86, 88-92); Ossie Davis (director): Cotton Comes to Harlem (81-82); Larry Cohen (director): Black Caesar (81, 90-91); Leslie H. Martinson (director): Batman (105, 107-111); Tim Burton (director): Batman Returns (105, 112-14); Joel Schumacher (director): Batman Forever (105, 114-17), Batman and Robin (105, 115, 117-18); Richard Loncraine (director): Brimstone and Treacle (140); Lawrence Kasdan (director): The Big Chill (141); Bruce Robinson (director): Withnail and I (141); David Green (director): Buster (141-42); Tony Scott (director): Top Gun (143); Michael Mann (director): Manhunter (143); Howard Deutch (director): Pretty In Pink (145); Quentin Tarantino (director): Pulp Fiction (146); Oliver Stone (director): Natural Born Killers (146); Robert Zemeckis (director): Forrest Gump (146); Danny Boyle (director): Trainspotting (148); Nicolas Winding Refn (director): Bronson (150); Wes Anderson (director): The Royal Tenenbaums (150); Abel Ferrara (director): Bad Lieutenant (154-61).

Sources: The Beatles: I Should Have Known Better (21, 24), Tell Me Why (24), If I Fell (24), She Loves You (24), She’s A Woman (26-28), Ticket to Ride (26-27), Help! (27), I Need You (27), The Night Before (27); The Seeds: Two Fingers Pointing at You (35); Strawberry Alarm Clock: Rainy Day Mushroom Pillow (35), Pretty Song from Psych-Out (35); Electric Flag: Flash, Bang, Pow (36); The Monkees: The Porpoise Song (37); The Beatles: It’s All Too Much (39); Pink Floyd: Interstellar Overdrive (53), Careful with that Axe, Eugene (54, 58); Curtis Mayfield: Pusherman (88-89), Freddie’s Dead (88-89); James Brown: Big Daddy (90-91), Down and Out In New York City (90-91), Mama’s Dead (91); Prince: Batman (108-11); Siouxsie and the Banshees: Face to Face (112); The Flaming Lips: Bad Days (115-16); The Offspring: Smash It Up (116); The Coasters: Poison Ivy (118); Goo Goo Dolls: Lazy Eye (118); Moloko: Fun for Me (118); Sting: Spread a Little Happiness (140-41); Marvin Gaye: I Heard it Through the Grapevine (141); Rolling Stones: You Can’t Always Get What You Want (141); Procol Harum: A Whiter Shade of Pale (141); Phil Collins: Groovy Kind of Love (142); Phil Collins and Lamont Dozier: Two Hearts (142); Berlin: Take My Breath Away (143); Kenny Loggins: Danger Zone (143); Shriekback: The Big Hush (143); Iron Butterfly: In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida (144); Robert Gordon: The Way I Walk (147); L7: Shitlist (147); Creedence Clearwater Revival: Fortunate Son (147); Beatles: A Hard Day’s Night (148); Iggy Pop: Lust for Life (148); Schoolly D: Signifyin’ Rapper (154-61); Led Zeppelin: Kashmir (156-59).

Index Classifications: 1900s, Popular, Film

Contributed by: Emily Baumgart