Best use of a song or piece of music in a film.

Any of the music used in the Lord Of the Rings films, especially at the end of the first film when Sam climbs into Frodos boat

Also the flying theme in ET is terrific
 
Hav to agree with you on this, but the best song in it, i'd to say the one Pippin is singing to Denethor when Faramir rides to meet his doom in order to reclaim Osgiliath.
 
The C&W song that's playing on the radio when they show the corpses that have been dug-up and "displayed" in the cemetery in Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Just...just wrong.
 
I agree with Mad World/Donnie Darko.

I also like:-

People Are Strange/The Lost Boys
End Of The World/Girl Interrupted
Down With The Sickness (lounge version)/Dawn Of The Dead remake :D
 
Not sure if this really counts as it is on the end credits but:

Annie Lennox - Love Song for a Vampire, from Francis Ford Coppola's version of Dracula

Incredible haunting tune, still gives me goosebumps when I hear it now.
 
I'd put lots of music created by Ennio Morricone for many films right up there.
'Once Upon a Time in the West' I'd put right up there....the entire score for that film.

Other notable films would be 'The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly', 'A Fistful of Dynamite', 'My Name is Nobody', and 'Once Upon a Time in America'. All Sergio Leone films as it happens, although Morricone has also done great music for many other good films too, one example of which is the music for a film called 'Burn'(Queimada) made in 1969 which I'd imagine not many people will have heard of. Very good use of music for that film that suited it well..

Other stuff I'd put right up there would be ......

John Barry's score for 'On Her Majesty's Secret Service'. 'We Have All the Time in the World' was used for great effect right at the end of the film.

Maurice Jarre's main theme for 'Lawrence of Arabia'.

Paul Giovanni for 'The Wicker Man'. The entire score.

Roy Budd for 'Get Carter'.

The Soundtrack for 'Nosferatu' (1979 version).

Nino Rota for 'The Godfather'.

Bernard Herrmann for 'Taxi Driver'.

Krzysztof Komeda for 'Rosemary's Baby' and 'The Fearless Vampire Killers'.

I've mainly listed entire scores, as the ones I've listed have used music for the best effect throughout the entire film and there have been several pieces of music from that score which worked really well within the respective film.
One example of just one particular individual piece of music used within a film for best effect would be John Murphy's 'In the House - In a Heartbeat', used in '28 Days Later'.
And one more,..... 'O Fortuna' used in 'Excalibur'.
 
The scene in Jeff Bridges Fearless, where he gets Rosie Perez character to hold a metal box full of tools to simulate the weight of her baby, and drives the car full speed at a wall in an effort to illustrate to her that she could not have held onto her baby in the fatal plane crash she was involved in.

It's a very poweful scene, but the use of U2's Where The Streets Have No Name fits perfectly, it's as though in was composed specifically for that scene.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=RUBaRqY_NqA&feature=related
 
If we're talking primarily use of existing songs rather than specially composed soundtracks three that spring to mind are -

Bad Moon Rising (Creedence Clearwater Revival)- An American Werewolf in London
Where is my mind? (Pixies) - Fight Club
Save Me (Aimee Mann) - Magnolia
 
Scorsese OWNS this thread. The best marriage of songs and cinema would have to be the entirity of Casino and that's why i give it the nod over Goodfellas as Scorsese's best movie. His uses of both Jumpin' Jack Flash and Mr Postman in Mean Streets are pretty special too.
 
I don't know what the piece of music is called but in the scene in Crash where Matt Dillon rescues Thandie Newton from the car wreck, the music playing is so beautiful, it really 'sucked' me into that scene, it's always a very emotional moment for me.
 
Louis Armstrong's 'What a Wonderful World' being used as a backdrop to some horrific war type stuff going on in a short scene from 'Full Metal Jacket'.

And going with the same theme in respect to war films, Wagner's 'Ride of the Valkyries' being used for the helicopter attack on a village in 'Apocalypse Now'.
 
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