Discover how five legendary scores forever transformed the way stories are told in film, and what techniques you can apply to your own projects to create music that moves the audience. Think of the scene of a spaceship traveling through space for the first time. Or a shark slowly approaching, not yet visible on screen. Perhaps you recall a young wizard entering a lit-up castle for the first time, or a hobbit leaving the tranquility of his home to embark on an adventure. Now imagine those same scenes without music. They’d probably still be good sequences, but they would hardly have achieved the same cultural impact. In film, music doesn’t just accompany the images—it gives them meaning. It can build tension before danger strikes, evoke nostalgia for a place that doesn’t exist, or ensure a character remains etched in our memory forever. The best soundtracks achieve precisely that. They don’t need to take center stage to become indispensable. They work almost invisibly, guiding the viewer’s emotions scene by scene to the point where it’s impossible to separate the film from its music. In fact, many people can identify a movie with just two or three notes. The theme from *Jaws*, the Imperial March from *Star Wars*, or the main theme from *Harry Potter* are part of the collective imagination even for those who have never seen the full films. That ability to transcend the screen is one of the reasons why some scores end up becoming true masterpieces. But what makes a soundtrack go down in history? Is it a matter of having a catchy melody? Does it depend solely on the composer’s talent? Or are there narrative and musical techniques that can be learned and applied to any audiovisual project? In this article, we’ll review five of the most influential soundtracks in film history to discover why they continue to move audiences decades after their release. We’ll analyze the techniques used by their composers, the way they interact with the visuals, and the lessons that anyone interested in film music can learn from them
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Irapuato, Mexico
A course by Dan Thompson
Illustration
A course by Shane Wolf
