SUPPORT FILMTRACKS! WE EARN A
COMMISSION ON WHAT YOU BUY:
Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk
 eBay
Amazon.ca
Glisten Effect
Editorial Reviews
Scoreboard Forum
Viewer Ratings
Composers
Awards
   CURRENT NUMBER OF:
     • Years Online: 29
    • Editorial Reviews: 2,501
   • Unique Albums Covered: 3,691
  • Reader Messages Posted: 503,781
 • Reader Votes Cast: 2,829,362


   CURRENT BEST-SELLING SCORES:
       1. Top Gun (2-CD)
      2. Avatar: The Way of Water
     3. The Wild Robot
    4. Gladiator (3-CD)
   5. Young Woman and the Sea
  6. Spider-Man 2 (3-CD)
 7. Cutthroat Island (2-CD)
8. Willow (2-CD)
   CURRENT MOST POPULAR REVIEWS:
         1. Spider-Man
        2. Alice in Wonderland
       3. The Matrix
      4. Gladiator
     5. Wicked
    6. Batman (1989)
   7. Raiders of the Lost Ark
  8. The Wild Robot
 9. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
10. Doctor Strange: Multiverse
Supergirl
Toy Story 5
Disclosure Day
Masters of the Universe
Obsession
The Mandalorian and Grogu
Covering the best and worst of original film and television music from America's Big Sky Country since 1996, Filmtracks is your spirited home for comprehensive, humorous, and controversial soundtrack reviews. Join our community to support this niche music genre!
On Cue Icon
ON CUE
 VIEW ALL
7/19/26 Sky High   (Michael Giacchino)
All New Review
Buy it... for cartoonish superhero innocence that hits the right notes for a budget production that came very early in Michael Giacchino's feature film career.
Avoid it... if the extremely dry recording quality of Giacchino's early works severely bothers you, because that dull sound really hampers this score.
7/17/26 Night Games   (John Barry)
All New Review
Buy it... for an easy and proficient but rather underwhelming erotica suspense outing from John Barry, the female vocals in this steamy thriller a wise strategy.
Avoid it... if you can't get past that nagging feeling that so much of Barry's music is narratively inert, his subdued style not quite matching the promise of the cue titles here.
7/15/26 Explorers   (Jerry Goldsmith)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... if you desire a whimsical, optimistic twist on Jerry Goldsmith's usual action style, joined by a handful of exhilarating statements of redemptive fantasy themes in the composer's trademark synthetic and orchestral blend for the era.
Avoid it... if you require a significant amount of symphonic meat to accompany your Goldsmith constructs for this genre, for the composer keeps the environment in Explorers airy, undemanding, and occasionally downright wacky.
7/13/26 Timecop   (Mark Isham)
All New Review
Buy it... on only the expanded 2026 album for its vastly superior sound quality if you want to appreciate Mark Isham's aggressively percussive music.
Avoid it... and seek a vintage Jerry Goldsmith score instead if you wish to hear a better execution of the same general strategy, Isham not quite as comfortable in this realm so early in his career.
7/11/26 The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water   (John Debney)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... only if you have a high tolerance threshold for obnoxiously bombastic children's parody music, John Debney uncorking an admirably solid effort for this hideously ridiculous concept.
Avoid it... if you expect the central pirate element in this film to be addressed by Debney with music even remotely as impressive as that heard in his classic score for Cutthroat Island.
7/9/26 Passenger   (Christopher Young)
All New Review
Buy it... if your selection of Christopher Young's completely unlistenable horror sound design hasn't yet compelled your roommate or partner to kill you, because here is another chance to yield an insane act.
Avoid it... even if you are curious about the solitary choral half of the score, because those performances, while relaxingly pretty compared to the horror ambience, are relatively mundane.
7/7/26 The Piper   (Christopher Young)
All New Review
Buy it... to hear Christopher Young near the top of his game in the horror genre, the premise of this movie requiring a highly unique approach to its music and yielding impressive tonal heights.
Avoid it... if you find the accessibly melodic portions of Young's most flamboyant horror scores to be challenging to separate from the extremely dissonant abrasiveness of the remainder.
7/5/26 Sin City   (Robert Rodriguez/Graeme Revell/John Debney)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... if you require a mood of tragedy and brooding contemplation that reaches to the dirty and soiled heart of Sin City's organic, pulpy style.
Avoid it... if the application of gritty, digitally distorted sax, an electric bass and guitar, and ambient sound design too substantially defies your standards of tolerance for the traditional film noir genre sound.
7/3/26 King Solomon's Mines   (Jerry Goldsmith)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... if you own and love Jerry Goldsmith's very similarly rendered score for Supergirl, though while King Solomon's Mines shares the same lofty, enthusiastic spirit of adventure, it bubbles along without the obnoxious electronics of the previous score.
Avoid it... if you have little tolerance for scores that cannot decide whether to treat the subject matter seriously or like a parody, for King Solomon's Mines could be too cheeky in its overly positive tone for some listeners to appreciate its otherwise decent constructs.
7/1/26 Forces of Nature   (John Powell)
All New Review
Buy it... on its sole, rare, score-only album for its seven minutes of pretty but very understated resolution at the end.
Avoid it... for everything else, John Powell's hip blends for the remainder of the short score too inconsistent to establish any satisfying mood.
6/29/26 Earth Days   (Michael Giacchino)
All New Review
Buy it... if you can forgive Michael Giacchino for nurturing decent but underwhelming themes, this work adequate at its task but missing so much potential.
Avoid it... if a near total lack of dynamism or passion in any orchestral score's performance is disqualifying for you.
6/27/26 The Legend of the Lone Ranger   (John Barry)
All New Review
Buy it... only to complete a John Barry collection, this blend of contemporary styling and bland action standing as a major strategic misfire in the genre.
Avoid it... even if you're an enthusiast of Country legend Merle Haggard, because his vocals here are a poor match for Barry's material.
6/25/26 Black Rain   (Hans Zimmer)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... if you're curious to know where the action truly started for Hans Zimmer, Black Rain being the composer's first entry into a genre that eventually evolved directly out of the sound heard in this score.
Avoid it... on any album if you have no interest in hearing Zimmer's intuitively smart but not particularly well refined merging of Eastern solo instruments with his comfortably familiar, rock-influenced tones.
6/23/26 Rocky II   (Bill Conti)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... if you seek only one of the first three soundtrack albums in the Rocky franchise, for this one summarizes all of the themes from the original classic while exploring the ideas that would be reprised to constitute most of Rocky III.
Avoid it... if nine minutes of gorgeous Bill Conti instrumentals (without 1970's pop or disco elements participating) in a few tracks on this album aren't worth a continuation of a badly dated general sound for the concept.
6/21/26 Rat Race   (Elmer Bernstein/John Powell)
All New Review
Buy it... on the album with Elmer Bernstein's rejected score if you have always had a soft spot for the composer's zany comedies, because this final entry in the genre is brief but full of life.
Avoid it... on that Bernstein album and instead seek the John Powell alternative that raises his best manic comedy mode for a wild ride of orchestral and choral silliness.
6/19/26 The Book of Henry   (Michael Giacchino)
All New Review
Buy it... for five to ten minutes of alluring melodic highlights of rhythmically propulsive attraction for mainly piano and strings, but don't expect much more than that.
Avoid it... for its darker underbelly, the suspense portions boringly mundane as Michael Giacchino struggles to address both halves of this unbelievable plot.
6/17/26 Hammett   (John Barry)
All New Review
Buy it... for its superbly rendered, bluesy main theme, John Barry capturing the noir glory of the concept expertly in piano and clarinet duets that drip with personality.
Avoid it... on the shorter 2000 album and seek the expanded 2023 alternative for a much more vibrant mix that adds attractively sultry reverb to the score's ambience.
6/15/26 Agent Cody Banks   (John Powell)
All New Review
Buy it... for an outrageously wild espionage score with ample personality and no limits to its expressions of grandeur from all generations of the genre.
Avoid it... if you easily tire of parody scores that devolve into comedy rather than taking the topic seriously, this one difficult to handle in its constantly cheery romping.
6/13/26 Bad Times at the El Royale   (Michael Giacchino)
All New Review
Buy it... for the long opening suite only, as it represents most of the accessible presentations of the score's two unmemorable themes.
Avoid it... if you are easily frustrated by scores that assemble all the right pieces but can't translate that style into any semblance of a satisfying narrative.
6/11/26 Frances   (John Barry)
All New Review
Buy it... if your insatiable desire for every slight variation of John Barry's light suspense and tortured drama drives you to hear each application of that highly familiar mode.
Avoid it... if you expect to hear anything remotely distinct in this score, its techniques applied without any unique character and better heard in other Barry works.
2001 FILMTRACKS NOMINEE: A Beautiful Mind
A Beautiful Mind
Scoreboard Icon
SCOREBOARD
 VIEW ALL
I think it’s fair to say Ludwig Göransson is the greatest film composer ever now   Expand
Jo - July 19, 2026, at 9:56 a.m.
4 messages  (261 views) - Newest: July 19, 2026, at 8:55 p.m. by Jonathan Broxton
Op-Ed - Odyssey with Spoilers   Expand
Craig Richard Lysy - July 19, 2026, at 9:55 a.m.
2 messages  (143 views) - Newest: July 19, 2026, at 10:11 a.m. by Sivakumark52
Nolan Interview Link
Craig Richard Lysy - July 18, 2026, at 8:10 a.m.
1 message  (200 views)
Review and site status: first half of 2026   Expand
Christian Clemmensen - July 17, 2026, at 7:00 p.m.
5 messages  (355 views) - Newest: July 18, 2026, at 12:19 p.m. by Christian Clemmensen
Now Playing: Friday, July 17   Expand
Roman - July 17, 2026, at 6:42 a.m.
2 messages  (46 views) - Newest: July 17, 2026, at 9:25 a.m. by JBlough
Updates Icon
SITE UPDATES
 VIEW ALL
Review and site status: first half of 2026
Christian Clemmensen - July 17, 2026, at 6:37 p.m.
1 update  (1041 views)
Copyright © 1996-2026, Filmtracks Publications. All rights reserved.
The reviews and other textual content contained on the filmtracks.com site may not be published, broadcast,
rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Christian Clemmensen at Filmtracks Publications. Page created 9/24/96 and last updated 5/23/15.
This site has never recognized George W. Bush or Donald J. Trump as the legitimate president of the United States of America.
This is approximately the 45,783,530th load of this page since 1996. One visitor said, "If assholes had wings, this place would be an airport." Validity of this still in question.
Reviews Preload Scoreboard decoration Ratings Preload Composers Preload Awards Preload Home Preload Search Preload Cover Preload