Good point about Morvern Callar, but boy did I hate that movie.

Good grief. The studied vacuity of "Movern Callar" didn't need amplification by its soundtrack... I'd sooner celebrate the soundtrack to "Irreversible." Here, however, are some genuine contenders: Ravel supports the substantively ineffable in Claud Sautet's "Un Coeur en Hiver"; the first movement of Bach's first piano concerto in the gas station scene of Carlos Reygadas' "Battle in Heaven" briefly attains to a transcendence or reconcilliation of the subjective and objective (or even his previous film, "Japon"); Bruno Dumont's use of Bach in the opening minutes of "Humanite" as detective de Winter commences his lonely journey into welschmertz; Antonioni's "Zabriskie Point"; Park's exquisitely harrowing deployment of the first movement of Vivald's "Winter" in "Oldboy"; Ry Cooder's austere evocations of wistful geographic and spiritual spareness in "Paris, Texas"...

I don't know if it's fair to dismiss another's opinion on a personal favorite as not a "genuine contender," but those are definitely some great soundtrack recommendations, Rob. Thanks (Cooder's score for Paris is definitely one of my favorites, too.)

I'll happily celebrate the soundtrack to "Irreversible." It's amazing -- Thomas Bangalter evokes hell-on-earth dehumanization, basically using only two notes. I find myself unconsciously humming it on occasion. (Great use of Beethoven, too.)

I love the Solaris soundtrack, too.

I pop in the Miller's Crossing soundtrack when I have a lady over like I did last night. Even though she's an elderly non-English speaking Cleaning Lady, she let me know she liked the music.

Re: Rob's recs. My favorite use of Ravel in film will always be Daphnis & Chloe in Desplechin's Comment Je Me Suis Dispute...(Ou Ma Vie Sexuelle). His use of sound and music in general in Kings & Queen was one of the highlights of last year.

ALSO: I remember sitting rapt thru Morvern Callar, tho it has been a while.... Like a lot of people, I'm still in love with Samantha Morton.

The Solaris soundtrack is available as a japanese import (I got mine from forcedexposure.com) and is worth listening to... there's a lot of low-level soundscape stuff going on there that was really ahead of its time and there's a nice piece about it in the extras of the criterion disc. As for Morvern Callar, if you didn't connect with the film then I'm sure my pick will irritate... and I'm glad that another film "briefly attains to a transcendence or reconcilliation of the subjective and objective" for you instead.

"glad that another film "briefly attains to a transcendence or reconcilliation of the subjective and objective" for you instead."

I'm glad you understood what that meant - that makes one of us. My head hurt from trying until I just wanted to go watch that Samantha Morton music video a bunch of times in a loop. Even if it wasn't transcendental, it was pretty cool - I say, subjectively.