10 Awesome Musical Scores That Deserved Better Movies

Back to the enormously hit-and-miss Brian De Palma now, and a movie which seemed to have everything going for it. A juicy true life murder story, a neo-noir novel from L.A. Confidential's James Ellroy, a director with a pedigree for lush crime stories, and a starry cast led by Aaron Eckhart and Scarlett Johansson. It says a lot, then, that The Black Dahlia is barely even remembered at all now, just over a decade after its release.

While the movie itself is too uninterested in its characters and story to be particularly memorable, its score from ambient musician and trumpeter Mark Isham is well worth revisiting.

Isham's jazzy score, unsurprisingly driven by trumpet solos, recalls the music of more classic modern noirs such as Jerry Goldsmith's work on Chinatown and the aforementioned L.A. Confidential. But this is more than simply pastiche and pushes into more experimental sounds and instruments, throwing the odd unsettling theremin into the mix.

The score is at its best in the one spot where De Palma also shows some emotional depth: in the character of Elizabeth Short, the butchered Dahlia herself. A poignant theme introduced on strings and xylophone, it begins innocently and then becomes more twisted and complex, a reflection of the tragic character herself. If only the rest of the movie was this good.