10 Grisly Horror Movies With Surprisingly Beautiful Music Scores

Composer: Charlie Clouser

Listen To: "Out of the Fire"

After the Saw franchise finally came to a much-needed close, writers Marcus Dunstan and Patrick Melton (Saws 3 through 7) decided to forge their own grue-stained path with The Collector. A home-invasion thriller regarding a lowly thief and his bout with a brutal trap-master known as, you guessed it, The Collector.

While the film was light on ingenuity, it was a genuinely entertaining, straight-for-the-jugular horror film that offered a compelling villain ("he always takes one") and a sympathetic antihero in Arkin (Josh Stewart).

With its sequel, The Collection, the filmmakers went for absolute broke and delivered an incredibly satisfying Aliens-esque slaughterhouse of carnage, bullet-riddled action and an utterly fantastic climax that saw Arkin square off against The Collector in a bone-crunching melee.

Unlike many films of the same ilk (or, pretty much every slasher), there's never a sense of true comeuppance for the purveyors of evil. Herein, however, the tables are wonderfully turned in favor of the protagonist actually besting the "unkillable" heavy. Simply put, it's a welcome slap in the face to studio franchising.

This is all well and good, but what makes this ending standout even further, is the music composed by Charlie Clouser. From the Saw series and Death Sentence to American Horror Story, if you want an industrial-horror soundtrack, you call Clouser.

In the past, the musician turned composer has applied his abilities to a multitude of bands/singers such as Nine Inch Nails, Marylin Manson, Killing Joke and even David Bowie. His experience is as wide as it is consistent. Even when he's focused on creating harmony or a heartfelt tune, his grungy style is never far off and in some respect, always permeating his music regardless of tone.

With the Collection, Clouser's music maintains a similar vibe to his previous efforts except with more "oomph". Songs "SWAT" and "Shredder" offer throbbing vigor to the chaos at hand while the moody vocals of "Main Titles" exude a sense of sensual mystery.

As a whole, there's a far more grandiose appeal to the soundtrack and the penultimate mano-e-mano track, "Out of the Fire" is the perfect theme to get one's blood-pumping. You know, for the next time you have to go toe-to-toe with a masked serial killer who has a penchant for Giger-esque taxidermy and booby traps.