Ranking Every Final Fantasy Composer

Works: The Spirits Within

Elliot Goldenthal has an Oscar, which does set him apart from everybody else on this list.

Admittedly he won it for Frida, which he scored after his work on Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, but he came into the project with considerable Hollywood pedigree. He certainly wouldn’t have come cheap, though money was seemingly not an object to the film’s development given that it clocked in as one of the most expensive movies ever made at the time. How nobody foresaw the financial disaster that it caused was baffling.

Goldenthal’s soundtrack was made up of 18 tracks in total and is certainly one of the high points of the underwhelming film, though it was rather formulaic in places.

The film is a predominantly pessimistic affair and the score certainly reflects that, though credits vocal track ‘The Dream Within’ is an uplifting affair and the unimaginatively named ‘Music For Dialogues’ hits a number of notes throughout its runtime.

Goldenthal had probably never played or even heard of Final Fantasy when he took the job. His work is certainly distinguishable from his counterparts on this list as a result, but not necessarily for the better.