The Poetry of Sound and Images

I'm listening to the music soundtrack for the movie The Lover by Gabriel Yared. This is one of my favourite soundtracks and I have been listening to it since it was released in 1992, almost 30 years ago. It certainly brings back lots of memories of my days living in a rented room Damansara Jaya.

The movie was based on the semi-autobiographical French novel by Maguerite Duras. I liked the movie too even though it was panned by the critics. Gabriel Yared is also the composer of the music soundtrack for another favourite movie of mine: The English Patient, the award winning movie based on the novel by Michael Oondaatje.

All the movies that I love happen to have good soundtrack music or perhaps it is due to music that these movies are so enduring in my mind. The two Blade Runner movies are good examples, the first by Vangelis and the sequel by Hans Zimmer. Who can forget the Morriconne soundtrack in Once Upon A Time in America and The Misson. 

Music are an essential part of Wong Kar Wai's movies, which is why I am such a big fan of his works. Days of Being Wild is my all-time favourite, followed by Happy Together and Chungking Express. 

If I like a movie, I'll always buy its soundtrack album. But I've also enjoyed lots of soundtrack music of movies which I've never seen before. Cinema Paradiso and Il Postino comes to mind.  

A movie is nothing but a stream of colours and sounds held together by the narrative thread of a plot. The story provides the architectural framework--the canvas on which the director paints its vision with light and tone. That's how I define a movie. The plot is secondary. A movie is a holistic experience of the senses--a poetry in motion.

Which is why one never tires of a good movie. They become a part of your life, its soundtrack seeping into every lyrical moment of your life's existence. And life is so much richer because of them.