I can't let Dick Tracy go quite yet! All that discussion and no tremulous ode to Stephen Sondheim's brilliant song score? It won't stand! Every moment when Breathless Mahoney (Madonna) and 88 Keys (Mandy Patinkin) are in frame together is gold.
(Eagle-eyed early 90s obsessiveness will know that Mandy Patinkin also pops up briefly in a celebrity-filled party scene in the Madonna documentary "Truth or Dare")
BEST ORIGINAL MOVIE SONGS OF THE 1990s
Beautiful Song Craft and/or Cheesy Epic Ballads For the Wins
* Oscar nominee ** Oscar winner
- "Wise Up" -Magnolia (Aimee Mann)
technically this song first showed up on the Jerry Maguire soundtrack which is why it wasn't eligible for the Oscars for Magnolia but let's make an exception - "Sooner or Later"** - Dick Tracy (Stephen Sondheim)
- "Gangsta's Paradise" - Dangerous Minds (Coolio)
deemed ineligible by Oscar due to sampling -- people were obsessed with the scary new "is this songwriting?" world of sampling back then. What to make of it? - "Stay" - Reality Bites (Lisa Loeb)
- "Be Our Guest" - Beauty & The Beast (Alan Menken & Howard Ashman)
- "More" - Dick Tracy (Stephen Sondheim)
- "You Must Love Me"** - Evita (Andrew Lloyd Webber & Tim Rice)
- "God Help the Outcasts" - Hunchback of Notre Dame (Alan Menken)
32 more tunes after the jump - "Santa Fe" - Newsies (Alan Menken & JAC Redford)
- "Show Me Heaven" - Days of Thunder (Maria McKee, Eric Rackin, and Jay Rifkin)
- "Save Me"* -Magnolia (Aimee Mann)
- "I'm Checkin' Out" - Postcards from The Edge (Shel Silverstein)
- "I Have Nothing"* - The Bodyguard (David Foster & Linda Thompson)
- "Colors of the Wind"** - Pocahontas (Alan Menken & Stephen Schwartz)
- "What Can You Lose" - Dick Tracy (Stephen Sondheim)
- "Born Bad" - Natural Born Killers (Cissie Cobb)
- "Heaven's Light/Hellfire" - Hunchback of Notre Dame (Alan Menken)
- "Just Around the River Bend" - Pocahontas (Alan Menken & Stephen Schwartz)
- "That Thing You Do!"* - That Thing You Do! (Adam Schlesinger)
- "Uninvited" - City of Angels (Alanis Morrisette)
- "I Don't Wanna Fight" - What's Love Got To Do With It (Steve DuBerry, Lulu Lawire, Billy Lawrie)
- "Streets of Philadelphia"** - Philadelphia (Bruce Springsteen)
- "Blame Canada"* - South Park: Bigger Longer and Uncut (Trey Parker & Marc Shaiman)
- "Kissing You" - Romeo + Juliet (Des'ree)
- "This Used to be My Playground" - A League of Their Own (Madonna)
- "Beauty and the Beast"** - Beauty & The Beast (Alan Menken & Howard Ashman)
- "If I Never Knew You" - Pocahontas (Alan Menken & Stephen Schwartz)
- "This is Halloween" - The Nightmare Before Christmas ()
- "Love Song for a Vampire" - Bram Stoker's Dracula (Annie Lennox)
- "My Heart Will Go On" ** -Titanic (James Horner & Will Jennings)
- "Tears in Heaven" - Rush (Eric Clapton & Will Jennings)
- "The Circle of Life"* - The Lion King (Elton John & Tim Rice)
- "Because You Loved Me"* - Up Close and Personal (Diane Warren)
- "Beautiful Stranger" - Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (Madonna)
- "What's This?" - The Nightmare Before Christmas ()
- "Beautiful Maria of My Soul"* - The Mambo Kings (Robert Kraft & Arne Glimcher)
- "When You Believe"** -The Prince of Egypt (Stephen Schwarz)
- "How Do I Live"* - Con Air (Diane Warren)
- "I Finally Found Someone"* - The Mirror Has Two Faces (Barba Streisand, Marvin Hamlisch, Bryan Adams, Robert John Lange)
- "GoldenEye" - GoldenEye (Bono & The Edge)
Honorable Mentions
"I'll Remember" - With Honors (Madonna)
"The World is Not Enough" - The World Is Not Enough (Garbage)
"Surrender" - Tomorrow Never Dies (K.D. Lang)
Okay okay. What did we forget? Do any of these songs bring back crazy good memories?