In part 2, we did breathing exercises with Whitney Houston, cleaned an apartment with Amy Adams, pretended that Bryan Adams had devoted his entire life to us, and imagined going over the rainbow with Judy Garland. Before we dive into the third part of this epic musical countdown, let's recap the criteria for ranking this list:

‍

1. Be a good song. Obviously.

‍

2. Have a legitimate application in the movie. No “Hey, let’s score a hit real quick” end credits nonsense. You have to at least use music from the movie, be inspired by an iconic line, something...

‍

3. Be written for the movie. Many songs have iconic moments in movies, but they weren’t written for the movie or are covers. Those don't count. However, songs from movie musicals adapted from the stage are okay because those are direct adaptations.

‍

4. No “used in a movie but only became famous after someone else covered it decades later or it became a staple of something else” songs.

‍

5. If it’s just kind of tacked on there at the end, even if it’s a great song and accurately depicts the film’s themes, etc. it won’t make it on. It has to feel like it’s truly part of the movie in a more tangible way. Lots of leeway here, but it won’t be ignored, Dan!

‍

Sadly, these criteria mean many great songs had to be left off, and we must pay tribute to them before kicking off the countdown: someone play the “My Heart Will Go On” recorder cover!

‍

“Kiss from a Rose” - Seal, from Batman Forever (1995)

“Shake Ya Tailfeather” - Nelly, Diddy, and Murphy Lee, from Bad Boys II (2003)

“I Will Always Love You” - Whitney Houston, from The Bodyguard (1992)

“The Way You Look Tonight” - Fred Astaire, from Swing Time (1936)

“White Christmas” - Bing Crosby, from Holiday Inn (1942)

“Love Is All Around” - Wet Wet Wet, from Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994)

“Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head” - BJ Thomas, from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)

“Love Love” - Take That, from X-Men: First Class (2011)

“Masterpiece” - Madonna, from W.E. (2011)

‍

Now, on to part 3!

‍

48. “Camp Isn’t Home” - AdirondACTS Theater Camp, from Theater Camp (2023)

‍

It’s sad that Theater Camp wasn’t better. The mockumentary style reached its peak with Best in Show 25 years ago, and no movie of its kind has come close to matching it. The one humorous moment, aside from Ayo Edibiri trying to teach the young campers about stage combat, is when Molly Gordon stumbles over improvising the closing number to the summer production when her partner realizes she’s failed to write anything in favor of preparing for an audition. Using her nonsensical narration to create a genuinely great song was genius that even non-theater kids can appreciate.

‍

‍

47. “It Hurts to Face Reality” - Robert Duvall, from Tender Mercies (1983)

‍

Tender Mercies is underrated, carried by a nuanced, powerhouse performance that won Robert Duvall his only Oscar. Despite some moving moments as a recovering alcoholic country singer trying to make right with a single mother and her young son, it’s arguable that no moment better encapsulates his understated genius than the song he sings to open the film. Lyrically, it’s a pointed recognition of how difficult facing life can be when you’ve truly made a mess of it, and Duvall’s (no pun intended) tender delivery makes it all the more heartbreaking.

‍

‍

46. “There’s A Place For Us” - Carrie Underwood, from The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010)

‍

It has the most on-the-nose title imaginable, but hey, that’s precisely what Narnia is: a place beyond WWII-torn England where the impossible is reality. The lyrics are that magical world in a nutshell: a place that’s more than just a prayer and our wildest imagination, where freedom and hope flourish. It may strike harder with viewers for whom C.S. Lewis’ allegory rings true, but the third Narnia film retains enough of the series’ magic to make Carrie Underwood’s soaring ballad feel like a fitting conclusion to an abandoned franchise.

‍

‍

45. “When She Loved Me” - Sarah McLachlan, from Toy Story 2 (1999)

‍

Hot take: Jessie’s background story of having her owner age her into obscurity and then abandon her by a tree isn’t as heartbreaking as everyone claims. It’s a bummer, sure, but it mostly relies on principle, so the scene is actually one of the film’s weak spots on its own: it’s McLachlan’s delivery that sells it (even better at her Oscars performance). If you shed a tear, it’s because Randy Newman and McLachlan made it that way; that’s a lot of power for a song to pack.

‍

‍

44. “High Life” - Eve Hewson & Orén Kinlan, from Flora and Son (2023)

‍

“High Life” had several objectives to accomplish as the wrap-up to Flora’s story of healing and growth. All those particular aims and the necessity for meeting them are too numerous to detail here, but for the sake of this blurb, suffice to say that “High Life” succeeds mostly by staying true to its character while feeling amateurish. Flora is not someone to become overwhelmed by guilt and saccharinely apologetic. She stands her ground while declaring herself a better person than she was before, and the song’s quality sounds exactly like a novice musician giving their first go in front of a crowd (while still being a banger in its own right).

‍

‍

43. “Always Remember Us This Way” - Lady Gaga, from A Star Is Born (2018)

‍

The insufferable “Shallow” drew all the critical and popular raves (including the Oscar), but “Always Remember Us This Way” was always the best song to come out of the 2018 update of A Star Is Born. The lyrics are a tad elementary, but their simplicity paired with Gaga’s relentless vocals strike a chord that “Shallow” could only dream about. By comparison, it’s fantastic. On its own, it holds well against some of the all time movie songs.

‍

‍

42. “Blame Canada!” -  South Park Parents, from South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut (1999)

‍

Trey Parker and Matt Stone made it look easy with “Blame Canada!,” but satire is hard, usually dependent on making the right choices an audience doesn’t always consider. If they’d chosen any country other than Canada to have their characters blame for their children’s woes, it wouldn’t have worked. But they did, so it does. On its own, it’s a riot; in context, it’s genius, and anyone who claims it got robbed at the Oscars by Tarzan’s “You’ll Be In My Heart” has a solid case.

‍

‍

41. “Come What May” - Ewan McGregor and Nicole Kidman, from Moulin Rouge! (2001)

‍

Moulin Rouge! is Baz Luhrmann at his most excessive and extravagant, which figures, since, ya know it’s set at the Moulin Rouge.

‍

Amazingly, the film finds balance between that unabashed opulence and the simple (though occasionally bombastic) romance between forbidden lovers Satine and Christian. McGregor and Kidman are an incomparable vocal force; no song could find a means of expressing the secret love between them than this one.

‍

P.S. Stupid Oscar rules precluded this song from the Best Original song nominations in 2001, and shame on them for that.

‍

‍

40. “Down to Earth” - Peter Gabriel, from WALL-E (2008)

‍

Pixar hadn’t scored a great song since before the millennium by the time “Down to Earth” closed out WALL-E. If there was a man to break it out of its funk, it was Peter Gabriel, which he did. He and composer Thomas Newman create a musical impression of the world through the big eyes of the film’s childlike titular character, a brilliant pairing of song to protagonist that feels rare in the modern cinematic landscape.

‍

Also, it’s a reminder of who was the better frontman for Genesis. Just sayin’...

‍

‍

39. “Into the West” - Annie Lennox, from The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)

‍

The Lord of the Rings trilogy deserved a song worthy of its iconic status and the moving conclusions for its many characters. Aragorn has become King of Gondor and married Arwen, while Eowyn’s love has been refocused on Faramir and is mercifully mutual. The Hobbits return to the Shire, and though Frodo must pass on to the Grey Havens and leave his friends behind, “Into the West” reminds us of how epic an adventure the Fellowship has completed and the extent to which it’s impacted their, and our, lives.

‍

‍

38. “Atlas” - Coldplay, from The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (2013)

‍

In many ways, “Atlas,” the closing credits song to the second Hunger Games movie, is a cheap imitation of “Clocks,” Coldplay’s signature song. Still, the first flick in the franchise was a sleeper hit, a capitalization on the YA craze that defied box office expectations, turned recent Oscar darling Jennifer Lawrence into a bonafide star, and legitimized a genre that’s best offering was the unintentional comedy of the Twilight “saga.”

‍

Thus, Catching Fire was one of the last films to be a true event, and crafting a song to reflect not only its epic stature in pop culture but also the spirit of the film itself, was a tall order. It’s subtle piano and Martin’s typically restrained vocal create an aura that feels both like a proper conclusion to the movie’s themes and events while instilling a deep sense of foreboding as we ponder all that’s to come for Panem and its Mockingjay.

‍

‍

37. “Falling Slowly” -  Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová, from Once (2007)

‍

Knowing the full story behind Glen Hansard’s romance with Markéta Irglová makes Once and its Oscar-winning song a tough pill. Isolated from its suspect roots, it’s a gentle indie folk song that doesn’t hide behind pretentious aims at poetic exploration. It’s about falling in love and all its highs and lows, and no one need comb over it a thousand times to see it. We need more songs like this, but especially in movies.

‍

‍

36. “Food, Glorious Food!” -  Dunstable Orphanage Boys, from Oliver! (1968)

‍

The opening number to Oliver! is best evaluated in retrospect; by film’s end, we’re massively disappointed.

‍

You see, Oliver! sucks, and we’d have never guessed that by “Food, Glorious Food!” Not only is it a great setup for the grimy existence forced upon the title character, but a humorous musical objection to exploitation that takes form in vile gruel and fat, bellowing men.

‍

‍

35. “Goldfinger” - Shirley Bassey, from Goldfinger (1964)

‍

Bassey’s first Bond song is bold, brassy, and bombastic, a melodramatic introduction to the series’ most iconic villain. If ever a song justified Bassey’s reckless lack of restraint, this is it. Sure, it may become a tad too screechy towards its relentless climax, but “Goldfinger” is the Bond song for a reason: it’s a character and all the stakes of battling his mania put to song, and those opening notes are unforgettable.

‍

‍

34. “Stayin’ Alive” - Bee Gees, from Saturday Night Fever (1977)

‍

The '70s disco craze knows no better anthem than “Stayin’ Alive,” and the image of a young John Travolta strutting down the streets of New York to the tune to open Saturday Night Fever is an indelible pop culture image. It’s an infectious throwback that never ages, equal parts instantly recognizable and delightfully irresistible. Bee Gees got their shot to leave their mark on Hollywood, and gave a song so good it left a mark on the whole world.

‍