Inside The Rock Era is saluting the best songs to be featured in movies since 1955. We have 10 more great cinema songs lined up--let's get right to them!
#30--"Because You Loved Me" by Celine Dion (from the movie Up Close and Personal--1996)
Celine Dion recorded this smash written by superstar songwriter Diane Warren in 1996 for the movie Up Close and Personal. Robert Redford plays a television news director in Florida (Warren Justice) with Michelle Pfeiffer as his protégée, Sally Atwater. Stockard Channing, Kate Nelligan and Joe Mantegna play supporting roles Warren feels Atwater has a lot of potential but there is a lot of jealousy towards her from others who work at the station. The work relationship of Warren and Atwater turns romantic.
Atwater eventually takes a job in Philadelphia but Warren continues to offer support and guidance.
Redford began his career in episodes of television shows such as The Twilight Zone, Perry Mason, The Virginian and Alfred Hitchcock Presents and scored an early role on Broadway in Barefoot in the Park. His breakthrough was as a star of the 1967 film version of that play, and then his career took off after starring with Paul Newman in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
From then on, Robert could do no wrong, starring in Jeremiah Johnson, The Candidate, the classic The Sting in 1973, The Way We Were, The Great Gatsby, Three Days of the Condor, another classic All The President's Men, The Electric Horseman, Out of Africa, The Natural, Indecent Proposal, Up Close & Personal, Spy Game and All Is Lost.
As great as Redford's acting career has been, he has made even more of an impact as a director, always choosing good quality films that are important, and as the founder of the Sundance Institute. Redford made his directorial debut in the drama Ordinary People, which won four Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director. He also directed A River Runs Through It and was nominated for Best Picture and Best Director again for Quiz Show, as well as directing the great movies Lions for Lambs (which he also stars in), The Legend of Bagger Vance and The Horse Whisperer.
In the early 1970's, Redford bought property in Utah and in 1978, Redford's company Wildwood Enterprises initiated the Utah/US Film Festival. It is now known as the Sundance Film Festival, the largest independent film festival in the United States. It has been a showcase for new directors and producers. The Festival will be moving to Boulder, Colorado beginning in 2027.
Redford has won two Golden Globes and an Academy Award. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, Kennedy Center Honors, the Cecil B. DeMille Award, the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award and the Academy Honorary Award.
"Because You Loved Me" was a worldwide smash, hitting #1 in the U.S.(on both the Adult Contemporary and overall charts) and Australia, #2 in Ireland, #3 in Canada, Switzerland and New Zealand, #4 in the Netherlands and Scotland and #5 in the U.K. It has sold two million units in the United States and over three million worldwide and was nominated for Best Original Song at the Golden Globes and the Academy Awards and nominated for Best Song Written Specifically for a Motion Picture or for Television at the Grammy Awards.
Up Close and Personal racked up $100 million in gross box office receipts.
#29--"Kiss From A Rose" by Seal (from the movie Batman Forever--1995)
Seal wrote this song in 1987 and first released it in 1994 with limited success, but it wasn't until it was included in the movie Batman Forever in 1995 that it took off. This was a tough call for us and our reasoning for including it was that few people had heard it during its initial release--the vast majority of listeners around the world didn't hear it until they saw the movie and overwhelming demand for the song forced a single re-release. As this special is about songs from movies, the song's popularity came almost exclusively once it was included in the movie and that is why it belongs here.
"Kiss From A Rose" plays over the closing credits of the movie, which is the third film in the 90's series retelling of the Batman story. Val Kilmer starred as Bruce Wayne & Batman, replacing Michael Keaton. Tommy Lee Jones plays Two Face as he and the Riddler (played by Jim Carrey) try to unmask Batman and discover his true identity. The two villains also have a master plan of getting information from the residents of Gotham, the fictional location for Batman's story.
Batman also has a new love interest--Dr. Chase Meridian, played by Nicole Kidman, and it is in this movie in which Dick Grayson (played by Chris O'Donnell) becomes Robin, Batman's sidekick.
While at Harvard, Jones was roommates with future Vice President of the United States, Al Gore and played football from 1965-68 (making the All-Ivy League team), culminating in Harvard's undefeated 1968 season.
Jones was a secondary actor for most of the 1970's and 80's (appearing in Love Story, Eyes of Laura Mars and Coal Miner's Daughter), but his career blossomed after his great performance as U.S. Marshal Samuel Gerard in The Fugitive, in which Tommy Lee captured Best Supporting Actor honors at the Academy Awards. He also was nominated for JFK, Lincoln and In the Valley of Elah.
Jones also starred in the Men in Black series, Jason Bourne, The Client and Double Jeopardy.
Tommy Lee won the Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Movie for The Executioner's Song and was also nominated for the television miniseries Lonesome Dove.
"Kiss From A Rose" was the biggest hit of 1995 in the U.S. and also topped the Adult Contemporary chart there. The song also reached #1 in Australia, #2 in Canada, #3 in Austria, the Netherlands and Norway, #4 in Ireland and the U.K. and has sold over two million copies worldwide.
The album landed at #2 in Canada and New Zealand, #5 in the United States, #6 in Australia and #10 in Finland. It has sold over two million copies in the U.S. alone.
Batman Forever drew a gross of $336 million at the box office and was nominated for Best Cinematography, Best Sound and Best Sound Effects Editing at the Academy Awards.
There used to be a greying tower alone on the sea
You became the light on the dark side of me
Love remained a drug that's the high and not the pill
But did you know that when it snows
My eyes become large and
The light that you shine can't be seen?
Baby, I compare you to a kiss from a rose on the grey
Ooh, the more I get of you, the stranger it feels, yeah
And now that your rose is in bloom
A light hits the gloom on the grey
Ba-ya-ya, ba-da, ba-da-da-da, ba-ya-ya
Ba-ya-ya, ba-da, ba-da-da-da, ba-ya-ya
There is so much a man can tell you, so much he can say
You remain my power, my pleasure, my pain
Baby, to me, you're like a growing addiction that I can't deny
Won't you tell me, is that healthy, baby?
But did you know that when it snows
My eyes become large and
The light that you shine can't be seen?
Baby, I compare you to a kiss from a rose on the grey
Ooh, the more I get of you, the stranger it feels, yeah (yeah)
Now that your rose is in bloom
A light hits the gloom on the grey
I've been kissed by a rose on the grey
I've been kissed by a rose on the grey
And if I should fall, will it all go away? (I've been kissed by a rose on the grey)
I've been kissed by a rose on the grey
There is so much a man can tell you, so much he can say
You remain my power, my pleasure, my pain
To me, you're like a growing addiction that I can't deny (yeah)
No won't you tell me, is that healthy, baby?
But did you know that when it snows
My eyes become large and
The light that you shine can't be seen?
Baby, I compare you to a kiss from a rose on the grey
Ooh, the more I get of you, the stranger it feels, yeah
Now that your rose is in bloom
A light hits the gloom on the grey
Yes, I compare you to a kiss from a rose on the grey
Ooh, the more I get of you, the stranger it feels, yeah (yeah)
And now that your rose is in bloom
A light hits the gloom on the grey
Ba-ya-ya, ba-da, ba-da-da-da, ba-ya-ya
Now that your rose is in bloom
A light hits the gloom on the grey
#28--"Ticket To Ride" by the Beatles (from the movie Help!--1965)
This next song was credited to Lennon-McCartney, the unparalleled songwriting team for the Beatles, who recorded the song for the 1965 movie Help! It is played in the scene where the Beatles attempt to ski.
In Help!, the Beatles protect drummer Ringo Starr from an eastern cult and two mad scientists who are out to steal a ring given to Ringo by a fan. Help!'s world premiere at the London Pavilion Theatre was shown with Princess Margaret in attendance.
Ringo devised a distinctive staccato drum pattern that he talked about often, mentioning that he's a left-handed drummer trying to play right-handed. Carl Palmer of Emerson, Lake & Palmer said Ringo's work is stellar:
One of the most exciting, rhythmical patterns and parts and songs that I ever heard, which I thought was really big-time and had it all going is a track by the Beatles called "Ticket To Ride". The drum part on that I always thought was exceptional.
"Ticket To Ride" became the Beatles' seventh straight #1 in the U.K. and third consecutive in the United States, with the #1 position also achieved in Canada, Australia and Ireland. It was a Top 10 song in every major country in the world and is nearing two million in global sales.
The "Help!" Soundtrack reached #1 in the U.S., United Kingdom, Australia and Finland and has sold 1.5 million copies in the U.S. and nearly 2 million worldwide. It was nominated for Best Original Score Written for a Motion Picture or Television Show at the Grammy Awards.
The movie brought in a gross take of $12 million.
#27--"Hello, Goodbye" by the Beatles (from the movie Magical Mystery Tour--1967)
Note: The eligibility of this song and others in 'Magical Mystery Tour' was a close call. Ordinarily, we wouldn't allow television movies to be included as our focus was on big-screen movies. However, this one was shown on the big screen repeatedly in the years that followed, so we gave it the approval.
Paul McCartney of the Beatles wrote this song in 1967, credited to the legendary partnership of Lennon-McCartney, for a standalone single that was included on the "Magical Mystery Tour" Soundtrack. Composition of the song came about as a result of a visit from Alistair Taylor, who was an assistant to Beatles manager Brian Epstein, to McCartney at his home in London. According to A Hard Day's Write: The Stories of Every Beatles Song by Steve Turner, Taylor was asking Paul how he went about writing a song, so Paul took Taylor into the dining room and they both sat down at a harmonium. Paul played the instrument and asked Taylor to say the opposite of every word Paul sang--"black and white, yes and no, stop and go, hello and goodbye."
In Magical Mystery Tour, the film follows a group of people, including the Beatles, on a bus tour who experience bizarre occurrences caused by magicians. Epstein died in late August before the group completed the projected. They decided to finish it as Epstein had approved it earlier in the year.
As talented as the Beatles were, they wouldn't have enjoyed the unprecedented success they had (nor been as focused) without Epstein. He was a believer in them from when he first saw them at an afternoon concert at the Cavern Club in Liverpool in 1961.
It was Epstein who directed the members to have a more clean-cut style. Brian secured a recording contract for the group on EMI's Parlophone label. Although Epstein had several other clients, including Gerry and the Pacemakers, Cilia Black and Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, the Beatles were his bread and butter and he fully recognized that.
Eventually, Brian's grandfather and his family settled at 27 Anfield Road in Liverpool, with his father running a furniture dealership that also included household appliances and musical instruments. They called the business NEMS, standing for North End Music Stores.
Brian was born at 4 Rodney Street. After finishing his national service as a data entry clerk with the Royal Army Service Corps, Brian ran the Clarendon Furnishing shop in Hoylake and was made a director of NEMS. He once wanted to pursue acting and enrolled at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. That didn't work out, so when Brian returned, his father put him in charge of the record department of the new NEMS music store on Great Charlotte Street.
Epstein first became aware of the Beatles by reading issues of Mersey Beat and through frequent talks with editor Bill Harry. About that lunchtime concert where Epstein first saw the Beatles and fate stepped in, Brian said:
I was immediately struck by their music, their beat and their sense of humour on stage--and, even afterwards, when I met them, I was struck again by their personal charm. And it was there that, really, it all started.
"Hello, Goodbye" was a Top 10 in very major country except Finland and Italy, #1 in the U.S. for three weeks, U.K., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark, France, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden and has sold over two million units worldwide.
The soundtrack was #1 in the U.K., #2 in the Netherlands and #3 in Australia, New Zealand and Sweden and has sold over six million in the U.S. alone and over seven million globally. It was nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards.
Magical Mystery Tour set a record for the highest initial sales of any album on Capitol Records, topped the U.S. chart for eight weeks and remained a best-seller for over a year.
#26--"Everything I Do (I Do It For You)" by Bryan Adams (from the movie Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves--1990)
Brian Adams brought in Michael Kamen to write this next smash in 1990 for the great movie Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, released the summer of the next year. Famous producer Robert "Mutt" Lange also contributed to the writing of the song.
The movie is based on the folk tale of Robin Hood with Kevin Costner as Robin Hood, Morgan Freeman as Azeem, Christian Slater playing Will Scarlett, Alan Rickman as the Sheriff of Nottingham and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio as Marian.
As the story goes, Robin of Locksley and Peter Dubois escape from prison in Jerusalem, after following King Richard the Lionheart on the Third Crusade. They also save the Moor Azeem. Peter is mortally wounded and makes Robin swear to protect Peter's sister Marian, so Robin and Azeem head to England.
Since King Richard is gone, the Sheriff of Nottingham aims to take the throne for himself and has Robin's father killed for remaining loyal to the King. After the witch Mortianna, brilliantly played by Geraldine McEwen, tells the Sheriff that she has foreseen that Robin and Azeem "will be our deaths", the Sherriff orders his men to hunt down Robin and Azeem. The two heroes flee into Sherwood Forest, where they meet a brave group of outlaws let by Little John.
Knowing that he will need more men to defeat the Sherriff and his army, Robin eventually wins over the outlaws and they hatch a plan to overcome their opponents and protect the throne for King Richard. It is during this time that Robin's legend grows as he is given the name "Robin of the Hood" by the Sheriff and robs rich people as they pass through the forest, giving the money and food to the poor.
Freeman has now enjoyed a career spanning six decades. He first became known for his role in The Electric Company, a children's television series. He was nominated for a Tony for Best Featured Actor in a Play for The Mighty Gents.
Freeman then appeared in Million Dollar Baby, earning Best Supporting Actor at the Academy Awards. Morgan was also nominated for Street Smart, Driving Miss Daisy, the great movie The Shawshank Redemption and Invictus. Freeman has also starred in the Dark Knight trilogy from 2005-2012, the hilarious Bruce Almighty, Glory, The Sum of All Fears, Amistad, Clean and Sober, Under Suspicion, Deep Impact and The Bucket List.
Morgan has also narrated many documentaries including March of the Penguins, Our Universe and Life on Our Planet. Freeman has received Kennedy Center Honors, the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award, the Cecil B. DeMille Award and the AFI Life Achievement Award.
"(Everything I Do) I Do It For You" was a worldwide smash, hitting #1 in nineteen countries, including a still-record 19 consecutive weeks at the top in the U.K. and seven weeks at #1 in the U.S. Adams' tune also reached #1 in Germany, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland, among others.
It so dominated the charts in 1991 that the song finished as the #1 song of the year in the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Belgium, the Netherlands and Sweden, one of the most impressive universal chart performances in history. To date, it has sold over 15 million copies around the world, making it one of the best-selling singles of all-time, and was nominated for Best Original Song at the Golden Globes and Academy Awards.
Adams should have won for Best Original Song, experiencing one of many awards show blunders as "A Whole New World" took the honors. While that song is a fellow member of The Top 500 Songs of the Rock Era Club*, it has nowhere near the cache that Adams' song does. The Grammy Awards righted that error by awarding Best Song Written Specifically for a Motion Picture or for Television to Adams, Kamen and Lange. The movie soundtrack has topped one million in sales.
Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves was a blockbuster, earning a gross of $390 million, that also picked up a Golden Globe nomination for Best Original Score and a Grammy Award for Best Pop Instrumental Performance as well as a nomination for Best Instrumental Composition Written for a Motion Picture or for Television.
#25--"A Hard Day's Night" by the Beatles (from the movie A Hard Day's Night--1964)
John Lennon wrote Song #25* in 1964 with help from Paul McCartney for the Beatles' first movie, A Hard Day's Night. The song's unusual title came from something that drummer Ringo Starr said once, as quoted by Keith Badman in the book The Beatles Off the Record:
We went to do a job, and we'd worked all day and we happened to work all night. I came up still thinking it was day I suppose, and I said, "It's been a hard day...' and I looked around and saw it was dark so I said, '...night!' So we came to "a Hard Day's Night.'"
The opening chord in both the song and the movie is "the most discussed pop opening of all-time," according to musicologist Jeremy Summerly in his "Making Music" lecture at Gresham College. George Harrison set the foundation for the chord with his Rickenbacker 360 12-string guitar. Producer George Martin told Mark Lewisohn for Mark's 1988 book The Beatles Recording Sessions: "We knew it would open both the film and the soundtrack LP, so we wanted a particularly strong and effective beginning . The strident guitar chord was the perfect launch."
Ian MacDonald called the chord "a significance in Beatles lore matched only by the concluding E major of 'A Day in the Life' in his book Revolution in the Head: The Beatles Records and the Sixties.
The highly-regarded movie, directed by Richard Lester, follows the band for 36 hours as they get ready for a television appearance, beginning as they run from fans as they board a train in London.
American Richard Lester Liebman spent most of his professional life in the United Kingdom. In addition to directing the films A Hard Day's Night and Help!, Lester worked with Peter Sellers and Spike Milligan on The Goon Show and The Running Jumping & Standing Still Film. Lester also directed Superman II and III, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, The Three Musketeers in 1973 and its sequels and Butch and Sundance: The Early Days.
The Beatles held down both the #1 song and the #1 album on both sides of the Atlantic for two weeks in August, the first time any artist had ever accomplished that feat. "A Hard Day's Night" was a global Top Five song, also reaching the top in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, South Africa and Sweden and #2 in Germany and selling over one million copies.
Besides the U.S. and U.K., the soundtrack album also hit #1 in Germany, Australia and Finland and has sold over four million units.
A Hard Day's Night grossed $14 million at the box office and earned Academy Award nominations for Best Music Score and Best Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen.
It's been a hard day's night,
And I've been working like a dog.
It's been a hard day's night,
I should be sleeping like a log.
But when I get home to you,
I find the things that you do
Will make me feel alright.
You know I work all day,
To get you money to buy you things.
And it's worth it just to hear you say,
You're gonna give me everything.
So why on earth should I moan,
'Cause when I get you alone,
You know I feel okay.
When I'm home
Everything seems to be right.
When I'm home,
Feeling you holding me tight, tight, yeah.
It's been a hard day's night,
And I've been working like a dog.
It's been a hard day's night,
I should be sleeping like a log.
But when I get home to you,
I find the things that you do
Will make me feel alright.
So why on earth should I moan,
'Cause when I get you alone,
You know I feel okay.
When I'm home
Everything seems to be right.
When I'm home,
Feeling you holding me tight, tight, yeah.
It's been a hard day's night,
And I've been working like a dog.
It's been a hard day's night,
I should be sleeping like a log.
But when I get home to you,
I find the things that you do
Will make me feel alright.
#24--"The End Of The Road" by Boyz II Men (from the movie Boomerang--1992)
Producers Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds, Antonio "L.A." Reid and Daryl Simmons wrote this song in 1992 for the movie Boomerang. Eddie Murphy plays Marcus Graham, an advertising executive who is a male chauvinist. But karma plays a hand as Graham's new boss Angela Lewis (played by Halle Berry) is virtually a female version of himself and he begins receiving the same kind of treatment that he has been giving to others. Robin Givens, David Alan Grier, Martin Lawrence, Grace Jones, Chris Rock and Eartha Kitt co-star.
Givens appeared on The Cosby Show and Diff'rent Strokes and starred in the sitcom Head of the Class for five years. She was married to boxer Mike Tyson for one tumultuous year in which he was physically abusive and hit her several times. Robin became a spokeswoman for the U.S. National Domestic Violence Hotline for several years.
People who the public look up to are often not what they appear to be, especially in "reality shows" such as The Apprentice. The public should beware and be skeptical of the image that the person wants to portray. That public image and the real person are not the same.
"The End Of The Road" became one of the biggest hits of the Rock Era when it set a then-record 13 weeks at #1, broken later in the year by Whitney Houston. The tune was a gigantic hit in every country in the world except Austria, also going to #1 in the U.K., Australia, New Zealand and the Netherlands, #2 in Sweden, #3 in Canada, #6 in Denmark and Germany and #7 in France, Panama and Switzerland. It was the #1 song of 1992 and has surpassed four million in U.S. sales.
The "Boomerang" Soundtrack reached #4 on the Album chart in the United States and has sold over three million copies there.
The movie chalked up a gross of $131 million.
#23--"Endless Love" by Diana Ross and Lionel Richie (from the movie Endless Love--1981)
Lionel Richie wrote this for a duet with Diana Ross for the 1981 movie Endless Love. Judith Rascoe adapted the screenplay for the movie from the 1979 book of the same name. Brooke Shields plays 15-year-old Jade Butterfield, who falls in love with 17-year-old David Axelrod (Martin Hewitt).
Although Jade's parents are very open, Hugh Butterfield (her father) begins to not feel good about their relationship and eventually he tells Jade that she can not see David until the end of the school year so she can focus on her studies. David is devastated. Shirley Knight, Don Murray, Richard Kiley co-star and Tom Cruise made his movie debut in Endless Love.
Knight appeared in more than 50 television, movies and plays in her career, nominated for Best Supporting Actress for Sweet Bird of Youth and The Dark at the Top of the Stairs. Shirley also appeared in The Couch, House of Women, The Rain People and Dutchman.
Knight won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for Kennedy's Children and also appeared in the movies As Good as It Gets and Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. Knight won three Primetime Emmy Awards from eight nominations and appeared in television shows such as The Fugitive, Murder, She Wrote, The Virginian, Law & Order, L.A. Law, ER and many others.
Shields was a child model before appearing in Endless Love. She suspended her modeling career to get a bachelor's degree in Romance languages at Princeton University. Brooke starred in Suddenly Susan from 1996 to 2000, earning two Golden Globe nominations. She also starred in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
According to genealogical research by William Addams Reitwiesner, Brooke has ancestors from a number of noble Italian families, including the Gattilusi-Palaiologos-Savy, Grimaldi, Imperiali, Carafa, Doria, Doria-Pamphili-Landi, Chigi-Albani and Torlonia dynasties. Her grandmother was the daughter of an Italian prince and her great uncle was Italian nobleman Alessandro Torlonio, husband of Infanta Beatriz of Spain.
"Endless Love" topped the U.S. chart for nine weeks and also rocketed to #1 in Canada, Australia and South Africa and peaked at #3 in New Zealand, #4 in the Netherlands, #5 in Sweden, #6 in Finland and Switzerland, #7 in the U.K. and #9 in Ireland. The song was nominated for Best Original Song at both the Golden Globe Awards and the Oscars. The single has sold over two million copies in the U.S. alone and is approaching three million in sales worldwide while the movie soundtrack is over 500,000 units sold. The album earned a Grammy nomination for Best Album of Original Score Written for a Motion Picture or Television Special.
The movie earned a gross of $32 million.
HIM: My love,
There´s only you in my life
The only thing that´s right
HER: My first love,
You´re every breath that I take
You´re every step I make
HIM: And I
HER: I-I-I-I-I
HIM: I want to share
BOTH: All my love with you
HIM: No one else will do...
HER: And your eyes
HIM: Your eyes, your eyes
BOTH: They tell me how much you care
Ooh yes, you will always be
My endless love
BOTH: Two hearts,
Two hearts that beat as one
Our lives have just begun
HER: Forever
HIM: Ohhhhhh
BOTH: I´ll hold you close in my arms
I can´t resist your charms
HER: And love
HIM: Oh, love
BOTH: I´ll be a fool
For you,
I´m sure
HER: You know I don´t mind
HIM: Oh, you know I don´t mind
BOTH: ´Cause you,
You mean the world to me
Oh
HER: I know
HIM: I know
BOTH: I´ve found in you
My endless love
HIM: Oooh-woow
BOTH: Boom, boom
Boom, boom, boom, boom, booom
Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom
BOTH: Oooh, and love
HIM: Oh, love
BOTH: I´ll be that fool
For you,
I´m sure
HER: You know I don´t mind
HIM: Oh you know-
BOTH: I don´t mind
BOTH: And, YES
You´ll be the only one
´Cause NO one can deny
This love I have inside
And I´ll give it all to you
HIM: My love
HER: My love, my love
BOTH: My endless love
#22--"The Long And Winding Road" by the Beatles (from the movie Let It Be--1970)
Written by Paul McCartney and credited to Lennon-McCartney, this 1970 song was featured in the Beatles' last movie, Let It Be. The single was released one month after the group split up. Producer Phil Spector added orchestral and choral overdubs to the song, which infuriated McCartney.
According to Howard Souries in his 2010 book Fab: An Intimate Life of Paul McCartney, Paul came up with the title during one of his first visits to his property near Campbeltown in Scotland, which he bought in 1966. Paul gazed up and saw a road "stretching up into the hills" in the remote Highlands, then sat down at his piano in 1968 and wrote the song.
The film, directed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg and produced by Neil Aspinall, was originally slated to be a television documentary in conjunction with a concert broadcast but when the Beatles couldn't agree on the particulars for the concert, those plans were scrapped and the project became a feature movie.
Let It Be shows the Beatles rehearsing and recording songs in January of 1969 for what turned out to be their final studio album. Although the film doesn't dwell on the deep dissensions that led to the group's breakup, it certainly shows some of the personal conflicts. The film ends with the famous unannounced concert on the roof of the Apple Corps building at 3 Savile Row in London.
Lindsay-Hogg, the son of actress Geraldine Fitzgerald, had previously directed episodes of the popular British show Ready Steady Go!, which led to Lindsay-Hogg being asked to direct promotional films for both the Beatles ("Paperback Writer", "Rain", "Hey Jude" and "Revolution") and the Rolling Stones (including "Jumpin' Jack Flash".
In the 70's and 80's, Michael directed music videos for Paul McCartney and Wings, the Stones, Whitney Houston ("You Give Good Love"), Simon & Garfunkel's The Concert in Central Park, Paul Simon's Graceland: The African Concert and more. Lindsay-Hogg also directed the 1978 stage production Whose Life Is It Anyway? (for which he earned a Tony Award nomination).
"The Long And Winding Road" became the Beatles' 20th and last #1 song of their incredible career, with the song also hitting #3 in New Zealand, #5 in Italy, #6 in Australia, #7 in Sweden and #8 in Switzerland and selling over one million copies.
The Let It Be album topped charts in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands, Norway and Italy and has sold over four million copies in the United States and five million globally.
The Beatles won an Academy Award for Best Original Song Score and a Grammy for Best Original Score Written for a Motion Picture or a Television Special.
#21--"Love Me Tender" by Elvis Presley (from the movie Love Me Tender--1956)
George R. Poulton wrote the music for this next smash in 1861. It was known as "Aura Lea" back then, popular during the American Civil War. The tune was given new lyrics for Elvis Presley's new movie in 1956.
Although lyrics are credited to Vera Matson, her husband Ken Darby wrote them. In addition to scoring movies, for which he won three Academy Awards (for The King and I, Porgy and Bess and Camelot) and a Grammy, Darby provided the voice for the mayor of Munchkinland in the 1939 classic The Wizard of Oz.
"Love Me Tender" appeared as the title song of the Western movie about a month after the single was released.
In addition to singing songs for the soundtrack, Presley plays Clint Reno, the youngest brother in his family, who stays home to take care of his mother and the family farm as the three oldest (Vance, Brett and Ray) go off to fight in the American Civil War. While they are away, Vance's girlfriend falls in love with Clint and they are married.
Four years later, the boys return and Vance has to come to grips with this piece of news about his girlfriend. Complicating matters is the fact that the three Reno brothers attacked a Union train and rob it of $12,000, not knowing that the war had ended the day before. The brothers and other cohorts in the robbery are wanted by the U.S. government.
Richard Egan plays Vance Reno, with Debra Paget, Mildred Dunnock, William Campbell and James Drury co-starring.
The Ken Darby Singers sang backing vocals for Bing Crosby on the original 1942 recording of the classic "White Christmas". Darby was also part of a vocal quartet called "The King's Men"--they were the featured vocalists on the popular radio program "Fibber McGee and Molly", which aired from 1940-1953.
Darby was the composer and production supervisor for Walt Disney Studios and was the music director on the classic film Song of the South. He also served as Marilyn Monroe's vocal coach for Gentlemen Prefer Blondes in 1953 and There's No Business Like Show Business the following year.
Egan won Golden Globe Awards for The Glory Brigade and The Kid from Left Field. Among his other movies were Demetrius and the Gladiators, Wicked Woman, Underwater!, a film he starred in opposite Jane Russell, The Hunters and A Summer Place in 1959.
Because of his distinctive voice, Egan was Rod Serling's first choice to narrate The Twilight Zone. But legal issues got in the way and Serling narrated the episodes himself.
"Love Me Tender" remained #1 for five weeks in the United States and also hit #1 in Canada and #6 in Australia and sold over three million copies.
The movie made $4.5 million.
We hope you enjoyed this segment and its 10 classics. Join us tomorrow exclusively on Inside The Rock Era as we dive into the Top 20*!
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