The 10 Best Movie Soundtracks Ever Made

10. Taxi Driver

Bernard Herrmann's unsettling score for Martin Scorsese's urban nightmare was also his last -- he died the night he finished composing the last track. Often ignored in comparison to Herrmann's other popular soundtracks for films such as "North by Northwest," "Taxi Driver" is simultaneously a great jazz record (think Lalo Schifrin's "Dirty Harry" score ) and one of the finest soundtracks ever written.

9. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Ennio Morricone's renowned work for director Sergio Leone is one of his finest. Inarguably his most popular work -- and the one that most often seems to define his style of spaghetti western music to casual listeners -- it's one of the best things you'll ever hear; the main theme is still an evocative masterpiece after all these years. It works as well within the film as it does on its own.

8. Saturday Night Fever

Fueled by the Bee Gees and other disco artists such as Walter Murphy and Ralph McDonald, it's almost a cliche at this point to list Saturday Night Fever as one of the greatest soundtracks of all-time, but if you can appreciate (or, in some people's view, tolerate) the outdated sounds of the disco era, you'll find a lot of solid tracks here. The Bee Gees' work is, of course, the best -- and, thankfully, the most present. They dominate the album with songs like "Stayin' Alive" and "More Than a Woman." It was the soundtrack of an era. (Also, don't overlook film composer David Shire's contributions to the album.)

7. The Conversation

Speaking of David Shire...

This score by Shire for Francis Ford Coppola's masterpiece of the paranoia thriller subtly evokes the schizophrenia of the main character with its moody jazz and piano pieces. Not only is The Conversation one of the most underrated films of the 1970s (I'd easily place it within the top ten of the decade) -- its soundtrack is even more painfully overlooked. It took a lot of searching on my part to find a copy of this. Definitely seek it out if you're a fan of piano and jazz.

6. Batman