what are your favorite movie soundtracks.

Must Haves:

'The Natural' - Randy Newman
'Last Temptation of Christ' (Passion) - Peter Gabriel
'Koyaanisqatsi' - Philip Glass
'Ascenseur Pour L'Echafaud' - Miles Davis
'For All Mankind' (Apollo) - Brian Eno

Also check out many the many soundtracks by Morricone, Knopfler and Vangelis

CD

The one and only: Bernard Herrmann. Wrote the music for "Citizen Kane" "Magnificent Ambersons" "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir" "The Day The Earth Stood Still" "The Wrong Man" "The Trouble With Harry" North By Northwest" "Vertigo" "Psycho" "Marnie" "The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad" "Jason and the Argonauts" "Mysterious Island" "Journey to the Center of the Earth" "Sisters" "Taxi Drivers"... and more! And most of these are available as original soundtracks or excellent newly recorded versions. If you don't know Herrmann's music, you don't know film soundtracks.

Theduke,
Your nomination of Bernard Hermann is spot on. While I put Curtis Mayfield's Superfly, as far as film soundtracks go, on a list of one; with regard to film scores in particular, Bernard Hermann is alone at the top.

His music for Vertigo (a brilliant musical commentary on Wagner's "Tristan und Isolde") is among my favorite compositions, in any musical genre, of the entire Century. It is impossible to overestimate the quality and importance of Bernard Hermann's film scores.

Have you ever heard or seen the movie "Southern Comfort"? Ry Cooder soundtrack, very erie and cool. He also did the soundtrack for "Crossroads" w/ Ralph Macchio. Very bluesy, and cool. I've always like the Wang Chung soundtrack from "To Live and Die in LA", a great cop movie featuring Willem Dafoe and William Peterson (currently on CSI).

Check 'em out.

I found in my collection a couple of more nominees:

-The Jackal
-Dark City
-Four Rooms
-Get Shorty