Soundtracks in Movies: Are They Important?

Soundtracks. Every movie has one, but how important are they to your viewing experience? Well, here are my thoughts.

Recently I saw both Thor: The Dark World and The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. While I enjoyed both, I have to say that I liked Thor more than Hunger Games sequel (and not just because I'm a Marvel fan).

One of the greatest things about Thor 2 was the soundtrack, composed by one of my favorite musicians, Brian Tyler (He's also made the Transformers: Prime theme, as well as the Iron Man 3 soundtrack). Without the music, some of the scenes in Thor 2 would not have been nearly as powerful as they were (I will try not to spoil the movie, but there was one scene in particular). Meanwhile, Catching Fire barely had a soundtrack, and not even a memorable one at that. By soundtrack, of course, I mean the actual music played during the scenes of a movie.

My enjoyment of movies has been partly because of some of the great music that makes up their soundtracks. (Man of Steel, for instance, had an amazing Hans Zimmer composition). However, several people I have talked to hardly pay attention to the music playing during a movie, and their enjoyment is unaffected by it. So does the music makes the movie? It depends on the person, but movie soundtracks should at least gather more appreciation for what they do.