At this point, I think it is fair to say that I write more about music than I do movies. But that love of music was initially fostered in large part thanks to movies. The art of the needle-drop – setting a sequence of a film or TV show to an already-released piece of music, rather than relying on the original score – is a long and storied one. Done well, that song can become inextricable from the scene’s impact whether that be through resonating lyrics, an injection of energy you can’t get from a traditional score, twisting a song’s prior meaning to reflect the uncommon situation it’s appeared in, or filling in entire shades of character work just through the music chosen. Done poorly and the music just becomes a distraction, particularly if everyone keeps using the same needle-drop in the same uninteresting way – shout-out to Bonnie Tyler’s licensing team, taking the ‘2017 John Denver’ Award for having no less than nine usages of ‘Holding Out for a Hero’ and ‘Total Eclipse of the Heart’ in 2023 alone.
Despite Bonnie-Overload, I felt like 2023 had an inordinately bountiful crop of excellent needle-drops. When I got to meet up with Kelechi Ehenulo in-person at this year’s London Film Festival, it turned out that I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. So, with the year now approaching its end, we’ve decided to pool our lists of noteworthy needle-drops together into a celebration of the best of the best.
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To ensure we’re all on the same page, we laid down some hard rules for what the definition of a needle-drop is and, therefore, eligible for consideration: a pre-existing piece of music which hasn’t been created for playing in the film or TV show it cropped up in. This meant that the vast majority of Barbie’s song choices – ‘Dance the Night,’ ‘Speed Drive,’ and ‘What Was I Made For?’ – could not be considered since those were original songs made for Barbie. Relatedly, original musical numbers and musical adaptations were also disqualified straight out, for pretty much the same reason – so no ‘I’m Just Ken,’ nothing from Theater Camp, and nothing from Wonka. Concert films are making a glorious comeback but that’d be cheating, so you won’t find THE ERAS TOUR or RENAISSANCE here either. One big grey area we chose to allow, however, was characters in-universe performing a prior-released song, say for example at karaoke. We felt that such situations fit the spirit of the needle-drop concept.
After much deliberation, we narrowed our list down to ten, trying to ensure that each example showed a different way that needle-drops can enhance a scene rather than merely going “that song sounded so fucking cool playing in this bit!”. As such, we had to chop off a lot of potential entries we still felt strongly about. They make up the ten Honourable Mentions you can read below:
- Cocaine Bear – ‘Just Can’t Get Enough’ by Depeche Mode
- Transformers: Rise of the Beasts – ‘Mama Said Knock You Out’ by LL Cool J
- The Creator – ‘Everything In its Right Place’ by Radiohead
- The Marvels – ‘Memory’ by Barbara Streisand
- They Cloned Tyrone – ‘Love Hangover’ by Diana Ross
- Bottoms – ‘Complicated’ by Avril Lavigne
- Barbie – ‘Push’ by Matchbox Twenty
- The Last of Us – ‘Long Long Time’ by Linda Ronstadt
- BEEF – ‘The Reason’ by Hoobastank
- Loki – ‘Oh Sweet Nothing’ by The Velvet Underground
Let us know what your favourite needle-drops in film and TV throughout 2023 were, either in the comments or on the socials! Oh and, obviously, MAJOR SPOILERS abound from here on out. – Callie Petch
M3GAN – ‘Titanium’ by David Guetta feat. Sia
When M3GAN graced us with her dance moves made perfect for that TikTok generation, the trailer took the internet by storm. But little did we know that writer Akela Cooper and director Gerald Johnstone had another gem up their sleeves!
The needle drop moment in M3GAN is genuinely funny, purely for the fact that it comes unexpectedly, after Brandon’s (Jack Cassidy) horrific death. The child bully (giving the energy of Sid in Toy Story) terrorises Cady (Violet McGraw) in the woods during a school outing. He steals M3GAN (activated in ‘protect Cady at all costs’ mode), begins his terror of abuse… and, in one swift second, gets a taste of his own medicine. She pulls off his ear and chases him on all fours like an animal before he gets hit by a passing car on the road. The fact Brandon gets hit by a car is triggering for Cady, still wrestling with her parents’ death in a car accident. It speaks volumes about her co-dependency with M3GAN, highlighting the addictiveness of technology in forming artificial relationships instead of real relationships with human beings. But that’s what makes the exchange (and needle drop) so brilliant. M3GAN, with zero f*cks in her attitude, has no sympathy for Brandon. He will not see heaven! And like a cold dash of reality tells Cady that no one will stand in her way again.
It brilliantly changes the context of the song. What is a classic pop/dance anthem now becomes a creepy lullaby sung by a relentless robot who’s endlessly slaying with every dialogue, movement and outfit. (The Terminator could never!) But it also works due to the sinister edge it provides with an AI robot prepared to kill to do so. With a film littered with dramatic ‘red flags’ with the audience fully knowing and expecting M3GAN – the robot – to malfunction, it has a blast doing so. – Kelechi Ehenulo
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John Wick: Chapter 4 – ‘Hate or Glory’ by Gestaffelstein
Music is a vital element of John Wick’s action sequences. For as balletic as the choreography on its own can be, when paired with either series’ composers Tyler Bates & Joel J. Richard’s score or an expertly-chosen set of electronic and industrial rock thumpers, the violence on-screen gains an additional giddy thrill and satisfaction when it feel like headshots are syncing up to the beat. There’s a reason why video game fans like to keep comparing this series to Hotline Miami and it ain’t just director Chad Stahelski’s adoration for neon.
French DJ Gestaffelstein did not find his work featured on Hotline Miami, but his dark deep bass techno would have made a perfect fit for those two games as evidenced by John Wick: Chapter 4 utilising the aggressively violent ‘Hate or Glory’ to back its most audacious set piece: the Arc de Triomphe gunfight. Like something out of a video game, or perhaps a nihilistic Looney Tunes short, John Wick (Keanu Reeves) crawls out of the overturned wreckage of a commandeered muscle car and is forced to shoot it out with wave after wave of freelance contract killers whilst the Arc’s infamous heavy traffic flows around them unabated. A lot of this franchise’s key moments have been sound-tracked by leftfield electro bangers, and this may be the most inspired choice of them all. Working the quiet-LOUD-quiet-LOUD dynamics of the song’s structure into the sequence’s pacing, beginning with those staccato bass stabs, turning up the rattling hi-hats and static-sounding synth bursts when a new set of henchmen screech into view, and quieting back down after a particularly nasty hit (usually involving a body getting flung into a car) to emphasise the moment.
The vibe is immaculate – from the second that the Warriors-reminiscent DJ clicks play on her tape deck and the song starts up, you know shit’s about to get wild – the pull is left-field, and the action is glorious, but it’s that seamless integration of ‘Hate and Glory’ into the rhythms of the scene which make this perhaps the highlight of Chapter 4’s spectacular hour-long blowout. – Callie Petch
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Doctor Who – ‘Spice Up Your Life’ by Spice Girls
Picture the scene: It’s 2022. Russell T. Davies is sitting at home watching Chris Chibnall’s ‘The Power of the Doctor.’ The Master (Sacha Dhawan), having brought the Cybermen and the Daleks together for another world-ending ploy, celebrates his victory over The Doctor (Jodie Whittaker) with a song and dance – Boney M’s ‘Rasputin’. Davies suddenly leans back on his sofa with a smirk and a grin and utters two words: “challenge accepted”.
None of that happened, but it is a brief reminder of the contrasting fortunes in Doctor Who’s recent history. ‘The Power of the Doctor’ ushered the end of Chibnall’s not so well received reign as showrunner. Episodes were rushed messes, playing fast and loose with its storylines and companions and not matching the standards of his predecessors. On the other hand, RTD returns to the franchise like a knight in shining armour. His anniversary specials more assured, confident and bombastic, and brilliantly unapologetic. Nothing summarises that feeling more so than ‘The Giggle’ and, in particular, the choice to centre an entire scene around the best Spice Girls song ever recorded. In a year where villains have taken centre stage, showcasing themselves at their most heinous without rationalising for their capitalist evil deeds, ‘Spice Up Your Life’ has now become an iconic villain song and dance.
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The Toymaker (Neil Patrick Harris) waltzes in dressed like a toy soldier and, for one minute and twenty-five seconds, he creates absolute torment and chaos. Bullets are swapped for rose petals. U.N.I.T. soldiers are turned into colourful bouncy balls. Kate Lethbridge-Stewart (Jemma Redgrave) and Melanie Bush (Bonnie Langford) are forced to dance to his evil steps (and flung to the ground for their participation). And The Doctor (David Tennant) in all this? Powerless. It’s the type of menace that reminds you of peak Who, something that combines absolute absurdity with a chilling aftertaste. The fact that The Toymaker, a being who can lock the Master in his gold tooth and turn God into a jack in a box, can do this with such ease, makes him a formidable foe for The Doctor. Judging by the fun the moment has, you can tell Neil Patrick Harris was living his best life.
But seriously, if the dance doesn’t feature on the next series of Strictly Come Dancing, we as a nation have missed a trick. – Kelechi Ehenulo
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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem – ‘Ante Up’ by M.O.P.
Listen, if I merely hear ‘Ante Up’ in my day-to-day life, shit is getting wrecked. Those Sam & Dave sampled horns with the gang “OH”s come in for even a second whether it’s on my iPod, during a fitness class, on the radio, at a party, in a rubbish KFC advert? Shiiiiiit. I’m 200ft tall. I’m striding with confident purpose. I’m acting stupid. I’m doing permanent damage to my neck from bouncing it too hard. I’m flooring it down the motorway. I’m smashing a chair across the head of the next person who looks at me funny. I’m powerbombing Godzilla through a volcano. I’m not a violent or confrontational person, you will never see me in the octagon, a stiff breeze could probably knock me out. But play ‘Ante Up’ whilst forcing me into a fight, I’m going down swinging. Certain songs are just built like that.
‘Ante Up’ appears twice in Mutant Mayhem, the best Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie (and if you disagree then please remember that previous paragraph). The first time, it’s during a montage of the turtles committing some light larceny on a snack run; functioning as both the obligatory ‘ironic’ hip-hop needle-drop nearly all animated movies are legally required to use for comic effect, and establishing the film’s sincere New York bona fides via one of the East Coast’s most undeniable bangers. (Also, ‘Ante Up’ for once sound-tracking a montage of robbing, even if the turtles technically leave cash behind for that stuff! That’s cool!) If that were the only time the song was featured, it’d be fun but not special enough to get included here.
When ‘Ante Up’ appears the second time, it’s as the turtles and their fellow mutants fly back into Manhattan ready to take on the now-kaiju-sized Superfly (Ice Cube), becoming the heroes they’ve spent their whole lives wanting to be. And trust me when I tell you that I was ready to leap right out my seat and launch myself into the next few rows the instant that “BRRRRRRRABADOU!” reappeared. Then that slo-mo group walk after Leonardo (Nicolas Cantu) slices open the net for a superhero landing? And April O’Neil’s (Ayo Edebiri) Akira-slide into shot with the off-hand gun toss to Raphael (Brady Noon)? Look, if you try and tell me you didn’t feel like putting a great white shark in a camel clutch when watching this sequence, I’m calling you a fucking liar. – Callie Petch
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Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse – ‘Ain’t No Love In The Heart of the City’ by Bobby “Blue” Bland
Who can forget that moment when Uncle Aaron’s record player drops the needle on Notorious B.I.G.’s ‘Hypnotize’ in Into the Spider-Verse? It’s a carefree moment for Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) and Aaron (Mahershala Ali). For Miles, it’s a distraction from finishing his ‘Great Expectations’ essay. For Aaron, it’s a nurturing moment, giving his nephew encouraging affirmations about his graffiti designs and teaching him some “game” with the ladies. Biggie’s song anchors this relationship beautifully, basking in the love and humour where Miles is “hypnotized” by his uncle’s cool presence – a stark contrast between Miles’ relationship with his father, who embarrassed him at the school gates and forced to say “I love you” in public. Aaron’s love of music is the cornerstone, a generational gap respecting Hip-Hop’s cultural roots to New York, but how the song allows the characters to see each other as the best versions of themselves – long before their eventual secret identities are revealed.
Across the Spider-Verse‘s climactic power comes from how it uses music to flip that relationship on its head. In echoing the first film, Bobby Bland’s needle drop flies under the radar, channelling a darker set of emotions for the film’s shocking conclusion. Miles – trapped on Earth-42 – not only sees his uncle alive, but with no Spider-Man in that universe, Earth-42’s Miles Morales becomes the heir to The Prowler.
The musical significance becomes a psychological taunt, playing with Miles’ emotions towards an uncle he looks up to, a person whose dying words to him were “you’re the best of all of us… Just keep going.” As the song suggests, “there ain’t no love” despite Miles’ desperate pleas to convince Earth-42’s Uncle Aaron that he’s a good guy. But the gut punch comes with the acknowledgement that he’s reunited with his beloved uncle under different circumstances, posing a terrifying ‘what if?’ of a harsh reality that could have easily been Miles’ future. And Miles’ greatest battle ahead of him will be a battle with himself. – Kelechi Ehenulo
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Anatomy of a Fall – ‘P.I.M.P.’ by Bacao Rhythm & Steel Band
Truly excellent needle-drops do way more than just soundtrack cool shit. They can also function as character work, a chosen song either synced to their action or set in motion by them revealing more than a half-dozen monologues ever could. One might therefore assume that an excellent needle-drop can tell you everything you need to know about a character… without them ever appearing on-screen. It’s one hell of a gamble, to put it mildly. Making that creative choice a cornerstone of your entire film is equivalent to Babe Ruth calling his shot in Game 5 of the World Series.
In Justine Triet’s courtroom drama Anatomy of a Fall, we only physically meet Samuel Maleski (Samuel Theis) when his son returns home from a walk to find his dead body sprawled out underneath the open attic window. It takes over 90 minutes for us to hear him utter any words, during an extended flashback played from a recording of his and accused wife Sandra’s (Sandra Hüller) last argument. Before then, the only concrete character information we have about Samuel – subsequently fuelling the ambiguous question of whether his death was a cruel accident, an act of suicide, or intentional murder by thriller novelist Sandra – is that he likes to blast music extremely loud whilst remodelling the attic, regardless of whether his wife has friends over or not. The song choice here is arguably more important than anything else in the movie.
So, during that opening scene of Sandra attempting to hold an interview with a young student, cue ‘P.I.M.P.’ Not just any recording of 50 Cent’s misogynist anthem, but an instrumental cover by German funk ensemble Bacao Rhythm & Steel Band. Like the original, it’s obnoxiously loud and repetitive; those steel pans bashing out the same melody over and over again, hogging up the mix’s forefront so they can be cleanly heard multiple floors down. Without the lyrics, a casual listener unfamiliar with the original can miss the sentiment of an impotent man spitefully blasting this song to annoy his significantly more successful wife, but those who are familiar can understand the passive-aggression (like the prosecution does during the trial). And when it finally fades out for a few blissful seconds of silence, Samuel starts the song right back up again, likely making the viewer want to shunt the prick out the attic window themselves.
Samuel’s pettiness, latent misogyny, and desire to make everybody else as miserable as he is are all expressed through this one needle-drop… and the rest of Anatomy is successfully fuelled off its back. Triet called her shot and sent it out the stadium. – Callie Petch
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Saltburn – ‘Murder on the Dancefloor’ by Sophie Ellis Bextor
‘Murder on the Dancefloor’ is easily one of the best needle-drops of the year in cinema. Yet to talk about why it is so good would be trespassing into massive spoiler territory! Without giving away too many clues to ruin this entry, let’s just say it is an eye-catching (and revealing) culmination of patience, power and unapologetic debauchery – all expressed through Barry Keoghan’s dancing.
Director Emerald Fennell takes audiences into the world of Saltburn, a sick, twisted ‘eat the rich’ fantasy wrapped in the inspirations of Brideshead Revisited and The Talented Mr. Ripley. Whether you vibe with Fennell’s latest escapade comes down to your own personal taste, but the entire film is a nostalgic throwback to the noughties, with Girls Aloud, Arcade Fire, T-Pain, and MGMT forming the soundtrack to our teenage lives. It’s impressive for how it perfectly sets the scene: Oliver (Keoghan) arrives at Oxford University for his first day. Already deemed an outsider by his classmates due to his working class social standing, he worms his way into upper class cliques and begins an unhealthy infatuation and obsession with Felix (Jacob Elordi). Cue the mind games, shocks and the most unserious characters to grace cinema when Oliver spends the summer at the Saltburn residence.
The song choice is iconic because of that rare occasion where the song matches the intention. When Oliver celebrates, it’s a sense of triumph and a statement of ownership – conducted in the darkest possible way that won’t sit right with your soul. But, like all good needle drops, it changes the context of Ellis Bextor’s song despite its upbeat emotions. Now, when you hear it, you will never forget it. – Kelechi Ehenulo
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Rye Lane – ‘Shoop’ by Salt-N-Pepa
Karaoke scenes are gimmes for effective, narrative-progressing needle-drops. Pair up two characters, whether both are on-stage performing or one’s in the audience watching, with a song that just so coincidentally happens to express feelings otherwise unspoken and watch the fireworks. Robson Green & Jerome Flynn launched a pop music career with three UK #1 singles off the back of a karaoke-type scene in Soldier Soldier. But don’t hold that fact against the concept. After all, you’d miss out on appreciating one of the most heartwarming scenes in Raine Allen-Miller’s exceptional rom-com Rye Lane.
Like everything else in Allen-Miller’s film, the dynamics are straightforward and laid out in the open well beforehand. Dom (David Jonsson) is a doormat of a guy with a romantic’s heart and real anxiety who wouldn’t be caught dead at karaoke; Yaz (Vivian Oparah) is an ultra-cool girl who projects effortless confidence and a cynical eye on love to protect herself from the risk of getting hurt. Over the course of a day in South London, the pair hang out and grow closer, circumstances eventually forcing Dom to perform karaoke as a favour to Yaz’s friend. Yaz, naturally, picks the song – ‘Shoop’ by Salt-N-Pepa, a proven party starter – and Dom is forced to lead off, frozen like a deer in headlights as he mumbles much of the opening verse and even does the stiffest audience handoff for “what’s my weakness, MEN!” He is bombing, and Jonsson leans in to every awkward phrase.
Which is when Yaz, fuelled by admiration at Dom’s willingness to embarrass himself selflessly on her behalf, slides in to help him out. The immediate calming contrast in Oparah’s quietly-assured delivery relaxes the viewer just like it does Dom and, by the time of the first chorus, both he and Yaz are locked together with the whole bar jumping. They ham up certain lines, raise their voices, engage in more natural audience handoffs, and feed off a shared spark together, galvanised by the throwback fun of S-n-P’s game-playing anthem. The joy, connection, and potential romance of karaoke communicated wonderfully by this scene and this song. – Callie Petch
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Guardians of the Galaxy vol. 3 – ‘Dog Days are Over’ by Florence + the Machine
A consistent thread, perhaps the consistent thread, throughout James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy has been his exploration of characters through needle-drops. Who can forget our introduced to Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), backed by Redbone’s ‘Come and Get Your Love’ – that kick-ass burst of energy for a character who acts like an immature child yet dreams of being a “somebody” in the galaxy. This, along with many other songs, speaks volumes to how character building and personalities sum up the mood of each film; it’s an artform Gunn clearly loves. Vol. 3 doesn’t reach the same giddy heights of its predecessors due to the darker tone in its story-line. But what it does achieve is something truly heartfelt – and easily the best Guardians adventure ever told.
It’s why ‘Dog Days Are Over’ elicits such tearful emotions. These characters have given us so much joy yet, the ending is bittersweet. We’re saying goodbye, but the goodbye comes through change. Star-Lord, Gamora (Zoe Saldaña), Rocket (Bradley Cooper), Nebula (Karen Gillan), Groot (Vin Diesel), Drax (Dave Bautista), and Mantis (Pom Klementieff) are all individuals who banded together through fear, abuse, trauma and grief – and instead of letting it consume their souls, ‘Dog Days’ allows the characters to shed their old personas for an outlook built on acceptance, maturity and growth, with a renewed sense of purpose.
It’s a beautifully euphoric moment that allows the Guardians to have closure without reducing their journey as a contrived cliche or something that sells “the next episode” in the Marvel machine. It allows the characters to take centre stage and with that knowledge, Gunn conceived his very own Star Wars trilogy with vol.3 being the Return of the Jedi of the franchise. ‘Dog Days’ is what John Williams’ ‘Victory Celebration’ has become, that feeling of good triumphing over evil where the Empire is defeated, or in Guardians’ case The High Evolutionary (Chukwudi Iwuji), and Drax allows himself to be an idiot and finally dance. – Kelechi Ehenulo
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The Bear – ‘Animal’ by Pearl Jam
The pilot of The Bear ends with Carmen (Jeremy Allen White) defiantly throwing a tin of tomato sauce for spaghetti he had been ordered to make into the trash as Pearl Jam’s seminal ‘Animal’ smash-cuts to credits. When interviewed by Steven Hyden, showrunner/music supervisor Christopher Storer pinpointed this specific needle-drop, out of the many which make up even an episode of The Bear, as the gauntlet for anyone watching the show. “We were making a statement that this is a loud show, and you are either in or out.” When Pearl Jam originally wrote ‘Animal,’ they felt like the world was out to get them, ready to watch them fall off the perch they had ascended with their conquering debut album, and so wrote a combative fight song as a defiant statement of intent. “5 against 1.”
17 episodes later, Storer and co. circle back to ‘Animal.’ Technically, this is a dual-entry, since the unbowed effect of ‘Animal’ is magnified by the previous needle-drop it cuts off. It’s opening night of the refurbished restaurant which Carmen, Sydney (Ayo Edebiri), Ritchie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) and the rest have poured every last cent, second, and sweat into for the past few months… and it’s going horribly wrong. They’re out of clean forks, grossly behind on the orders, and Carmen’s locked inside the walk-in freezer with no way to get out. All the while, Wilco’s ‘Spiders (Kidsmoke),’ which had previously sound-tracked the crew’s lowest point – Season 1’s ‘Review’ that depicted the failed first revamp of Carmen’s vision for The Bear – is chugging away in the background. All signs point to history repeating itself and, even when Syd and Ritchie decide to change roles on the fly in an attempt to get on top of shit within five minutes “or we’re fucked,” there’s no guarantee everyone can pull it off.
But the instant that ‘Animal’ kicks in, it’s like a switch flips. The chefs get out their heads, lock in, and it becomes “5 against 1.” The song sits in the middle of the mix, dialogue underneath, room ambience on top, driving the scene along as if the music itself is actively powering everyone up. Victory is snatched from the jaws of defeat in one of the most cathartic moments of TV all year… aside from the bittersweet twist in the muted chorus when we cut to Carmy pacing around the lock-in, stewing on all his past failures and oblivious to what’s going on outside. Like so much else in The Bear, the action and the music meld into one another, shifting and reading the scenes to an extent where you cannot envision either on their own. I cannot stop watching this specific needle-drop; it’s magnificent. – Callie Petch