Tunes — well-chosen ones — turn normal movie scenes into electric ones. Needle drops, they’re called in the film world. (And don’t laugh: Several of the filmmakers below are, indeed, dropping turntable needles onto vinyl records.)
What makes for a good needle drop? Sometimes it’s comic irony. Elsewhere, it’s trapping the sincerity of a moment in the amber glow of a perfect pop song, one you’ll never think of in the same way again.
We went through the entire year and grabbed a dozen of our favorites, listed below in no particular order — feel free to resequence them into your own personal playlist.
Our picks for this year’s best in arts and entertainment.
The Spice Girls, ‘2 Become 1,’ as heard in ‘Together’
Alison Brie and Dave Franco in the movie “Together.”
(Neon)
Dave Franco and Alison Brie are married in real life, but in the body horror romance “Together,” they play an engaged couple named Tim and Millie who might be happier breaking up. He’s a frustrated, flunked-out rock star; she’s a schoolteacher who loves the Spice Girls. Writer-director Michael Shanks plays their discordant musical taste like a minor joke among all the major reasons why their codependent relationship has hit the skids. As a hail Mary, Tim and Millie move from the city to the countryside for some miserable quality time — and there, deep in the woods, an eerie cave infects Tim’s skin cells with the urge to merge with Millie permanently. It all climaxes in a slow dance to the 1996 grrrl-pop ballad that’s never felt more sticky-sweet. — Amy Nicholson
Jack O’Connell, Lola Kirke and Peter Dreimanis, ‘Pick Poor Robin Clean,’ as heard in ‘Sinners’
Peter Dreimanis, left, Jack O’Connell, Hailee Steinfeld and Lola Kirke in the movie “Sinners.”
(Warner Bros. Pictures)
So much of Ryan Coogler’s supercharged vampire movie is saturated with blues music, both in its original score by Ludwig Göransson (itself an impressive piece of scholarship) and its careful selection of authentic period songs that both articulate and subvert the legend of going down to the crossroads to make a deal with the devil. So why is it this one I’m fixated on? It’s the tune most loaded with subtext. A trio of white musicians shows up at the door of the juke joint. They play this traditional number in the hopes of getting through the door. But in their smiling, cleaned-up, sprightly version of it, you can hear the whole of white cultural appropriation to come. The music is ominous. What exactly is getting picked clean? The song has become an evil spell. And the fact that it doesn’t work — they’re turned away — is another credit to Coogler’s instincts. It’s music criticism smuggled into a Hollywood smash. — Joshua Rothkopf
Steely Dan, ‘Dirty Work,’ as heard in ‘One Battle After Another’
Chase Infiniti in the movie “One Battle After Another.”
(Warners Bros. Pictures)
Paul Thomas Anderson has been deploying needle drops with precision since “Boogie Nights” and “Magnolia,” and 10 movies deep into his career, his ear remains sharp. In “One Battle After Another,” his darkly comic action-thriller, Leonardo DiCaprio plays Bob Ferguson, a former revolutionary who has spent years in hiding, raising his teenage daughter and trying to keep his past at bay. But the movie’s frenetic opening stretch loosens into something shaggier when Steely Dan’s 1972 world-weary track “Dirty Work” comes in. We see Bob parked outside his daughter’s school, getting high before a parent-teacher conference, ducking the eyes of other parents and swinging the door to air out the smoke. When the chorus arrives — “I’m a fool to do your dirty work” — it lands as recognition, not commentary. Bob knows he’s a sucker. We all are sometimes. The song just says it out loud. — Josh Rottenberg
George Harrison, ‘Beware of Darkness,’ as heard in ‘Weapons’
A scene from the movie “Weapons.”
(Warner Bros. Pictures)
Zach Cregger’s viral horror hit winds its way methodically to a climax of such hilarious savagery that you’ll scare yourself with how hard you’re laughing. Yet the movie opens with an almost unbearably poignant blend of picture and sound: a bunch of third-graders in their PJs running over dark, rain-slicked suburban streets — why? how? to what end? — against the aching psychedelic folk-rock of George Harrison’s “Beware of Darkness.” The song, from Harrison’s first solo album after the Beatles’ breakup, urges the listener not to be swallowed by “the hopelessness around you in the dead of night.” In “Weapons,” its eerie harmonic movement portends an innocence soon to be lost. — Mikael Wood
Led Zeppelin, ‘Whole Lotta Love,’ as heard in ‘F1’
Brad Pitt in the movie “F1.”
(Warner Bros. Pictures)
Too on the nose? Sure. That’s why it’s such a thing of beauty. First with “Top Gun: Maverick” and now this year with “F1,” director Joseph Kosinski has perfected Dad Cinema, creating movies centered on old(ish) guys who most definitely know best. There’s no better soundtrack to this microgenre than classic rock music. And there’s no better classic rock band than Led Zeppelin, a group famously resistant to licensing their songs until recently when the levee has apparently broken. Kosinski employs “Whole Lotta Love” when Brad Pitt’s Sonny arrives at the track for his shift at the 24 Hours of Daytona. His team is languishing until Sonny gets behind the wheel and Robert Plant starts wailing and John Bonham begins bashing. Jimmy Page’s guitar riff seemingly propels Sonny’s car forward to the lead. Ramble on, baby. — Glenn Whipp
John Prine and Iris DeMent, ‘In Spite of Ourselves,’ as heard in ‘Die My Love’
Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson in the movie “Die My Love.”
(Mubi)
Lynne Ramsay’s film is an elliptical, claustrophobic portrait of postpartum delirium. Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson evoke the small-bore unraveling of new parenthood in the boonies, with Lawrence in particular throwing her whole body into a creeping alienation from one’s spouse and oneself. But there is humor and tenderness shot throughout, moments where the lines of connection between them still hum. The pair singing along to Prine and DeMent’s “In Spite of Ourselves,” with its wincingly funny lovers trading jabs and devotions, is one moment of levity and self-awareness breaking through the desperation. The tune also memorably appeared in Celine Song’s “Materialists,” but here, it’s arguably the heart of the movie. — August Brown
Gil Scott-Heron, ‘The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,’ as heard in ‘Dead Man’s Wire,’ ‘One Battle After Another’ and ‘The Running Man’
Glen Powell, left, and Colman Domingo in the movie “The Running Man”
(Ross Ferguson / Paramount Pictures)
If the same piece of music is used at the end of three different movies, it becomes song of the year by default, right? Gil Scott-Heron’s 1971 “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” unexpectedly captured the mood of the moment, one of absurdity and anger with a clear-eyed view on the world. Edgar Wright’s “The Running Man” used the song’s looping, funky backing track underneath a bit of conspiracy-minded explainer video, adding an escalating urgency to the conclusion of the movie’s action-packed satire of corporate media culture. Gus Van Sant’s “Dead Man’s Wire” (in theaters Jan. 9) placed it in the end credits to sharpen focus on the film’s growing sense that those stuck outside the system must make their own sense of justice. Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” also deploys the song as part of the end credits, revealing that lines of his script’s dialogue — repeated numerous times as a passcode among compatriot revolutionaries — come from the lyrics. To see three movies using this one song in particular is thrilling, giving expression to the confusion and discontent felt by so many. Moviemaking can often feel disconnected from the moment. To get three films so vibrant and relevant, in tune with the times and each other, is electrifying. — Mark Olsen
Peter Gabriel, ‘I Have the Touch,’ as heard in ‘Marty Supreme’
Timothée Chalamet in the movie “Marty Supreme.”
(A24)
Let the era of Peter Gabriel’s gentle movie contributions — “In Your Eyes,” and “Solsbury Hill” most sweetly — come to an end. So much of his spikier music deserves attention. Take this cut off 1982’s “Security,” which director Josh Safdie puts to vibrant use in “Marty Supreme” (in theaters Dec. 25). How good is Timothée Chalamet’s Marty at table tennis? He’s a machine. Aggressive ’80s drums and processed electric guitars set the tone. Even as his opponents step up, there’s no question about the outcome. “I have the touch,” Gabriel states, an alpha competitor in his element. Originally, the song was about establishing dominance while meeting strangers (ah, art rock). Safdie turns it into a referee’s instructions: “Shake hands!” the lyrics continue, as we train in on a match. Then, a few seconds later, we hear Gabriel’s voice isolated in scary clarity: Shake hands. — J. Rothkopf
Donna Summer, ‘Love to Love You Baby,’ as heard in ‘The Secret Agent’
Wagner Moura in the movie “The Secret Agent.”
(Victor Juca)
Between “Sirāt” and “The Secret Agent,” 2025 was a good movie year for scenes featuring late-night drives along treacherous rural roads. “The Secret Agent” finds a ruthless stepfather and stepson hit man team winding their way around São Paulo in the dead of night, skirting the Sérgio Motta Dam, their headlights barely illuminating the path ahead. The darkness is essential to the task at hand: dumping a corpse into the dam’s reservoir. It’s 1977 and the radio’s on, so naturally the soundtrack to their drive is Donna Summer’s disco anthem. It’s a 17-minute song, punctuated by 23 orgasmic moans (per a BBC count). The hypnotic groove gives the sequence an eerie, otherworldly feel, giving it a place among cinema’s great late-night body disposal scenes. — G.W.
Katy Perry, ‘Firework,’ as heard in ‘Eddington’
Two men argue on the street of a dusty town.
(A24)
Katy Perry’s “Firework” insists on optimism whether you’re in the mood or not. Midway through “Eddington,” Ari Aster’s polarizing pandemic-era western, the glossy pop song becomes a pivot point as tensions rise between Joaquin Phoenix’s sheriff and Pedro Pascal’s mayor. At a COVID-masked backyard fundraiser, the sheriff shows up on a noise complaint and tries to turn the music down. The mayor turns it up. The sheriff cuts it again. The mayor cranks it louder still. When Pascal finally slaps Phoenix across the face, the joke is gone and what’s left is a petty, pathetic standoff, scored to Perry’s incongruously perky anthem. Aster has shown a taste for this kind of pop perversity before, most memorably using Mariah Carey’s “Always Be My Baby” in an Oedipal sex scene in “Beau Is Afraid.” For some filmmakers, a needle drop doesn’t just score a moment. It pierces it. — J. Rottenberg
The Veronicas, ‘Untouched,’ as heard in ‘Bring Her Back’
Sally Hawkins and Jonah Wren Phillips in the movie “Bring Her Back.”
(A24)
In any other movie, the pop-punk confection of the Veronicas’ “Untouched” would be a perfect cue to establish its setting in middle-class suburban Australia, as light and lucky a place as ever was. In this foster care cult-horror nightmare, though, the song is the comic foil to one of the movie’s most grotesque and intense moments, and you’re left to watch the scene cackling through clenched hands as all the gore gets barely papered over by a frothy mid-aughts hit. It’s played less for irony and more as context for the relatable world that the directing Philippou brothers built for Sally Hawkins’ desperate pain. A completely sinister, bleakly hilarious bit of soundtrack work that the Veronicas must have found absolutely delicious. — A.B.
Pedro Pascal in the movie “Freaky Tales.”
(Lionsgate)
“Freaky Tales” is a kooky love song to the Oakland of the 1980s by the filmmaking duo Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck (“Half Nelson,” “Captain Marvel”). Fittingly, it’s packed with fantastic tunes by local artists like Too Short, who narrates these retro misadventures and lets a younger version of himself lose a rap battle to a pair of ferocious female teenagers. Their lyrical spat is my favorite scene but the film’s show-stopping sequence is Golden State Warriors point guard Sleepy Floyd (Jay Ellis) avenging himself upon a Nazi gang who murdered his girlfriend during a playoff game. (Here’s where I should say “Freaky Tales” is very fictional.) At the first peals of Metallica’s thrash classic, Floyd stuffs his pockets with knives, grabs a samurai sword and gets to slashing, offing so many goons that the movie eventually has to cue up another Bay Area banger, E-40’s “Choices (Yup).” — A.N.
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