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What movies have used a particular song in the soundtrack?

My wife and I have a bet: she says that Bruce Springsteen's iconic Born in the USA has been used in more films than Elvis Presley's Love Me Tender. I think she's wacked. Can you settle our bet?


Dave's Answer:

This is a darn interesting question because it's not always easy to figure out what songs are on what movie soundtrack. There are also two other complicating factors: movies also have scores and there are often songs included in the soundtrack that never make it to the cinematic release (usually due to the editing process, the portion of the film with that song ends up "on the cutting room floor", as they say in the biz).

It's also sometimes just about impossible to catch where in a movie the music appears. Sometimes it's music playing on a car radio for just a few seconds, sometimes it's overheard on a bus the character's riding, and sometimes the music is reserved for playing during the closing credits. Other times it's central to a portion of the film and some films are partially developed around specific musical sequences, from the obvious (Vincente Minnelli's wonderful An American in Paris, written around the Gershwin songs and lyrics of the same name) to the more subtle (Wang Chung in To Live and Die in LA).

Elvis Presley versus Bruce Springsteen: Movie MusicBack to your query, though. You could dig around in Gracenote, but while their database has the information we seek (song = "Born in the USA" AND title contains "soundtrack") their search facility doesn't let us do sophisticated two-field searches.

Fortunately IMDB.com comes through, as it often does. You need to hunt for it, but the site has a "soundtrack seach" capability you can find here: IMDB soundtrack search.

Now we'll do two searches, one for Born In The USA and one for Love Me Tender.

The results: you're right and she's wrong. In fact, Born In the USA had made it into less than a half-dozen films, notably including Canadian Bacon, Mask, and Skins. By contrast, Elvis' huge hit Love Me Tender appears in almost twenty movies, including Backbeat, Blue Money, Die Hard 2, FM, Honeymoon in Vegas, Porky's Revenge, Princess Diaries 2, Touched by Love and Wild at Heart.

There's probably a custom search engine somewhere that makes this kind of search easier, and lets you screen out the TV show matches, which IMDB can't do, but even with its current capabilities, you can definitely figure out the winner of this bet.

Now, a tough trivia question: what song or songs have appeared in more soundtracks than Love Me Tender?



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Comments

Hi Dave, if I may, here is my comment as an answer to your opened question to us.

So, using the same method as yours I am coming with some interesting results:

"Love Me Tender" has been used 51 one times, and it is already quite an impressive result.
However, a standard, like "I will survive" makes the jump to 63. Already better but not as impressive as "Happy Birthday to you" (150 times) or a simple "Jingle Bells" (183 times !) . Yes yes, these are songs !
I'd be happy to see if some can be found with higher scores, let me know.

I have met your site tonight, and I am also convinced a lot can be answered !
Keep on the good work you are doing it well !

Bounty

Posted by: Bounty at April 7, 2008 3:44 PM

Although this is probably not fair. I tried "What a Wonderful World", only 36 and thought weddings???? The Wedding March has 222 credits and I am sure the missed a few.

Posted by: shariee at April 8, 2008 5:11 PM

what recent movies have had the song "use me' by Bil Withers??

Posted by: cathy p at April 24, 2009 6:21 AM

Dave,
Would you happen to know who sang the song "You're The One" in the 1996 movie "Dark Breed"?

Posted by: John at May 16, 2009 12:54 PM

I know this is an old thread, but who can forget the song "I Will Survive", which has 85 mentions in the search. I know it is not as high as some of the others, but still high up there.

Posted by: Jason at October 21, 2009 8:50 AM

I have something to say, now that you mention it, but ...
Starbucks coffee cup I do have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but first I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a cup of coffee!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!











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