In The Count of Monte Cristo (1998), Edmond Dantes (Gerard Depardieu), unjustly imprisoned in the Chateau d’If for 18 years, escapes. Impersonating a priest he rides on horseback to a small chapel on a hilltop, breaks down the door, and enters:

Dantes: I’m not a traitor to man or God so I’m warning You. You didn’t see fit to exercise divine justice, so I’ll do it my way. I shall be ruthless and devastating

Exiting the chapel he encounters Brother Barnabé:

Barabé: I’m Brother Barnabé of the order of Saint Francis. I live a hermit’s life in the hills and this chapel is my oratory. I’m surprised that a priest with such a fine horse should stop in such a wretched place to seek God.

Dantes: I don’t seek God. I came to warn Him I’m taking His place.

Barnabé crosses himself. Dantes takes coins from his pocket and lets them fall to the ground.

Dantes: For repairs to your door. Pray for me.

The music of Bruno Coulais and the words of Edmond Dantes are one. And they are in minor. They have to be in minor.

Minor is Orpheus descending and Orpheus rising and Orpheus bringing Euridice all the way back to life this time and not losing her.

Minor is the glide path guiding the airplane of our souls to the land of courage and heart—without which life on this planet would be meaningless and despairing.

Of course a case could be made that music is subjective. This is true in the sense that no one can deny another person his or her loves and hates in music. But let us not let this truism distract us from seeing a more important truth: that each piece of music takes us somewhere with an objective reality. I am focusing on one very particular place—the land of courage and heart. Musically you can get there only in minor.

In the past fifty years the classical tradition has given us Samuel Barber, John Cage, Igor Stravinsky, Carl Orff, Aaron Copland, Dimitri Shostakovich, Olivier Messiaen, Allan Pettersson, Benjamin Britten, Milton Babbitt, Pierre Boulez, Harry Partch, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Stephen Sondheim, Philip Glass, Nadia Boulanger, Leonard Bernstein, Luciano Berio, Witold Lutoslawski, George Crumb, William Schuman, and Henryk Górecki.

It might be thought that great music can only come from this classical tradition—that this is the serious important music—and that pop music is less worthy and that music composed for movies should be dismissed as selling out and going commercial.

But this would be a huge mistake!

The only important thing is this: does the music take you to the third way?

Just as there can be stupid deadly pretentious art films and brilliant moving popular entertainments, just so there can be stupid deadly pretentious classical music and magnificent pop music and movie music.

Of course most music for the movies is a bad joke—formulaic and manipulative. It is just added on as if without it we would not know what to feel. It is stupid and heavy-handed and is barely music at all.

But some of the greatest music of the past fifty years has been composed for movies.

And in fact music composed for movies is easily the best way to enter the third way musically.

There are several reasons for this.

First: great movies must perforce have a great script and a great director. This means that the composer is entering an already enchanted land. A very gifted and sensitive composer can enter that world, soak it up, and return with music that is exactly the same in depth and feeling as the screenplay and the director’s vision. The music is not added on. The music is the film. The film is the music.

Great movies are always of the third way: they go beyond the pleasant escapes of the first way and completely bypass the descent into hell of the second way of pathological rebellion. They are in minor mode and are by definition filled with courage and heart. So music by great composers writing for great movies creates this same sentiment and tells the same tale.

Second: the composer has a very specific assignment. He must understand the overall sensibility of the film and he also must write music for each individual scene. These constraints give him focus and I believe actually stimulate his creativity.

Third: Movies are a business. This requires lots of money. This tough environment produces some of the greatest music ever written. But it is not in spite of the money but because of it: lots of money means the producers can spend what it takes to get the best talent for any given project.

There. I have made my case for minor and for music composed for movies. Now I will let the music speak for itself. Perhaps it will speak to you.

I give you what I consider some of the greatest music ever written.

Perhaps you will respond as I do: you smile in unexpected happiness, you get shivers all through your body, tears of sorrow and of joy well up and flow down your face, you feel ecstatic. You have entered the third way.

Perhaps you discover—to your astonishment—that you already live in that land. Then this will simply affirm you and make you realize you are already home.

Or perhaps you find the land of minor mode is a wonderful place to visit.

Either way I hope I have added to your happiness.

Well here goes: