The 15 Best Movie Music Moments Of 2014

The smell of nutmeg and cinnamon and brewing family arguments may hang heavy in the air, but we’re not quite done with our pre-Christmas blow out of Best of 2014 features yet (you can find the whole lot of them to date here). While we’ve already run through our Best of 2014 Soundtracks and Best of 2014 Scores, there’s one last music-related feature that we always run—our Favorite Music Moments.

In a way describing what constitutes a Music Moment is more difficult than actually agreeing which to choose—it’s a prime example of the “I’ll know it when I see/hear it” syndrome. In fact it’s surprising how quickly we can all agree on the fine distinction between music simply used well and music used transcendently—and the latter is what we’re looking for here. If sound in general is the ugly sister of visuals when it comes to the priorities of cinema, these music moments are times when picture and audio combine to bring something greater than the sum their parts.

And so, these are the...