These Films Are Rated V

For extreme violins.

When I first heard Alexandre Desplat’s score for the Guillermo del Toro film Frankenstein (2025), I was immediately struck by the use of the violin throughout. The violin soloist is the Norwegian rising star Eldbjørg Hemsing and Desplat gives her music that adds an incredible depth, richness, and complexity to the characters on screen.

Desplat told me recently the violin was an answer to the question he and del Toro were wrestling with. “How do we make sure that the creature [Frankenstein] is not just a monster which creates terror and how do we bring its fragility and its humanity to the audience?” Desplat said he could have scored the film with a giant brass and percussion section but by having the violin play the creature’s theme it adds fragility and humanity to what you see on screen.

With Frankenstein, Eldbjørg Hemsing and Alexandre Desplat add their names to a long history of iconic music for violin in film. Itzhak Perlman and John Williams immediately come to mind with the score for Schindler’s List. Throughout the film the violin takes on different emotional characters. It is the voice of memory, remembrance, quiet devastation, and ultimately resilience. Perlman said he hadn’t watched the film prior to the recording session and when he saw what was on screen his emotions overtook him and “I almost couldn’t play.”

The story of violins in movies cannot be complete without Joshua Bell and John Corigliano teaming up for The Red Violin. Here, the violin is literally the protagonist. As the story traverses centuries and musical styles, the violin adapts to tell its story of love and pain. The violin takes us to places of power and drama, elegance and intrigue, and ultimately the extremes of human vulnerability. That the score has been turned into multiple different concert works is a testament to its transcendence.

While it’s not a soloist/composer pairing, Psycho may actually be the most iconic use of violins in film scoring. In this case, Bernard Herrmann uses violins to accentuate violence. Director Alfred Hitchcock made the film on a very small budget and he wanted a big jazz band for the score. When he asked Herrmann to lower his fee, Herrmann said no, but he could save money by scoring the film with just strings alone. The iconic shower scene is made even more dramatic by the absence of music all the way until the violins start stabbing.

There are so many more great examples of violins in film not listed here. Please feel free to leave your favorites in the comments. The expressive power of the violin is undeniable. It gives vocality which mirrors the sound of the human voice. It gives flexibility whether shrieking in terror, soaring with romance, or whispering with poignancy. It gives intimacy that can make you feel like its speaking directly to you. The violin is all of these things and with Frankenstein we have another knockout to add to the list of great scores for a great instrument.