No composer was better suited to score a picture than Jerry Goldsmith with L.A. Confidential (1997), director Curtis Hanson’s masterpiece of the James Elroy novel about corruption in 1950s Los Angeles. Not only was a Goldsmith a master of the thriller and crime genres, but his own career started in the era depicted in the film, and he had scored the all-time great detective noir, Chinatown.

L.A. Confidential starred Russell Crowe, Guy Pearce and Kevin Spacey as police detectives, with Kim Basinger as a Veronica Lake-lookalike prostitute, in a labyrinthine but brilliantly constructed plot connecting city hall and the cops, organized crime, Hollywood tabloids and the gutter. The film received nine Oscar nominations—including for Goldsmith’s score—and won two, for Basinger and Best Adapted Screenplay. It was heralded as an instant classic and, 25 years later, is every bit as captivating. Artists on the soundtrack include Johnny Mercer, Dean Martin, Chet Baker, Lee Wiley, Betty Hutton, Jackie Gleason, Joni James, Gerry Mulligan Quartet, Jerry Goldsmith.