The Very Fairy Princess Here Comes the Flower Girl

I don’t mean taking a ruler and drawing a line under your words to emphasize them. That’s a different sort of underscore altogether. The underscore I’m talking about is a film term — the music that runs through a movie, enhancing and emphasizing the action and emotions of the film. Sometimes, one is hardly aware of the underscore. Sometimes one is more aware than one should be, if the music is too loud, or does not suit the action. Scoring a film is not an easy thing to do. One of the most masterful examples of underscore in my experience is the score for the film Victor/Victoria (and indeed, Henry Mancini won an Oscar for this score). Listen to that music. I’m not talking about the songs sung by the performers, I’m talking about the underscore. One example — the “Cat and Mouse” music that so aptly reflects the action as King Marchand and his bodyguard sneak in to Toddy and Victoria’s hotel room, then try to make their way out again without being discovered. Watch the movie again. Listen to the underscore. You’ll hear what I mean. There are underscores in writing, too.