Wagner's alleged influence on film score composers is at least arguable, I suppose, but in the wider context of the direction that classical music has taken I think his music represented a dead end. Of course, his followers would claim that his music reached a pinnacle which couldn't be surmounted, but they would, wouldn't they. I see very little of his influence on composers beyond the early part of the last century, with the exception of Richard Strauss, who at least managed to move away from the heaviness and overstuffedness of it. I'd ten times sooner see an opera by Mozart, Verdi or Puccini than anything by Wagner any day.