Film Score Friday 1/25/02

Mark your calendars: Sony Classical will release John Williams's score to Star Wars: Episode II -- Attack of the Clones on April 30, a few weeks before the film is released. Williams is recording the score this month with the London Symphony Orchestra.

Congratulations to this year's Golden Globe winners: Best Score: Moulin Rouge (Craig Armstrong [...er, paging Herbie Hancock, 'Round Midnight!, and Anne Dudley, The Full Monty, among others!]); Best Song: "Until" by Sting (from Kate & Leopold).

Tomorrow, January 26, the San Diego Symphony will perform various excerpts from the film scores of Larry Groupe live to picture (conducted by Jung-Ho Pak). Call the box office at 619-235-0804.

See Cary Wong's article from earlier this week:

From: "W. David Lichty" <irmo@iquest.net>

Agreed on the Sure Things, FELLOWSHIP and BEAUTIFUL MIND are shoo-ins. I think a couple of others are as well though. IN THE BEDROOM will be heavily nominated, small film though it is, and the scores follow the big noms quite frequently (come on, explain THE FULL MONTY any other way), also Thomas Newman has won before, which means that the academy has heard of him. It helps. AMELIE will also likely get a nod, as it has a specific sound. You won't confuse AMELIE with a Star Wars movie, but an uneducated ear might do this with THE MUMMY RETURNS (which should, but won't, be nominated). Lately the full symphony sound has been passed over in favor of sparser, more ethnic scores, and AMELIE is that. Some think it'll be nominated for Best Picture, which it won't, but that's enough talk to bring it to voters' minds, and as you wrote, the music is noticable - so it'll get a consolation nomination.

Another likely sure thing is MOULIN ROUGE. The Golden Globe thing might've sealed it. I no longer fear that this film will be overlooked, at least as far as noms go, and I think that voters won't necessarily realize exactly what they're nominating, and MOULIN ROUGE is nothing if not musically spectacular.

I think you're onto something with Amenabar's THE OTHERS, by the way. Like AMELIE, it could be a consolation - respect and a pat on the back for the new, very talented kid whose movie can't necessarily pull much else off. And on quality alone I think THE SHIPPING NEWS is also an astute mention, but I don't know if anyone will see it, or like it enough to keep it in mind for more than a week.
 
My suspicion is that the best Picture noms will likely be (in order of certainty):

A BEAUTIFUL MIND
FELLOWSHIP OF THE RINGS
IN THE BEDROOM
BLACK HAWK DOWN
MONSTERS BALL

with possible runners-up:

MOULIN ROUGE
MEMENTO
GOSFORD PARK
AMELIE
(the loathsome) ROYAL TENNENBAUMS
 
....score noms could follow hard upon.
 

I point Cary Wong to the Academy Awards rule book, Rule 16.B.5. There, it will tell him why Craig Armstrong's score to Moulin Rouge or the scores for Ali, Shrek or Monster's Ball will not be nominated: www.oscars.org/74academyawards/rules/rule16.html

On a personal note, I wish that Final Fantasy had been a hit. That way Elliot Goldenthal's powerful score would be getting some notices.

Last week we reported the death of composer Juan Esquivel, "lounge legend" and occasional film composer. Chris Nagel wrote in with one other factoid of the composer's career:

From: "Christopher K. Nagel" <rmos@csinet.net>

Also, re: Esquivel: Are you aware that he composed, along with Stanley Wilson, the Revue Studios Emblem theme, (later Universal TV), that closed hundreds of TV shows during the 1960s through the 1980s? Probably his most famous composition-and shortest, too!

Here's a curio from the Internet world of inane philosophical gibberish: an "Interview with God" set to Forrest Gump music by Alan Silvestri. See http://168.143.173.209/IWGnet.swf.