One Category at a Time: Original Score

Another tricky call this year presents itself in Best Original Score. It's a category that almost always goes to a Best Picture nominee, of which there's only a single one in play. And yet... it doesn't really sound like a winner.

Oscar Postmortem Pt. 3: The show

Properly reviewing an Oscar ceremony can be tedious business, so I'm not gonna do it. Not properly, at least. The whole never quite amounts to the sum of its parts (although the Condon/Mark production from 2009 comes awfully close), so it's easiest just to look back and assess those parts at face value. Let's take a look at some moments that stood out (for me anyway) at the 86th Academy Awards

After last year's show hosted by Seth McFarlane came under such harsh critical fire, the pressure was on returning producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron to atone. They made all the safest possible choices, and it started with the selection of Ellen Degeneres to return as host after her first kick at the can seven years ago.

Ellen assures viewers around the world, "We're fine. Thank you for your prayers" in regards to the rain.

One Category at a Time: Original Score

There are all sorts of theories on how the Academy votes for Best Original Score, arguably the most subjective of the craft categories. Appraisal of music is so prone to personal tastes that just when you think you've got the Academy pegged, they go and do something unpredictably awful (like award Gustavo Santaolalla a second consecutive Oscar for a score that makes liberal use of pre-existing compositions) or go and do something unpredictably cool (like give Trent Reznor an Oscar for an extremely atypical electronic soundtrack).

A few thoughts on Jurassic Park 3D

I have a bit of a love/hate relationship of 3D re-releases. On the one hand, I'm more often unimpressed with 3D movies in general, and go out of my way to avoid them unless I've read that the extra dimension is actually an additive experience. On the other, no 3D conversion can turn a good movie bad, and the temptation of revisiting old favourites on the big screen is often all the convincing I need.

To wit, I give you Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park, a sci-fi spectacle with which I fell in love growing up as it became commonplace on VHS and television, but had never gotten the opportunity to see in a theatre. At the tender age of five, I was far too young to go see it in the summer of '93. Naturally, I was eager to finally behold the film's Oscar-winning sound design and groundbreaking effects in their proper theatrical format. I was not disappointed. Jurassic Park 3D proved to be a perfect post-Oscars palette cleanser at the outset of a long awards off-season.

Top Ten Moments in Jurassic Park (Repost)

(This list was posted a couple of years ago as one of my Sunday Top Tens. With this weekend's 3D rerelease of Jurassic Park, now seems like an appropriate time to repost it. I'll definitely be giving it look. Will you?)

20 years ago saw the domestic release of Jurassic Park, Steven Spielberg's exhilarating disaster/monster movie that smashed box office records, demonstrated the potential of CGI, and scared the living shit out of children who can now only look back on it with the greatest fondness. Never mind that the story has its imperfections and the characters aren't always drawn with much focus, because it's a film that's defined by its moments – those temporary sensations conceived by a few carefully made images and sounds. Here are my ten personal favourites.

One Category at a Time: Original Score

Best Original Score feels kinda wide open this year. Sure, you could essentially eliminate the two nominees that aren't also up for Best Picture, but of the other three, any of them could win.

IFMCA fall big time for Williams

My two favourite musical scores of the year, War Horse and Tintin by the immortal John Williams, aren't likely to wrestle the Best Original Score Oscar away from The Artist on Sunday, but they did manage to win four awards from the International Film Music Critics, while the man himself additionally won Composer of the Year. It's a nice group of winners all around, which includes Cliff Martinez's Academy-DQed score for Drive.

FILM SCORE OF THE YEAR
War Horse, John Williams

FILM COMPOSER OF THE YEAR
John Williams

One Category at a Time: Original Score

Along with Best Art Direction, this is the only other craft category that I think we can assume is locked up. And I have to say that I rather like the lineup, myself. Even with the silly disqualification of Drive and the inevitable snubs of Hanna and The Ides of March, the music branch still managed to pin down five of the year's best scores.

My Awards nominations: Original Score

My options for the best Original Score of the year:

The Adventures of Tintin (John Williams):

Busy orchestrations with lots of jazzy ornaments mixed in for distinction, actually making it a closer cousin of Williams' Catch Me If You Can than Indiana Jones, but still with loads of exciting fast-paced compositions.

The Artist (Ludovic Bource):

Hard not to enjoy the romantic swells and antiquated whimsy of Bource's music. He has to become the voice of the entire picture, and he takes up the challenge with aplomb.

Hanna (The Chemical Brothers):

The hypnotic electronic rhythms are a key aural element to this stylized actioner, lending a unique sonic flavour to each scene in which it is used. Another notch on the belt of progressive scoring.

The Ides of March (Alexandre Desplat):

Quietly dissonant background strings masked by more obvious stoccatic beats, kinda like how the drama of dirty campaign managing is masked by the frontdrop posters, platforms, and politics.

War Horse (John Williams):

A sweeping, old school Williams score with melodious themes and robust arrangements. It basically comes down to whether or not you like old school Williams scores, and I do. I really do.

Just missed:
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Hugo, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Review - A Spielberg double feature

For New Years Eve I took advantage of a unique opportunity; the chance to view two new Steven Spielberg features on the same day. Spielberg has had four others years in which he released two films, but never simultaneously, so this is kind of a first both for him and his eager fans. The two films in question are awards pony War Horse and "animated" action/adventure Tintin. Both my reviews after the cut.

Sunday Top Ten: John Williams scores

I've always been a sucker for the music John Williams. There's something about his melodies and orchestrations that just stick with me. I'm not alone, apparently. He was an Academy favourite for decades, amassing 45 nominations in 38 years. Granted, he hasn't been nominated since 2006, a long layoff by his standards, but he could be back with one or two Best Original Score nominations this year courtesy of Spielberg's Tin Tin and War Horse.

After hearing Michael Giacchino's apt impersonation of the composer in Super 8 two weeks ago, I felt compelled to revisit the his works and dedicate this week's top ten list to his finest film scores.

Sunday Top Ten: Moments in Jurassic Park

18 years ago yesterday saw the domestic release of Jurassic Park, Steven Spielberg's exhilarating disaster/monster movie that smashed box office records, demonstrated the potential of CGI, and scared the living shit out of children who can now only look back on it with the greatest fondness. Never mind that the story has its imperfections and the characters aren't always drawn with much focus, because it's a film that's defined by its moments – those temporary sensations conceived by a few carefully made images and sounds. Here are my ten personal favourites.

Sunday Top Ten: Responses to people who try to tell you Star Wars sucks

This Wednesday marks the 34th anniversary of the U.S. Release of Star Wars, a film that helped define the modern blockbuster. Yet, as beloved as it is many, it's just as commonly despised. It's not a film franchise for everyone. Neither is this top ten list. Whenever Star Wars detractors contradict my often enthusiastic advocacy for the films, I usually whip out one of the following chestnuts in their defense. If you're a Star Wars fan, enjoy the list! If you're Star-Wars-averse, feel free to retaliate with your own rejoinders.

One Category at a Time: Best Original Score / Song

I'll get these categories out of the way early because there simply is no logical way to go about predicting the nominees until the music has been heard. For Best Original Score, it isn't unreasonable to just pick Best Picture nominees or films with notable composers.

I get the feeling Alexandre Desplat was real close to winning this year for The King's Speech, but it ended up going to Reznor and Ross, whose work was more deserving anyway. Besides, Desplat will have many more opportunities. He scores so many films a year it's hard to keep count! He already has four lined up for 2011, including Terrence Malick's much anticipated The Tree of Life.

John Williams hasn't been nominated in a while (2006 for Memoirs of a Geisha and Munich), but he's got two Spielberg films to garner him some attention from the music branch, including possible Best Picture contender War Horse.

Could the elegant tones and orchestrations that helped Dario Marianelli to nominations for Pride and Prejudice and Atonement (which he went on to win) help him gain some traction for Jane Eyre? The early release is a hindrance, but sometimes a film from the first half of the year can survive it to the nominations.

Were it not for his Oscar-winning score to Up last year, I think Michael Giacchino may have still been in the running for his work on Star Trek. He's got another chance this summer to get our pulses racing with J.J. Abrams Super 8, which has many a movie fan shivering with excitement. If not that, maybe Cars 2?

James Newton Howard is still waiting for his first Oscar after eight nominations, the most recent of which came two years ago for Defiance. He's got a few titles in the running this year, including the adaptation of the bestselling Water for Elephants.

Predicted five:
Jane Eyre
Super 8
The Tree of Life
War Horse
Water for Elephants

Best Original Song is anyone's guess. Who knows what films will have songs? Animated features often feature one or two, so I suppose I'll guess:

Cars 2
Happy Feet 2
The Muppets
Winnie the Pooh