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Academy Award Winners 2002
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) have announced the winners of the 75th Academy Awards, honoring the best in film in 2002.
In the Best Original Score category, American composer Elliot Goldenthal won the Academy Award for his score for Julie Taymor’s Frida, the biopic of artist Frida Kahlo. In his acceptance speech Goldenthal said:
Wow. To be around such remarkable women: Julie Taymor, Salma Hayek, Sarah Green, Margie Perenchio. Thank you, Miramax. But what I really want to say, and I’ll do it quickly, is I want to dedicate this award to the bridges that we try to build, to the people of Mexico, to the artistic tradition and legacy of personal and political art. For you, Mexico.
The other nominees for Best Original Score were John Williams for Catch Me If You Can, Elmer Bernstein for Far from Heaven, Philip Glass for The Hours, and Thomas Newman for Road to Perdition.
In the Best Original Song category, Marshall Mathers III (Eminem), Jeff Bass and Luis Resto won the Academy Award for “Lose Yourself” from the hip-hop themed drama 8 Mile. The victory made “Lose Yourself” the first rap song to win the Academy Award for Best Original Song.
The other nominees for Best Original Song were Elliot Goldenthal and Julie Taymor for “Burn It Blue” from Frida; Paul Simon for “Father and Daughter” from The Wild Thornberrys Movie; Bono, The Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen from U2 for “The Hands That Built America” from Gangs of New York; and John Kander and Fred Ebb for “I Move On” from Chicago.
NIRGENDWO IN AFRIKA/NOWHERE IN AFRICA – Niki Reiser
Original Review by Peter Simons
Nowhere In Africa (or, in its native German, “Nirgendwo In Afrika”) tells the tragic story of a Jewish family that moves from Germany to Kenya just before WWII in 1938. There, in Africa, they start a farm, but not all members of the family can get used to their new lives. However, the war in Europe makes it impossible for them to return back home. So, all anyone can do is try and make the best out of things. The film was written and directed by Caroline Link, who based her screenplay on the book by Stefanie Zweig. Quite surprisingly, this German film nabbed the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film at this year’s ceremony. This is the third time Swiss composer Niki Reiser composed a score for director Link. They previously worked together on Jenseits Der Stille (Beyond The Silence, 1996) and Pünktchen Und Anton (Annaluise & Anton, 1999). The soundtrack for Nowhere In Africa is a lovely combination of European and African music. There are bittersweet string chords that could have sprung from the minds of James Horner or Rachel Portman, a theme for oboe that’s quite reminiscent of the theme from The English Patient and there’s quite a bit of mellow African percussion and chanting. There are, unfortunately, a few things working against this score, but ultimately the music is just too darn nice to be really upset by its shortcomings. Read more…
TEARS OF THE SUN – Hans Zimmer
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
War movies seem to be the new oeuvre at Media Ventures, especially war movies which take place in far-flung corners of the world. Following their contribution to Terence Malick’s Thin Red Line, Ridley Scott’s Black Hawk Down, their latest project is Tears of the Sun, which basically tells the same story of American soldiers caught in the crossfire of a bloody civil war – but this time the setting is the inhospitable jungles of west Africa as opposed to the dusty streets of Mogadishu. Directed by Antoine “Training Day” Fuqua, Tears of the Sun stars Bruce Willis as Lt. Waters, the leader of an American special-ops group who are sent into the dense jungles of Nigeria to rescue Médecins Sans Frontières doctor Lena Kendricks (Monica Bellucci), who finds herself in danger when rebels overthrow the Government. However, Kendricks refuses to leave her isolated hospital unless Waters and his men agree to help transport 70 refugees to the nearby Cameroonian border, else they be slaughtered by the vicious, unforgiving rebel army. Reluctantly, Waters agrees, and soon he and his men are trekking through the forest with a large group of scared Nigerian men and women – all the while being pursued by the rebels. Read more…
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