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ZERO DARK THIRTY – Alexandre Desplat
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Zero Dark Thirty is the seventh and final score of 2012 from the workaholic composer Alexandre Desplat, whose output this year has ranged from the lush and emotional Cloclo to the quirky Moonrise Kingdom, the sweeping and playful Rise of the Guardians, and the darkly dramatic Argo, for which he received his fifth Academy Award nomination. His work on Zero Dark Thirty, as one would expect, is most closely aligned with his work on Argo, making use of subtle Middle Eastern tones as part of its orchestral makeup, but its overall demeanor is less flashy and less crowd-pleasing than that of Argo, matching the tone and style taken by the film’s director, Kathryn Bigelow, in the movie itself.
I have some serious issues with Zero Dark Thirty as a movie, but I’ll get to those in a minute. The film tells the painstakingly detailed and (allegedly) true story of the way the United States military tracked down Osama Bin Laden, the Al Qaeda leader responsible for masterminding the 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York in 2001, who was eventually killed by elite US special forces during a raid on a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan in May 2011. Read more…
Movie Music UK Awards 2012
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FLIGHT OF THE STORKS – Éric Neveux
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Flight of the Storks (Le Vol des Cigognes) is a French TV mini series starring Harry Treadaway as Jonathan, a young English academic ornithologist who teams up with a colleague to follow storks on their migration from Switzerland to Africa. However, when his colleague is found dead in mysterious circumstances, Jonathan finds himself caught up in an international web of intrigue, travelling through Bulgaria, Turkey, the Middle East, and the Congo along the pathway of the migrating storks, with a dogged Swiss detective hot on his heels. This mini-series was directed by Jan Kounen adapted from the novel by Jean-Christophe Grangé, co-starred Rutger Hauer and Perdita Weeks, and was scored by French composer Éric Neveux. Read more…
LORD OF THE CARPATHIANS – Bartlomiej Gliniak
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Lord of the Carpathians – Niedźwiedź: Władca Gór in its original Polish – is a feature documentary directed by Krystian Matysek about brown bears living in the Carpathian Mountains of eastern Europe. A well-regarded and well-made film, it won awards at the International Festival of Films on the Environment in Banska Bystrica, and at the International Festival of Nature Films in Lodz in 2012, before recieving a short theatrical release at the beginning of 2013. Read more…
JACK REACHER – Joe Kraemer
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Jack Reacher is a new action-thriller film directed by Christopher McQuarrie, based on the popular character created by author Lee Child. This film is based on the plot of the novel “One Shot”, and stars Tom Cruise in the title role as an ex-military investigator called in to help ambitious defense attorney Helen Rodin (Rosamund Pike), who sees something wrong with the apparently open-and-shut case of a former military sniper accused of killing five innocent civilians along Pittsburgh’s Allegheny River waterfront. Helped and hindered by dogged police detective Emerson (David Oyelowo) and district attorney Alex Rodin (Richard Jenkins) – Helen’s father and legal opponent – Reacher discovers that there is much more to the story than meets the eye, and that a shadowy figure known only as The Zec (Werner Herzog) may be behind it all. Director McQuarrie, still best known for winning an Oscar for writing The Usual Suspects in 1996, has crafted a tight, enjoyable, engrossing little thriller with several superb set-pieces and a labyrinthine plot that is both believable and unpredictable, while Cruise’s lead performance is a good one, full of charisma and cockiness, despite him being the physical opposite of the character in the novels. Read more…
Golden Globe Winners 2012
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) have announced the winners of the 70th Golden Globe Awards, honoring the best in film and American television of 2012.
In the Best Original Score category composer Mychael Danna won the award for his score for the fantastical drama Life of Pi. In his acceptance speech, Danna said:
“Thank you Hollywood Foreign Press Association. Well, I felt very very blessed, even before this, and I speak for the whole cast and crew, to be part of the whole Life of Pi experience. A beautiful, special film, a film of a lifetime, and I want to say thank you to Fox for being crazy enough to make this movie. I want to share this award with my director, Ang Lee – there you are! Ang, I will always treasure this voyage we made together. Thank you for guiding us to shore so safely. I want to shout out to my music crew, Rob and Doc, the musicians and singers all over the world that we recorded for this. My mom and dad, the gift of music that you gave me, thank you so much. Everyone at Fox, it’s like working with family, thank you so much. And my agents, Robert Messinger and Vasi Vangelos, my buddies back in Toronto watching, my kids back in Toronto watching, and most of all, in a room full of starlets, the most beautiful woman here, my wife Apurna. Thank you for your years of support and patience and love, it gets me through every day. Thank you. ”
The other nominees were Alexandre Desplat for Argo, Dario Marianelli for Anna Karenina, Tom Tykwer, Johnny Klimek and Reinhold Heil for Cloud Atlas, and John Williams for Lincoln.
In the Best Original Song category, the winners were Adele Atkins and Paul Epworth for “Skyfall”, the title song from the James Bond film of the same name.
The other nominees were Jon Bon Jovi for “Not Running Anymore” from Stand-Up Guys; Monty Powell and Keith Urban for “For You” from Act of Valor; Claude-Michel Schönberg, Alain Boublil and Herbert Kretzmer for “Suddenly” from Les Miserables; and Taylor Swift, John Paul White, Joy Williams and T-Bone Burnett for “Safe and Sound” from The Hunger Games.
Academy Award Nominations 2012
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) have announced the nominations for the 85th Academy Awards, honoring the best in film in 2012.
In the Best Original Score category, the nominees are:
- MYCHAEL DANNA for Life of Pi
- ALEXANDRE DESPLAT for Argo
- DARIO MARIANELLI for Anna Karenina
- THOMAS NEWMAN for Skyfall
- JOHN WILLIAMS for Lincoln
This is the first Oscar nomination for Danna, who also picked up Golden Globe and BAFTA nominations for Life of Pi. This is the 5th Oscar nomination for Desplat,the 3rdOscar nomination for Marianelli, who won the Award in 2007 for Atonement, the 11th Oscar nomination for Newman, and the 48th Oscar nomination for Williams, who previously won in 1971 for Fiddler on the Roof, 1975 for Jaws, 1977 for Star Wars, 1982 for E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, and 1993 for Schindler’s List.
In the Best Original Song category, the nominees are:
- ADELE ATKINS and PAUL EPWORTH for “Skyfall” from Skyfall
- MYCHAEL DANNA and BOMBAY JAYASHRI for “Pi’s Lullaby” from Life of Pi
- WALTER MURPHY and SETH MACFARLANE for “Everybody Needs A Best Friend” from Ted
- JOSHUA RALPH for “Before My Time” from Chasing Ice
- CLAUDE-MICHEL SCHÖNBERG, ALAIN BOUBLIL and HERBERT KRETZMER for “Suddenly” from Les Misérables
The winners of the 85th Academy Awards will be announced on February 24, 2013.
BAFTA Nominations 2012
The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) has announced the nominations for the 66th British Academy Film Awards, honoring the best in film in 2012.
In the Best Original Music category, which is named in memory of the film director Anthony Asquith, the nominees are:
- MYCHAEL DANNA for Life of Pi
- ALEXANDRE DESPLAT for Argo
- DARIO MARIANELLI for Anna Karenina
- THOMAS NEWMAN for Skyfall
- JOHN WILLIAMS for Lincoln
This is the first BAFTA nomination for Danna. It is the 6th BAFTA nomination for Desplat, who won the award in 2011 for his score for The King’s Speech, and the 2nd BAFTA nomination for Marianelli. It is the 3rd BAFTA nomination for Newman, who won the award in 2000 for American Beauty, and is the 14th nomination for Williams, who has won on seven previous occasions: for Jaws in 1975, Star Wars in 1977, The Empire Strikes Back in 1980, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial in 1983, Empire of the Sun in 1987, Schindler’s List in 1993, and Memoirs of a Geisha in 2006.
The winners of the 66th BAFTA Awards will be announced on February 10, 2013.
QUO VADIS – Miklós Rózsa
MOVIE MUSIC UK CLASSICS
Original Review by Craig Lysy
Producer Sam Zimbalist and director Mervyn LeRoy saw an opportunity to create a grand epic by adapting Henryk Sienkiewicz’s 1896 novel Quo Vadis. They hired a fine cast, which included Robert Taylor (Marcus Vinicius), Deborah Kerr (Lygia), Peter Ustinov (Nero) and Leo Glenn (Petronius). Set in imperial Rome during the reign of the maniacal emperor Nero (54 – 68 C.E.) we see a love story unfold between the pagan Marcus and the Christian Lygia. Our lovers are caught in the tide of history as an increasingly mad Nero terrorizes his court and ultimately sets Rome aflame in a stunning horrific conflagration. To cover his guilt Nero falsely blames the Christians and unleashes a reign of terror with gruesome executions in the Coliseum. Through their ensuing travails, Marcus converts and our lovers manage an escape to Sicily as an avenging mob, now aware that Nero burned Rome, storms the palace and brings Nero to a well-deserved end. The film was both a commercial and critical success, earning eight Academy Award nominations. Read more…
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