BAFTA Nominations 2017
The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) has announced the nominations for the 71st British Academy Film Awards, honoring the best in film in 2017.
In the Best Original Music category, which is named in memory of the film director Anthony Asquith, the nominees are:
- ALEXANDRE DESPLAT for The Shape of Water
- JONNY GREENWOOD for Phantom Thread
- DARIO MARIANELLI for Darkest Hour
- BENJAMIN WALLFISCH and HANS ZIMMER for Blade Runner 2049
- HANS ZIMMER for Dunkirk
This is the eighth BAFTA nomination for Desplat, who won for “The King’s Speech” in 2010 and “The Grand Budapest Hotel” in 2014; the second nomination for Greenwood; the third nomination for Marianelli; the first nomination for Wallfisch; and the ninth BAFTA film award nomination for Zimmer. Zimmer also has music nominations from the BAFTA TV Awards and the BAFTA Games Awards.
The winners of the 71st BAFTA Awards will be announced on February 18, 2018.
Under-the-Radar Round Up 2017, Part 4
Original Reviews by Jonathan Broxton
The fourth installment in my annual series of articles looking at the best “under the radar” scores from around the world sees us back in France, with a look at a wonderful octet of scores from films made in one of the world’s great cinematic nations. This set of scores ranges across every genre imaginable, and includes one by a controversial double Oscar-winner, two by beloved staples of classic French cinema, and two by one of the most impressive newcomers to emerge in 2017.
Golden Globe Winners 2017
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) have announced the winners of the 75th Golden Globe Awards, honoring the best in film and American television of 2017.
In the Best Original Score category composer Alexandre Desplat won the award for his score for director Guillermo del Toro’s romantic fantasy The Shape of Water. This is Desplat’s second Golden Globe, him having won previously for The Painted Veil in 2006. In his acceptance speech, Desplat said:
“Thank you, merci, merci beaucoup. Different color from the previous one! Thank you Hollywood Foreign Press. Thanks to Fox Searchlight, to Miles Dale the producer, and Guillermo… you moved me. Your movie has moved me so much, inspired me so much, because it’s made of your humanity, your passion. I thank you also for all the dinners we have in Paris, and the ones to come. I want to thank all the musicians who recorded the score, they are marvelous. All the crew and cast: Richard [Jenkins], Sally [Hawkins], Doug [Jones]. The music department at Fox Searchlight, Queen Renee Fleming, Laura Engel, Ray Costa, my friend Katz, and Solrey – this is for you. Thank you very much!”
The other nominees were Carter Burwell for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri, Jonny Greenwood for Phantom Thread, John Williams for The Post, and Hans Zimmer for Dunkirk.
In the Best Original Song category, the winners were Benj Pasek, and Justin Paul for their song “This Is Me” from the screen musical The Greatest Showman.
The other nominees were Kristin Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez for “Remember Me” from Coco; Mariah Carey and Marc Shaiman for “The Star” from The Star; Nick Jonas, Justin Tranter, and Nick Monson for “Home” from Ferdinand; and Raphael Saadiq, Mary J. Blige, and Taura Stinson for “Mighty River” from Mudbound.
THE POST – John Williams
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
In 1971 the Washington Post was still a comparatively small-scale regional newspaper, lagging behind such behemoths as the New York Times in terms of prestige and influence. That all changed when the Post’s hard boiled news editor Ben Bradlee found himself in possession of what became known as The Pentagon Papers: a leaked classified report which proved that the US government had lied to the American people about the scope of its involvement in the Vietnam War, and that multiple US presidents were involved in the cover-up. Director Steven Spielberg’s film The Post tells the story of how the newspaper came into possession of the Papers, and the subsequent protracted legal and ethical battles that ensued over whether or not to publish; it stars Tom Hanks as Bradlee, Meryl Streep as the Post’s owner Kay Graham, and has a stellar supporting cast including Bob Odenkirk, Bruce Greenwood, Tracy Letts, Bradley Whitford, Matthew Rhys, Carrie Coon, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Sarah Paulson. Read more…
Under-the-Radar Round Up 2017, Part 3
Original Reviews by Jonathan Broxton
The third installment in my annual series of articles looking at the best “under the radar” scores from around the world returns to the United Kingdom, with a look at a half dozen or so more outstanding scores from films made in Britain. This set of scores from comprises comedies, dramas, and even a horror movie, and includes one by an Oscar-winner, one by a well-loved multiple Oscar nominee, and one by one of the most impressive newcomers to emerge in 2017.
DARKEST HOUR – Dario Marianelli
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
There are few twentieth century political and military leaders as respected and admired as Sir Winston Churchill. An army officer, Nobel prize winning writer, and artist, he served two terms as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, from 1940 to 1945, and again from 1951 to 1955. He, along with his comrades Josef Stalin and Franklin Roosevelt, led the Allies to victory in World War II, and in so doing became one of the most well-known and recognizable figures in the world, with his iconic hat, jowls, and cigar. As an orator, he was patriotic and inspirational, and several of his most famous speeches – “we shall fight them on the beaches,” “never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few” – are legendary. But he was also a complex, conflicted man, who failed to be as effective a governor in peacetime as he was in war. He has been portrayed on film many times over the years, but the performance given by actor Gary Oldman in director Joe Wright’s film Darkest Hour, may be the most acclaimed to date. Read more…
Dominic Frontiere, 1931-2017
Composer Dominic Frontiere died on December 21, 2017, in his home in Tesuque, New Mexico, after a short illness. He was 86.
Dominic Carmen Frontiere was born in New Haven, Connecticut, in June 1931. A classically trained accordion prodigy who performed at Carnegie Hall as a teenager, Frontiere went on to study at the Juilliard School before beginning a career in Hollywood that spanned more than four decades. He first gained recognition as musical director at 20th Century Fox, where he collaborated with Alfred Newman and contributed to a variety of studio productions.
His association with director and producer Leslie Stevens led to Frontiere scoring his first major film, The Marriage-Go-Round, in 1961. That relationship led Frontiere to became an executive of the television and film production company Daystar Productions, a company Stevens run. He composed several famous television themes of the 1960s, such as those for The Outer Limits, The Rat Patrol, Branded, and The Flying Nun, as well as The Invaders, The Fugitive, and 12 O’Clock High for producer Quinn Martin.
In cinema, he earned acclaim for his scores to films including Hang ‘Em High (1968), starring Clint Eastwood, and Freebie and the Bean (1974) while his score for The Stunt won a Golden Globe Award and earned him a Grammy nomination in 1980. Other notable films scored by Frontiere include On Any Sunday in 1971, Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold in 1975, Brannigan in 1975, The Aviator in 1985, and Color of Night in 1994, which was his final major work. Read more…
STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI – John Williams
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS PLOT SPOILERS. IF YOU HAVE NOT YET SEEN THE FILM, YOU MIGHT WANT TO CONSIDER WAITING UNTIL AFTER YOU HAVE DONE SO TO READ IT.
With George Lucas’s prequel trilogy having received almost universal critical disdain in the decade that followed the release of Revenge of the Sith, it took the 2015 film The Force Awakens to re-ignite the Star Wars franchise and bring back the love that so many millions had for the original trilogy that began in 1977. Luxuriating in $2 billion worldwide grosses, and having introduced a cache of interesting new characters to sit alongside the story stalwarts, The Force Awakens allowed Lucasfilm and the Walt Disney company to push forward with their plans for new sequels, as well as several standalone side-stories, confident that people were happy to come back to the galaxy far, far away. The first side-story, Rogue One, premiered in 2016, and a second movie looking at the early years of Han Solo is scheduled for 2018. But before we get into that, 2017’s most anticipated film is Star Wars: The Last Jedi, written and directed by Rian Johnson, which is the second film of the third trilogy, and the eighth ‘main story’ Star Wars film overall. Read more…
Under-the-Radar Round Up 2017, Part 2
Original Reviews by Jonathan Broxton
The second installment in my annual series of articles looking at the best “under the radar” scores from around the world concentrates on music from films from the land of Delerue, Jarre, and Desplat: la belle France! There has been an embarrassment of riches emanating from French cinema in 2017, and this first set of six reviews encompasses a number of outstanding scores, including two by one of Composers of the Year, Cyrille Aufort.
Golden Globe Nominations 2017
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) has announced the nominations for the 75th Golden Globe Awards, honoring the best in film and American television of 2017.
In the Best Original Score category, the nominees are:
- CARTER BURWELL for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri
- ALEXANDRE DESPLAT for The Shape of Water
- JONNY GREENWOOD for Phantom Thread
- JOHN WILLIAMS for The Post
- HANS ZIMMER for Dunkirk
This is the first Golden Globe nomination for Greenwood, and just his second major film music award nomination – he was previously nominated for a BAFTA for There Will Be Blood in 2007 – although he has been a multiple Grammy award nominee and winner for his work as a member of the alternative rock group Radiohead.
This is the 3rd nomination for Burwell, and the 9th nomination for Desplat, who previously won the Globe for The Painted Veil in 2006. It’s also the 25th nomination for Williams – who previously won Globes in 1975 for Jaws, 1977 for Star Wars, 1982 for E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, and 2005 for Memoirs of a Geisha – and the 14th nomination for Zimmer, who previously won Globes for The Lion King in 1994 and Gladiator in 2000.
In the Best Original Song category, the nominees are:
- KRISTIN ANDERSON-LOPEZ and ROBERT LOPEZ for “Remember Me” from Coco
- MARIAH CAREY and MARC SHAIMAN for “The Star” from The Star
- NICK JONAS, JUSTIN TRANTER, and NICK MONSON for “Home” from Ferdinand
- BENJ PASEK, and JUSTIN PAUL for “This Is Me” from The Greatest Showman
- RAPHAEL SAADIQ, MARY J. BLIGE, and TAURA STINSON for “Mighty River” from Mudbound
The winners of the 75th Golden Globe Awards will be announced on January 7, 2018.
Under-the-Radar Round Up 2017, Part 1
Original Reviews by Jonathan Broxton
The first installment in my annual series of articles looking at the best “under the radar” scores from around the world concentrates on music from films from my home country, the United Kingdom. There has been a wealth of riches from all four parts of the country – England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland – and this first set of reviews encompasses a rich and varied set of scores from Oscar winning favorites and talented newcomers, dramas, documentaries, comedies, and even a groundbreaking animation. There will be more to come from the UK later!
THE SHAPE OF WATER – Alexandre Desplat
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
The Shape of Water is a science fiction fairy tale written and directed by Guillermo del Toro, starring Sally Hawkins, Richard Jenkins, Octavia Spencer, Michael Shannon, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Doug Jones. It’s an odd mishmash of a film – it’s one part romantic drama, one part monster movie, one part spy thriller, and it explores additional themes that range from one character’s closeted homosexuality to another’s love of classic Hollywood musicals – but somehow it all works beautifully. Hawkins plays Elisa, a shy mute woman who works as a cleaner on the night shift at a military research facility in the 1960s. One night Elisa meets a mysterious but highly intelligent amphibious humanoid creature (Jones) that has been captured in a remote part of the Amazon and brought to the facility for study by the ruthless Colonel Strickland (Shannon). Unexpectedly, Elisa and the Amphibious Man meet and begin to bond, and form the beginnings of an almost romantic relationship; however, when she hears of the government’s plans to kill and dissect the Amphibious Man to study it’s biology, Elisa vows to save him, and with the help of her sassy co-worker Zelda (Spencer) and her next door neighbor Giles (Jenkins), comes up with a plan to break him out. Read more…
THE LAST EMPEROR – Ryuichi Sakamoto, David Byrne, and Cong Su
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
They don’t make movies like The Last Emperor anymore. A lavish historical epic directed by the great Italian filmmaker Bernardo Bertolucci and starring John Lone, Joan Chen, and Peter O’Toole, the film tells the life story of Pu Yi, the last monarch of the Chinese Qing dynasty prior to the republican revolution in 1911. It is set within a framing story wherein the adult Pu Yi – a political prisoner of communist leader Mao Zedong – looks back on his life, beginning with his ascent to the throne aged just three in 1908, and continuing through his early life growing up in the Forbidden City in Beijing, and the subsequent political upheaval that led to his overthrow, exile, and eventual imprisonment. It’s an enormous, visually spectacular masterpiece that balances great pageantry and opulence with the very personal story of a man trying to navigate his life as a figurehead and monarch, and how he balances that with his private life and his political and social importance. It was the overwhelming critical success of 1987, and went on to win nine Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Adapted Screenplay, as well as a slew of technical awards for Art Direction, Cinematography, Editing, Costume Design, and Score. Read more…
THE MAN WHO INVENTED CHRISTMAS – Mychael Danna
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
The words ‘Dickensian Christmas’ often conjure up specific imagery. Crisply snow-covered cobbled streets, gentlemen and ladies dressed in their finery, handsome houses bedecked with wreathes and candles, great feasts centered around a roasted game bird. It’s fascinating to realize that much of the festive iconography we take for granted was popularized, if not outright invented, by the author Charles Dickens in his 1843 story A Christmas Carol. Even the phrase ‘Merry Christmas’, despite the words themselves obviously pre-dating Dickens, was only adopted as a common seasonal greeting following their liberal use by the story’s central character, Ebenezer Scrooge. In fact, the very concept of Christmas being a time for family gatherings, specific seasonal food and drink, and a festive generosity through present-giving, was not commonplace at that time, and it is only in the period since the novel’s publication that this aspect of the holiday has been given equal importance to the original religious meaning. Read more…
IL BUONO, IL BRUTTO, IL CATTIVO/THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY – Ennio Morricone
GREATEST SCORES OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
Original Review by Craig Lysy
The commercial success of the Spaghetti Westerns A Fistful of Dollars and For A Few More Dollars caught the eyes of studio executives at United Artists. They contacted Italian screenwriter Luciano Vincenzoni, offered him a contract, and expressed a desire to purchase film rights for the next installment. The Italian creative team of producer Alberto Grimaldi, director Sergio Leone and Vincenzoni met and agreed to collaborate. They proposed a story set during the American Civil War, where three rogues join in an uneasy alliance in search of buried treasure. United Artists agreed to the storyline and provided a generous budget of $1.2 million. Vincenzoni joined with Leone, Agenore Incrocci, and Furio Scarpelli to create the screenplay that was not without controversy, in that it eschewed the traditional Americana romanticism. It instead offered a potent social commentary on capitalism, greed, as well as the destructiveness and absurdity of war. Its heroes are less pure, less righteous and more morally ambiguous, where the clear lines between hero and villain are blurred. Read more…
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