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Will The Force Awakens be Williams' 50th best score nomination?


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John Williams at the 2016 Academy Awards  

62 members have voted

  1. 1. Will The Force Awakens be Williams' 50th best score nomination?

  2. 2. What would have happened if schedules allowed John to score both Episode 7 and Bridge of Spies

    • Both scores would have been nominated
    • Only Bridge of Spies would have been nominated
    • Only The Force Awakens would have been nominated
    • Neither would have been nominated
    • I don't know man - I just wanted to vote on the simple question above!


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The film may have been disappointing but the music is still top-knotch stuff.

I agree!

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Spalko's theme, Dovchenko?'s theme, the Skull theme all wonderful additions to the indy music library. The film may have been disappointing but the music is still top-knotch stuff.

While I don't think it's a bad score by any means, I would consider Crystal Skull to be middle-notch.

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Spalko's theme, Dovchenko?'s theme, the Skull theme all wonderful additions to the indy music library. The film may have been disappointing but the music is still top-knotch stuff.

Either dull or inappropriate for the film/character.

Crystal Skull's score is largely devoid of life. One of JW's worst scores.

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Well, he gave AOTC 5 stars, and it's the shittiest of the SW scores, so I'm sure TFA will have the highest rating too.

AOTC still warrants 5 stars. At least as it was written for the film. The version as heard in the film is a completely different story.

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The album is very good.

And then he gives ROTS four out of five.

I think many people's dissatisfaction with ROTS' score comes from the lame Throne Room rehash in the end credits. Other than that, I don't see how it's any more "incohesive" than AOTC (which, again, is also awesome).

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The album is very good.

And then he gives ROTS four out of five.

I think many people's dissatisfaction with ROTS' score comes from the lame Throne Room rehash in the end credits. Other than that, I don't see how it's any more "incohesive" than AOTC (which, again, is also awesome).

Clemmy's biggest complaint about ROTS was that the Luke and Leia theme was absent. Whatevs.

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Attack of the Clones is underrated as a score, but I guess the concensus seems to be that it isn't as much a 'Star Wars' score.

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ROTS has a terrible album presentation as well, but in complete form it's got some glorious stretches of magnificence.

Why the album doesn't end with the film's last 45 minutes of wall-to-wall music is beyond me. Simply breathtaking writing from the maestro.

Never found AOTC all that impressive, but the horrendous tracking in the film didn't leave me with the best impression of the score.

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If Williams writes at least one film score during the Oscar period, I expect at least one of them to be nominated. Since TFA is the only one this time, as long as it meets the rules, I'd be very surprised if it doesn't get a nom.

Didn't happen in 2008 with KotCS. Granted I think that was the first time that ha happened since 1992 (JW isn't nominated for anything in a year where he scores at least one film)

I forgot that all JW wrote between Munich and Tintin was KOTCS. I regularly listen to the end credits suite but that's about it. That score lifted too many passages from the other films and the new themes were mostly forgettable (the mediocre film clearly didn't inspire JW to write anything exceptional, even with a year of post-production).

Really hope J.J. has a Cuaron-esque personality that demands excellence of Williams and not just "the expected." Being challenged on Azkaban brought out JW's true brilliance as a creative.

I doubt it'll be Cuaron-esque. From what we've seen before it'll be a slightly different but more of the same aesthetic from the OT. Might not be that inspiring to write for. Nostalgia will only go so far re: KOTCS

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I think KOTCS definitely showed that nostalgia =/= classic Williams writing.

It's an interesting score in that he followed his writing formula from the OT to a tee (heavy thematic association, action scenes integrating character themes, etc.), yet I always felt the score came across as mostly devoid of energy and lifeless. The music is all there but it never really escalates the material, likely due to how soulless the film is. Again, the OST being a poor representation of the score, as written, doesn't help.

Either way, it's hardly a surprise considering the film itself. Spielberg's direction isn't mediocre but it feels more like a director desperately trying to recapture his younger style; an imitation more than the real thing. It's still an improvement on his Lost World levels of disinterest though.

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The complete Jungle Chase is great!

The highlight of the score, without question. Love the militaristic rendition of Spalko's theme towards the start.

Obviously, being such a highlight, Williams chose to omit this from the OST. :huh:

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The highlight of KOTCS is the brief rendition of the alternate Raiders March counterpoint to the classic March at the end of the credits. I'm afraid it's too little, too late by that point.

The Jungle Chase is hardly "great".

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Attack of the Clones is underrated as a score, but I guess the concensus seems to be that it isn't as much a 'Star Wars' score.

What consensus? Jeff Bond raved about it (and he was hardly the only one):

For me, the dissatisfaction with Episode One extended to John Williams' score. Sure, it sounded like a Star Wars movie score, but despite a few memorable set pieces there seemed to be no there there. The score was largely ambient, failing to drive or anticipate the action, seemingly as aware as the critics were that there was no drama onscreen. It was a movie that seemed to lack a protagonist and a definable plot, and that seemed to make things tough for Williams to sink his teeth into the score. I haven't seen Episode Two: Attack of the Clones yet, and for all I know I might dislike it as much as I disliked Episode One -- but something in its story certainly inspired John Williams this time. From the opening post-crawl moments of the score it's clear that something's actually happening in this movie -- Williams' score is motivic, driven by shifting, rhythmic patterns and some impressive new themes (as well as more-than-welcome reprises of many of the old ones). It's sweeping, gorgeous, romantic and exciting as hell. I've seen a few gripes that this score isn't "thematic" enough -- don't you believe it. The themes are there to be found, and part of the fun is seeing how they emerge out of dauntingly complex passages or suggest themselves before their full-blown orchestral statements appear. This is the kind of writing I like best from Williams: rich and thoughtful, clearly fully-engaged by the movie in front of him.

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Attack of the Clones is only a good score to morons and desperate JWFanners that will eat up anything Star Wars. I'm the latter. It really is a piece of crap, but at least I can admit that. Still, it's a guilty pleasure.

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Hm. Thinking about 2002, I'd say that was a good year with a hefty number of very finely crafted scores, from Williams or otherwise, some for good films, some for duds.

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Hm. Thinking about 2002, I'd say that was a good year with a hefty number of very finely crafted scores, from Williams or otherwise, some for good films, some for duds.

I picked it as my favorite year for film scores, though Attack Of The Clones was excluded.
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But without 2014, we wouldn't have Desplat's Godzilla - the king of 2014 film music.

That score gave me a headache; so pedestrian and loud. At least Arnold's Godzilla (albeit for a wildly different movie, tonally) had some energy. I guess Desplat was merely trying to reflect how bland and uninteresting all the characters in that movie were?

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Fantastic score, Desplat's. Great dynamic range and the work of a true craftsman.

Is the score on its own radically different to its film presentation? It clearly doesn't do it justice in the mix.

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Hm. Thinking about 2002, I'd say that was a good year with a hefty number of very finely crafted scores, from Williams or otherwise, some for good films, some for duds.

No, you're wrong. To even suggest that other composers could write scores as finely crafted as Williams' is an insult not only to the man, but to the film music community as a whole.

In other words, you're a shit-eating pig.

Oh.

:(

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