Adam

But that's the whole point. If we're looking for factors that would help JW win, the one you're mentioning is way much more important than the politics, if history means anything. - Adam

The most obvious way to put Chris?s point about the politics of Hollywood and JW?s chances to the test is to look at past winners in Best Score. Most recently we have Finding Neverland, a movie which, among other things, tries to affirm the value of faith in life. Then we have a long string of essentially non-political movies winning best score like Lord of the Rings, Titanic, etc., etc. What movies has JW won for? I suppose Schindler?s List will seem liberal to the tiny percentage of the population who identifies with the Nazis. Certainly a political film but not at all controversial in its sympathies. Need I go through the other JW oscar winners to draw out the point? Is Hollywod liberal? Overall, yes - in a very safe, establisment-make-money kind of way. Does it have anything to do with JW and the best score category? Sure doesn?t seem like it. - Adam

I sbould have stated my point a little more exactly but the main point is that the scores that did win had a certain status where I would think that, even at the time, they would have been the predictable choice. Star Wars, for example, was unprecedented for that time in its popularity, both as a film and as a large symphonic score. ET was a huge phenomenon with a score that was a major part of the movie, and thus hard not to recognize. And as a minor logical point, saying that JW has only won when the choice has seemed obvious is not the same as saying that he always wins when the choice is obvious (Superman). The part about oscar credibility was wrongly stated, or at least could have used some nuance to explain what I meant, so I'd agree with your disagreement on that. - Adam

The optimistic way of looking at JW?s chances are : There has been a slight upsurge this past year in appreciation for his long and fruitful career. The Harry Potter franchise has been extremely successful for Hollywood and the music has been an intergral part of all the movies. So in a wide open field, he wins as sort of a belated recognition to his contribution to a successful franchise and in recognition of the fact that he continues to be considered the best in the biz after all of these years. Oh yeah, and its the best score of the year and the academy, contrary to many highly questionable picks in the past, recognizes this. The pessimistic way of looking at this is : JW has been nominated about 43 times which means he?s lost 38 times - giving him a losing percentage of about 88%. Furthermore, he?s only won on those years when not winning would have involved the academy losing whatever shreds of credibility it still maintains. And POA hasn't come close to reaching the status of the other scores(with Fiddler being sort of a separate category). - Adam

Remember Saving Private Ryan? All of the majoy battle scenes were not accompanied by music. I believe Spielberg will apply the same rules to this film. Leave the major Martian attacks unscored thereby lending a more documentary-type tone ergo making the events seem more terrifying. Most of my post that you left out states that I think this is going to be a small-type of score precisely for the types of reasons that you're alluding to. I just think given that this is an alien invasion threatening to destroy the world, something quite different than Saving Private Ryan as Alex stated, its quite likely there will be some large orchestral statements. Having said that, we're all guessing and anything is possible. - Adam

Memoirs of a Geisha sounds like it could have more epic sweep than WotW which I find to be kind of funny. Any movie called War of the Worlds is bound to have some large orchestral statements I would think. But the realistic style and smallness of its focus, seems to indicate this film is trying to be the anti-Independence Day in some respects. So I doubt the score will have the sweep and adventure aspects that one would think of in a sci-fi score. Its just a guess, but I imagine there being a quiet, tonal aspect of the score that relates to family relationships. And then the supernatual aspect would be scary and relatively more atonal. It could also be a small score in the sense that there might not be a lot of it. Of course these are just impressions from Spielberg?s comments. The final look of the film could be quite different. - Adam

The interesting part to me is that Spielberg is calling this the most realistic-style of movie he's shot. If this is really as "small", documentary-style as they're making it sound, that will have implications for the score. That seems to suggest that this won't be a movie with a lot of underscore and the score that does exist could be more dissonant and modern in the sense of the Close Encounters type of style - at least for the scenes involving the aliens. But we shall see, its hard to know for sure. - Adam

I?m mostly very hyped for this score but I?m also very surprised by the description of the end credits. JW seems to be going further than I would have imagined in terms of trying to bring the score full circle. Leia?s theme sounds great but two separate presentations in the end credits? It sounds like the theme might take on a greater significance and symbolism beyond Leia at the end of RotS so that could partially explain it. The Throne Room concert version seems somewhat appropriate in that it has the closest thing to a concert version of the force theme with about a minute where its developed as a bittersweet, reflective version. But the ceremonial part seems like it would be out of place a little bit with the rest of the movie and score except as an obvious way of foreshadowing the first Star Wars and maybe it could be seen as a final celebration of the whole Star Wars franchise. But the verdict is sill out, obviously, until we can actually hear everything in context with the rest of the score and movie. Can?t wait... - Adam

I think there's something to what you're saying, Roald, but it doesn't have to be the case that people base their view just on the listening experience. It so happens that the impression given is that people often do this and I agree that its arrogant to equate one's own tastes and perceptions of the music with some kind of authoritative judgement about a score's worth. But there can be scores that get highly praised, perhaps precisely because people love the music, but would be overrated when evaluated more closely with the film. For example, a non-JW example could be Yared's Troy for the simple fact that I imagine few people have actually tried to cue up the score with the movie, if that's even possible given possible re-editing and logistical difficulties. - Adam

I indicated the two tracks that are split up. Am I leaving something off? I'm fairly certain I'm not. Not sure why this thread got bumped up, though. - Adam

Also, technically, the prequel main titles are different so far. The main title to AOTC is slightly darker and more percussive than the main title to TPM. Of course this was done through manipulating the sound mix. And this was presumably done because the overall score to AOTC is darker and more percussive. So if the point is to get a recording that fits the overall score, I'm not sure it makes a big dfference rather or not there's a new recording. I'd say it would be better if they did but not really too much of an issue for all practical purposes. I'm more worried we'll be hearing a tracked DotF over the Williams non-DotF version that the article mentions since ultimately Lucas has the power in that disagreement. We can only hope he had a change of heart. The new arrangments of the love theme sound intriguing as does the new theme that got mentioned. I?ll be curious to see how much new thematic material there is. By the time you reach 6th film, where he?s still drawing from numerous themes from all previous 5, it doesn?t leave a lot of room for new material. Especially since we know that Darth Vader?s Theme, DotF, Emperor?s Theme, Love Theme, Force Theme all figure to be fairly prominent, as well as some quotes of a few others, Yoda, Luke and Leia perhaps, etc. Its possible that the new themes, even if there?s quite a few, will be fairly tangential. But it will just depend on the film, I suppose. - Adam

In tems of favorites, ET gets my vote. Star Wars, though a great score, is not something I listen to that much. In fact, I listen to it less than the prequel scores though more recent scores always have an advantage in that regard. - Adam

I'm leaning towards Finding Neverland at this point. Lots of nominations and a weak field in the sense that there's no clear favorite. Having said that, nothing could really surprise me. - Adam

Since Morlock knows that JW will win he should put his fortune down in Vegas for POA, borrow money if he needs to, and split the winnings with Andreas. - Adam

I very much enjoyed hearing your story, Ricard. My belated but sincere condolences. - Adam

The Football Game does have a kind of street swagger about it which comes as close as anythng he's done, perhaps, to being sort of hip or cool in the sense that the question might be meant. Its horribly dialed down in the film, unfortunately, and barely audible. But I like how he works in the revenge theme over the rythmic part which propels the scene forward. Also lots of little details like how he times his orchestral hits with the violent hits in the movie. - Adam

This is a good point. With modern orchestral music, I think it can also be a matter of composers going for seemingly greater complexity. They feel as though they're advancing the craft to new profound levels. But, in the process, they're no longer connecting the art to the audience. Part of the popularity of JW and film music, in general, is that its orchestral music that isn't afraid to be melodic and accessible. And, in fact, as I believe JW has pointed out, this can actually be much harder, though its looked down on in some cicrcles. I also agree with the earlier point about temp tracks. Unfortunately, we rarely know what exactly is used as a temp track but we know that they are quite common. Even with American Journey, I suspect the temp track may explain the close similarity to Far and Away. People sometimes don't realize that American Journey was written for a documentary. So he approached it exactly like he does with a film and I wouldn't be surprised if Spielberg had certain musical ideas he wanted in the movie. - Adam

The underscore to his 60s comedies is hard to listen to. The source music and songs, though very campy, will sometimes be of interest to me. So I?ll still buy the albums. But the mickey mouse stuff is just really hard to take and this point was particularly evident when listening to 90 minutes of music to Penelope. So his earlier comedy scores are sort of like curiosities for me with occasional gems (like the piano work in the jazz track - track 14 Penelope). But, at any rate, we?ve all got our favorite scores and our favorite tracks and our favorite passages within a track so I don?t think there are ?yes men? in the sense that there?s someone who would regard all JW music as equally great. In terms of how the music works with the movie, in the words of Bill Conti, ?John Williams blows me away? (my best recollection of his quote). He?s just amazingly good and I base this view on an obscene amount of time observing his scores as they appear in the movies, even the bad ones. So its not really a yes man type of thing since I?d be more than happy to have a bad view of one of his scores and I don?t offer up praise to scores where I can?t hear it with the movie. For example, I thought he sort of missed the mark when I was able to see The Man who Loved Cat Dancing. Though not a bad score and seemingly more fitting than the one that got thrown out, its still not up to his usual standards in terms of capturing the essence of the movie. So anyway I think with his level of skill and understanding of the craft, combined with a remarkably consistent approach in terms of the way he subordinates his music to the demands of the film, its possible to get consistently top-notch scores, which is different than saying that quiet dialog underscore is as good as music to the ET finale or something like that. - Adam

The closest thing to an animated film might be The Phantom Mencace. And I don't mean this in a critical way, necessarily, or in refernce to the actual use of computer animation. In an interview JW alluded to the fact that the film had a certain bounce in its step, even using the word "cartoon". Maybe somebody can remember what interview that was. But he's referring, I think, to the pacing and the way its edited, which is closer to the style of animation than the usual Star Wars films. I think that does kind of come through in the film and score, for better or worse. - Adam

Lots of documentaries will tear me up. There's a scene in Hoop Dreams that did it where the mom learns her son is going to college (I think). The emotion isn't even sad in that scene but its enough that it reveals something true and pure in human emotion. That can elict tears of empathy, I guess, espcially since we know this is real life. On the much more manipulative side of things, ET did it the second time I saw it. The first time, I was young and probably was wishing I was seeing TESB for the 3rd time or something. But when I saw ET again in high school I fell victim to every button that Spielberg and Williams hit. Too many scenes to even pinpoint but by the end its probably one of the few times that I approximated something like actual crying. Tearing up is something that happens quite easily including most recently Finding Neverland and Million Dollar Baby. Particularly the latter movie, although melodramatic in many respects, still an extremely well-executed and involving movie. - Adam

I like reading informed and thoughtful criticism of JW. Even if I disagree I feel like I benefit from hearing that kind of thing. Then there's the kind of criticism that sounds like criticism but really is ?I don?t like listening to that? in which case I don?t feel the need to get defensive (since everyone differs in preferences) except maybe to occasionally point out that its better not to equate one?s tastes with some sort of definitive judgement on JW or a score?s worth. If I feel like somebody is bashing him based on a misunderstanding or a lack of understanding then I?m probably defensive, not because of the criticism but because of the misunderstanding. The FSM board does provide some examples of this although now I'm consciously avoiding it to escape the vortex that will suck me in and take away more of my time. ( : - Adam

Dry your Tears is an interesting theme because it kind of doubles as an African and American anthem. The full chorus version is more African obviously but in the film its generally more American in its orientation. I heard one movie reviewer criticize the choral piece for sounding like a tradiional South African piece when the only African connection in the movie is to West Africans. There might be something to that although he said nothing about the fact that most S. African pieces (much less W.African) don?t have a full-fledged orchestra backing up the chorus with an intricate and advanced underscore. Its not the kind of piece where JW was going for absolute authenticty. Sort of exists somewhere between Hollywood and a kind of generalized notion we all have of African music. I especially like the rythmic stuff he does with that piece in terms of the syncopation, which conjures up the movements of traditional African dancers. My favorite is probably Star of Bethlehem - the first couple minutes especially. Very beautiful, IMO. - Adam

Wow, I didn't know you made the Snickets comment until after I entered my post in. Wasn't trying to steal that from you. - Adam

This is a hard year to predict a winner. As others have said, its a pretty wide-open field. Snicket seem like the least likely but, even that, wouldn't completely surprise me. I sitll think Azkaban probably won't win though I'd love to be wrong. Certainly its the most deserving of the movies I've seen (only 3 of them). - Adam

I've only heard a fraction of his total output but I like his music and craft enough to be interested in hearing what he does next - in the film world, in particular. - Adam