Most of us probably haven’t purchased a movie ticket and an $11 tub of popcorn since Bong Joon-ho’s masterpiece Parasite made history at the 2020 Academy Awards. Nevertheless, 2020 persevered and bequeathed to us an array of films for home-theater viewing, accompanied by hair-raising cinematic scores. This year also marks the first time two Black composers were nominated in the Best Original Score category.
With the Oscars coming up this Sunday, April 25, we're planning a two-day salute to the music that brings the movies to life. During our Big Score Weekend, you’ll hear music originally written for the silver screen every hour and relive the moments when classical music really made a scene.
Below are the 2021 Oscar-nominees for Best Original Score, followed by a playlist of triumphs from years past.
Da 5 Bloods - Terence Blanchard
Director Spike Lee and Terence Blanchard have collaborated together on over 15 films including previous Oscar nods Malcolm X and BlacKkKlansman. The 2020 film Da Five Bloods follows a group of aging veterans from the 1st Infantry Division as they return to Vietnam in search of the remains of their fallen leader and to retrieve a treasure they buried while serving. Blanchard’s epic score joins a noble canon of music composed for war movies, eliciting pangs of loss, victory, and peril.
Outside of the film world, Blanchard’s name may have recently appeared on your classical music radar: his opera Fire Shut Up in My Bones opens the Metropolitan Opera’s 2021-22 season and will be the first opera by a Black composer to appear on the New York institution’s stage.
Minari - Emile Mosseri
After years of touring and recording with the band the Dig, Emile Mosseri took his infatuation with poignant film scores (he has noted Danny Elfman’s Edward Scissorhands and Nino Rota’s waltz from The Godfather as inspiration) and has turned cinematic composition into the main attraction. Although a recent development in his career, his work has been heard on screen in multiple endeavors, most recently in the art-house films The Last Black Man in San Francisco and Miranda July’s Kajillionaire.
Mosseri wrote the score to Minari based on the screenplay alone, before the film even began production. The score bears the emotional weight of the story which offers a glimpse into the life of a South Korean family who start a farm in rural Arkansas in search of the American dream. The music takes us through the movie’s themes of hope, disappointment, and the tenacity required to remain strong in the face of adversity.
Mank - Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross
Like Mosseri, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross enjoyed a prolific tenure as touring musicians before they took to scoring films. The Nine Inch Nails bandmates also worked on the score for David Fincher’s previous Oscar nominees Gone Girl and The Social Network. Fincher’s latest feature film, Mank, explores the creative process of director Herman J. Mankiewicz as he writes the script to the 1941 film Citizen Kane, considered by many to be the greatest film ever made. The score is sprinkled with allusions to pop music of the WWII era and the pomp of a swinging Big Band in a 1940s supper club. Like the anxiety associated with producing any grand masterpiece, the music keeps your on your toes throughout, requiring your attention and maintaining your curiosity.
News of the World - James Newton Howard
James Newton Howard has composed over 100 film scores (Pretty Woman, The Fugitive,The Dark Knight and The Hunger Games series, to name a few) and has been nominated for nine Academy Awards. Director Paul Greengrass’s latest film News of the World is an introspective Western starring Tom Hanks as a Civil War veteran tasked with returning a young girl to her only living relatives after being taken in by the Kiowa people. The instrumentation of the score features cello d’amores, viola da gambas, and gut-string fiddles—“ancient instruments” as Newton Howard calls them—which transport the viewer to the Great Plains circa 1870. As Hanks and his ward traverse across state lines, the music exemplifies the grandeur expected from a Western, but also thoughtfully accompanies the tale of healing, restoration, and companionship at the heart of this film.
Soul - Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross and Jon Batiste
The ever-cool, ever-smiling multi-talented pianist Jon Batiste personifies the musical spirit of the protagonist at the heart of Pixar's Soul. The animated motion picture introduces us to Joe Gardner, a jazz teacher who just got his dream gig at the Half Note (aka The Village Vanguard), and promptly takes him away via an unfortunate encounter with a manhole, where he slips into the “Great Beyond.” While Batiste effortlessly tickles the keys to emulate Joe’s terrestrial world, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross score the otherworldly ambience of the Great Beyond. In classic Pixar fashion, it's a film that makes the whole family laugh, cry, and in this case, snap your fingers.
In case you haven't had your fill of cinematic music, here's a playlist of our favorite Oscar-nominated film scores: