Tag: Leona Lewis
-
TECH SUPPORT: Best Original Song
Over the last five months, Gerard has diligently canvassed and re-canvassed the various crafts categories here at In Contention. The one category we have held back on all this time, as contenders have slowly fallen into place, was Best Original Song. Today, it’s time to dig into the field.This has turned into something of a banner year for original songs in feature films. We’ve had the great pleasure of bringing a number of hopefuls to you via our “listen to” posts, and look forward to continuing that into the new year. But inevitably, frontrunners are bound to show up, and I think we can successfully narrow the field now.
Before diving in, it’s worth reiterating the voting process in this category. I’ll simply let the Academy’s rule book speak for itself:
“An original song consists of words and music, both of which are original and written specifically for the motion picture. There must be a clearly audible, intelligible, substantive rendition (not necessarily visually presented) of both lyric and melody, used in the body of the motion picture or as the first music cue in the end credits.
-
Listen to Leona Lewis’s ‘I See You’ from ‘Avatar’
We were going to be featuring U2’s track “Winter” from Jim Sheridan’s “Brothers” today, but we’ll hold off until Monday on that as the love theme from one of the most anticipated films of the year has crossed our path this morning.Leona Lewis was revealed a few weeks ago as the crooner responsible for “I See You,” the central tune of James Cameron’s “Avatar.” I imagine that, much like Celine Dion’s “My Heart Will Go On” in “Titanic,” the melodies of the track will be evident throughout James Horner’s score. No one has seen the film yet (December 10 is the date for me), so it’s difficult to say exactly how the song is implemented in the film. I do know it’s a closing credits tune, but again, it could have a presence throughout.
Dion’s song, of course, won the Oscar in 1997, so it’s fair to think “I See You” will be a formidable contender here, but in this brave new (arbitrary) world of Academy music branch voting, all bets are off. This is a bit, I don’t know, overly produced, a bit schmaltzy, but I’ll hold off full judgment on it until I saw how it’s used in the film. It has striking parallels to “My Heart Will Go On” here and there, though.
Have a listen to the song below and tell us what you think.
[display_podcast]
-
WEEKLY WRAP: Doc shortlist, honorary Oscars and more
• The shortlist of contenders for the documentary Oscar was announced, surprising many — we dug into it a little.• The season’s first Oscars were handed out, as Lauren Bacall, Gordon Willis, Roger Corman and John Calley were celebrated at the Governors’ Awards.
• This week’s Off the Carpet column broke down the wide-open Best Original Screenplay race.
• The Long Shot lived up to its name, spotlighting a few of the season’s most deserving outsiders.
-
Leona Lewis to sing ‘Avatar’ theme
Chalk up another contender for Best Original Song. British pop diva Leona Lewis is to sing the (presumably multi-octave-scaling) theme song from James Cameron’s “Avatar.”Best known Stateside for her megahit “Bleeding Love,” the 24 year-old chanteuse rose to fame as the 2006 winner of “The X Factor,” the UK’s “American Idol” equivalent — thus making “Avatar” the year’s second sci-fi blockbuster (after “2012”) to turn to a reality-show star for musical duties.
Empire reports that Lewis is currently shooting the video for the song, a James Horner-penned closing-credits effort titled “I See You (Theme from Avatar).”
If this all sounds a little 1997, I guess that’s the idea. Lewis is, after all, a latter-day answer to Celine Dion, whose ubiquitous Oscar-winning theme for Cameron’s last film — what was the title again? — was part and parcel of its success. (Of course, times have changed since then, and the Academy looks a lot less kindly on closing-credit tracks these days.)