I’ve posted here before when I’ve been a guest on my friend’s podcast: All Time Top Ten (Warning: Audio starts right away when link opens)
For each show there’s a different topic. The Host and his Guest each put together a Top Ten list for that topic.
I got to be a guest on the show again, the topic was All Time Top Ten Oscar Nominated Songs. For this episode, the host had two Guests. Rather than putting together his own list, the host moderated while the other guest and I counted down our lists.
So, what are your top ten Oscar nominated songs?
We chose not to limit the selection to Oscar Winners, but to be eligible for the list the songs have to have been nominated for The Academy Award for Best Original Song (Wiki link as a point of reference while putting together your list).
MY Top Ten List:
[ol]
[li]Cheek to Cheek - 1935 from Top Hat[/li][li]Moon River - 1961 from Breakfast at Tiffany’s[/li][li]The Way You Look Tonight - 1936 from Swing Time[/li][li]Sooner or Later - 1990 from Dick Tracy[/li][li]Rainbow Connection - 1979 from The Muppet Movie*****[/li][li]The Look of Love - 1967 from Casino Royale[/li][li]Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B - 1941 from Buck Privates[/li][li]Unchained Melody - 1955 from Unchained[/li][li]Town Without Pity - 1961 from Town Without Pity[/li][li]Everybody Needs a Best Friend - 2012 from Ted[/li][/ol]
The Other Guest’s Top Ten List:
[ol]
[li]Over the Rainbow - 1939 from The Wizard of Oz[/li][li]Live and Let Die - 1973 from Live and Let Die[/li][li]Save Me - 1999 from Magnolia[/li][li]Kiss at the End of the Rainbow - 2003 from A Mighty Wind[/li][li]Rainbow Connection - 1979 from The Muppet Movie*****[/li][li]Blame Canada - 1999 from South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut[/li][li]Lose Yourself - 2002 from 8 Mile[/li][li]Streets of Philadelphia - 1993 from Philadelphia[/li][li]Wild is the Wind - 1957 from Wild is the Wind[/li][li]Falling Slowly - 2007 from Once[/li][/ol]
*****There is a Rule on the Show: No Repeats
You have to have a short selection of “alternates” in case the other person plays a song from your list before you get to it.
If the other person steals one of your songs, you play a song from your list of alternates.
The other guest played “Rainbow Connection” before me, so I had to substitute an alternate.
I played: “Nine to Five” - 1980 from Nine to Five
The “No Repeats” rule of course does NOT apply to this Thread.
So, what are your Top Ten?
“Moon River” — Breakfast at Tiffany’s
“Georgy Girl” — Georgy Girl
“The Windmills of Your Mind” — The Thomas Crown Affair
“Theme from Shaft” — Shaft
“It Might Be You” — Tootsie
“Let the River Run” — Working Girl
“Miss Misery” — Good Will Hunting
“Things Have Changed” — Wonder Boys
“Town Without Pity” — Town Without Pity
“Alfie” — Alfie
To narrow my list down, I only included songs that I strongly associate with the movies they appeared in. Otherwise, “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy,” “Call Me Irresponsible,” and “Unchained Melody” might have made my top 10.
For sure. I started with about 25 - 30, then whittled it down.
I kind of did a hybrid approach, blending priority of personal fondness with priority of a more academic selection (what songs would be in a film history textbook in the music chapter?). I included “Unchained Melody” because the song has such an interesting history that I was looking forward to being able to share. “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy” is definitely associated with the movie for me. I was first exposed to Abbott and Costello movies broadcast on T.V. on Saturday afternoons when I was a little kid. I think it’s very possible that the very first time I heard the song it was within the context of the movie.
My top-10. I picked songs that I liked and could recognize/remember from the title alone w/o worrying about historical significance, overall popularity, etc. There very well may be a song that I like better than #10 among the forgotten, but if I forgot it, I guess it doesn’t deserve to be in the top-10, right?
1 “Moon River” - A lovely, lovely song. I like Audrey singing it, I like the over-orchestrated version of it.
2 “Belle” - If I burst into song (and yes, sometimes I burst into song), this could very well be the one I start singing. IMHO, one of the all-time great movie openings. “Right from the moment when I met her, saw her, I said ‘She’s gorgeous’ and I fell. Here in town there’s only she, who’s as beautiful as me! So I made my plans to woo and marry Belle.” This song opens the movie, introduces all the major characters (except the Beast), states the personal conflict of Belle’s life (her ennui) as well as the external conflict (Gaston), gives you an idea of what the town is like… God, a lot goes on here. There could very well be more than 15 separate voices to this 5 minute song.
3 “Be Our Guest” - What can I say other than Beauty and the Beast is my favorite movie musical?
4 “Live and Let Die” - Really, “A Hard Day’s Night” should be on this list. This is one of the best Wings tunes, however.
5 “Theme fromShaft” - Shaft!
6 “Nobody Does It Better” - I like Carly Simon and I like this one more than “Let the River Run.”
7 “Over the Rainbow” - Tonight, on CBS!
8 “Unchained Melody” - It got a bit (more than a bit) overplayed after Ghost, but is still a great, great ballad.
9 “Georgy Girl” - This one is kind of weird, in a bouncy way. Three different sets of lyrics to this one (one at the beginning of the movie, a second set at the end, and the single had a third set.)
10 “Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now)” - Phil Collins bizarrely gets a lot of shit, but I consider this one of his finest works.
Actually, I decided to count the distinct singers in Belle and there are at least 38 different parts singing in this song.
1 Belle
6 5 “Bon Jour” singers
7 Baker
9 2 old ladies (“Look there she goes that girl is strange, no question…”)
10 Woman at barbershop door
11 Barber
13 2 peasants (“No denying she’s a funny girl that Belle.”)
14 Wagon driver
15 Pretty girl
16 Meat seller
17 2nd pretty girl
18 Egg buyer
19 Pottery buyer
<< all the above in the first 1:36>>
book seller < -doesn’t really sing, though.
22 3 guys (“Look there she goes that girl is so peculiar…”)
24 2 ruffians (“And her nose stuck in a book”)
25 Wig buyer
26 Wig seller
27 Gaston
Lumiere < -doesn’t really sing, though.
30 3 girls swooning over Gaston
38 8 different people in the final medley as Belle walks out of town (“This bread/those fish, is stale/they smell!”)
Then, at the end, the entire town sings the final verses.
Belle is a great song, wonderfully complex in its lyrical construction (at least to my untrained ears, that is.) Had I gone through this exercise before my previous post, I would have put it at #1.
The Way You Look Tonight - Swing Time
I’ve Got You Under My Skin - Born to Dance
They Can’t Take That Away from Me - Shall We Dance?
You’d Be So Nice to Come Home to - Something to Shout About
Over the Rainbow - The Wizard of Oz
Unchained Melody - Unchained
The Shadow of Your Smile - The Sandpiper
I Will Wait for You - The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
The Look of Love - Casino Royale
The Windmills of Your Mind - The Thomas Crown Affair
It was hard to narrow it down after my top four choices. If I went over the list again tomorrow my list might be somewhat different.
One thing I noticed in going over the list is how few memorable songs have been nominated since 1990. I hope this doesn’t just mean I’m getting old.
Jeff Lichtman, if I were to put together a list on top ten songs since 1990 I would draw from the following list. The songs are only listed chronologically, and I haven’t whittled the list down to 10 (obviously). Choosing from this selection of songs I could put together a pretty awesome Top Ten List:
[ul]
[li]Sooner or Later - 1990 from Dick Tracy[/li][li]Be Our Guest - 1991 from Beauty and the Beast[/li][li]A Friend Like Me - 1992 from Aladdin[/li][li]A Wink and a Smile - 1993 from Sleepless in Seattle[/li][li]You’ve Got a Friend in Me - 1995 from Toy Story[/li][li]That Thing You Do! - 1996 from That Thing You Do![/li][li]Save Me - 1999 from Magnolia[/li][li]Blame Cananda - 1999 from South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut[/li][li]I’ve Seen it All - 2000 from Dancer in the Dark[/li][li]Lose Yourself - 2002 from 8 Mile[/li][li]Father and Daughter - 2002 from The Wild Thornberrys Movie[/li][li]Belleville Rendez-Vous - 2003 from The Triplets of Belleville[/li][li]The Scarlet Tide - 2003 from Cold Mountain[/li][li]Accidentally in Love - 2004 from Shrek 2[/li][li]It’s Hard out Here for a Pimp - 2005 from Hustle & Flow[/li][li]Falling Slowly - 2007 from Once[/li][li]That’s How You Know - 2007 from Enchanted[/li][li]Everybody Needs a Best Friend - 2012 from Ted[/li][/ul]
AAAARRGH!!!
AGAIN my list somehow neglects “A Kiss at the End of the Rainbow” from A Mighty Wind2003!!! :mad:
I figured it out. That song is in red text on the Wiki page, and my eye just keeps skipping over it when I am looking at the list as a reminder. The is an AWESOME song, and I can’t believe I left it off my list TWICE!
Because I don’t know what songs have been Oscar nominated the following are my favorites from the ones that have been named so far by the rest of y’all. Thank you for doing that by the way.
1.) “Rainbow Connection” from The Muppet Movie
2.) “You’ve Got A Friend In Me” from Toy Story
Something I noticed after seeing the list of nominees and winners: there was a period in the 90s where animated Disney movies had two or more songs nominated in a single year for several years in a row (or almost). In every year, I prefer the losing song(s) over the winning one. Go figure.
1989 (yeah, I know you said 90s) The Little Mermaid
I do prefer “Kiss the Girl” to “Under the Sea” but I can’t really gripe about this one.
1991 Beauty and the Beast
“Beauty and the Beast” won, I definitely think “Be Our Guest” was the better song. “Belle” was also nominated, a great song but it can’t really be separated from the movie. Ideal for me is a song that enhances and supports the movie and also stands on its own.
1992 Aladdin
“A Whole New World” won, um . . . are you kidding me? Definitely should have been “A Friend Like Me”.
1994 The Lion King
I really didn’t like this movie and don’t have a strong feeling about the nominees- none of which I particularly love. “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” made sense as the obvious win but I would have gone with “Hakuna Matata”. I think “Circle of Life” and “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” are about equal on the LCD scale.
1995 Pocahontas
Only one song nominated: “Colors of the Wind”. Disney did have a second nomination with a different film: “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” from Toy Story, which would have gotten my vote.
1997 Hercules
One nomination. Lost to “My Heart Will Go On” from Titanic.
1999 Tarzan
Only one song nominated, “You’ll Be in My Heart”, it won . . . it won despite the fact that it SUCKS!!!
1999 was my angriest year for this category. “You’ll Be in My Heart” won beating both “Save Me” from Magnolia AND “Blame Canada” from South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut. AAAARGH! This will make me angry until and possibly long after the day I die!!!
But, yes Rollo Tomasi, that was a pretty interesting point to make. 10 Nominations for 4 films- 4 films in a row all scoring a win (actually 5 films in a row scoring a win but the 5th film wasn’t a multi-song nominee) but none of the wins would have been my choice.
The Way You Look Tonight - Swing Time
They Can’t Take That Away From Me - Shall We Dance
Over the Rainbow - Wizard of Oz
Blues in the Night - Blues in the Night
Baby, It’s Cold Outside - Neptune’s Daughter
Windmills of Your Mind - Thomas Crown Affair
Nobody Does it Better - The Spy Who Loved Me
Sooner or Later - Dick Tracy
Kiss the Girl - The Little Mermaid
Be Our Guest - Beauty and the Beast
Lose Yourself - 8 Mile
