Cinema '62: Best Original Screenplay

For the second year in a row, non-English language films dominate the Original Screenplay race. Last Year at Marienbad had been submitted by France for Best Foreign Language Film consideration the year before; beautiful yet inscrutable (to me), it's the kind of film people picture when they say "art film." Through a Glass Darkly won Best Foreign Language Film the previous year for Sweden, a Bergman film dealing with a family on the verge of collapse. And then there's the previously-discussed Divorce Italian Style, not even submitted for Foreign Language Film consideration, just a hit!

Joining them are the biopic Freud and That Touch of Mink, a rom-com in the Rock Hudson-Doris Day-Tony Randall style but with Cary Grant instead of Hudson, Gig Young instead of Randall. Day remains, thank goodness. 

The nominees:

Cinema '62: Best Original Score

Each category always seems to have one lone nominee, the sole representative of a film that, perhaps, had greater Oscar dreams. I'm sure the lone nominee in this category had higher aspirations: Taras Bulba.

Based on the novel by Nikolai Gogol, Taras Bulba is the story of a family. Taras is a proud Cossack, a ferocious military leader, an enemy of the Poles, a friend as well a father to his sons. His sons Andriy and Ostap are educated in Kyiv, where Andriy falls in love with a Polish noblewoman. This leads to some tensions when the Cossack take arms against the Polish government. Exciting battle scenes, with so many horses, extras, and pyrotechnics, you'll thrill even as you worry for everyone's safety! A bear pit! Lots of drinking and singing! Great performances!

And, of course, a sweeping, epic score - let's discuss further: