Summary
- Best Original Song category at the Oscars celebrates talented musicians in film history.
- Between 2 and 14 songs have been nominated in a single year, but since 2012, there have been five nominees per year.
- Best Original Song winners often leave a larger mark than the movie they were featured in.
The Oscars best song awards category, Best Original Song, celebrates the talented musicians who have crafted some of the most beautiful and memorable arrangements in film history. The Academy Awards is the most prestigious movie awards ceremony and a win in any category is an acknowledgment of technical, cultural, and industry success. Nearly every aspect of filmmaking is recognized, and music has two awards celebrating their efforts: Best Original Song and Best Original Score. Best Original Song goes to the songwriters of one original song made specifically for a movie of that year.
The award was first presented at the 7th Academy Awards, which took place in 1935 with the Oscar going to "The Continental" from The Gay Divorcee. Since then, the Oscar has been presented at every Academy Award ceremony. How movies get nominated for Oscars can be a complex process and, over its history, between two and 14 songs have been nominated in a single year. However, since 2012, the rules have outlined that there would be five nominees per year, via Billboard. Best Original Song winners have sometimes left a larger mark than the movie they featured in, and often, they've managed to elevate an already celebrated title.
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The magic of Disney animation shined bright during its Renaissance era, but how do the classic soundtracks of these films stand against each other?
50 "Let The River Run" By Carly Simon (Music & Lyrics)
Working Girl (1988) at the 61st Academy Awards
Singer-songwriter Carly Simon earned an Oscar for "Let the River Run", which she wrote and performed for Working Girl, a 1988 rom-com about a secretary (Melanie Griffith) who takes over her boss' job after she goes on sick leave. The film earned six Academy Award nominations, only winning for Best Original Song. "Let the River Run" is an electric and thrumming ode to New York City and, with Simon's gospel-like melody, also earned a Grammy win for Best Song Written Specifically for a Motion Picture or Television.
49 "Gigi" By Frederick Loewe (Music); Alan Jay Lerner (Lyrics)
Gigi (1958) at the 31st Academy Awards
Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe won an Academy Award for "Gigi", the title song of the 1958 movie that went nine for nine at the ceremony, winning all awards it was nominated for. The song is sung by Gaston Lachaille (Louis Jourdan) about the titular Gilberte "Gigi" (Leslie Caron) who Gaston has fallen in love with. It's romantic and exciting with Jourdan, expertly dressed, running through a lonely-looking Paris as he extols why he loves Gigi.
48 "Arthur's Theme (Best That You Can Do)" By Peter Allen, Burt Bacharach, Christopher Cross & Carole Bayer Sager (Music & Lyrics)
Arthur (1981) at the 54th Academy Awards
Arthur follows the titular character, played by Dudley Moore, a playboy millionaire who halts his arranged marriage to a wealthy heiress when he falls in love with a working-class girl from Queens. The film earned four Oscar nominations and won Best ing Actor for John Gielgud and Best Original Song for "Arthur's Theme (Best That You Can Do)". The song is a catchy rock ballad that swings between well-written, nostalgic lyrics like "When you get caught between the moon and New York City," and describing exactly what Arthur does daily.
47 "Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head" By Burt Bacharach (Music); Hal David (Lyrics)
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) at the 42nd Academy Awards
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Cast
Katharine Ross
Strother Martin
- Release Date
- September 24, 1969
"Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head" and Burt Bacharach and Hal Davis won one of the whopping seven Oscars that Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were nominated for at the 42nd Academy Awards. The buddy Western starring Robert Redford and Paul Newman ended up winning four awards that night. The song is an upbeat tune about keeping one's head up even when it seems everything is going wrong. Spider-Man 2 famously employed the song when Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) decides to stop fighting crime.
46 "Theme From Shaft" By Isaac Hayes (Music & Lyrics)
Shaft (1971) at the 44th Academy Awards
Most people may know the controversial Isaac Hayes for playing Chef in South Park, but long before that, Hayes was a Grammy-winning soul musician who was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2002 (via Rockhall). He composed the theme song for the blaxploitation crime thriller Shaft, which plays at the beginning of the film, making him the first Black man to win the award. Funky, cool, and setting the groove for the movie, the song could be considered one of the first superhero themes.
45 "No Time To Die" By Billie Eilish & Finneas O'Connell (Music & Lyrics)
No Time To Die (2021) at the 94th Academy Awards
The James Bond theme songs are key aspects of the enduring franchise and are just as important to the movies as new villains or gadgets. Billie Eilish became the youngest person to write one of the themes when she and her brother Finneas O'Connell composed "No Time to Die" for the movie of the same name. The groundbreaking and hip Eilish went for a more classical approach to the theme, which helps to make it a dark and mysterious number to open Craig's final Bond movie.
44 "I'm Easy" By Keith Carradine (Music & Lyrics)
Nashville (1975) at the 48th Academy Awards
Nashville is a satirical musical-comedy by Robert Altman that follows five different people in the lead-up to a gala concert. There is nearly an hour of musical numbers in the film, but it's "I'm Easy" by Keith Carradine that received the Oscar for Best Original Song. Carradine, who plays Tom Frank, sings this love ballad about a man who is enraptured by the woman of his dreams. The song makes a funny juxtaposition compared to Tom's character as a cad and manipulative womanizer.
43 "If I Didn't Have You" By Randy Newman (Music & Lyrics)
Monsters, Inc. (2001) at the 74th Academy Awards
Randy Newman continues his long collaboration with Pixar in Monsters, Inc. with the Academy Award-winning song "If I Didn't Have You". Monsters, Inc. is the third feature-length Pixar movie and a sign that the studio's success with Toy Story was not a fluke after the excellent but less critically lauded A Bug's Life. Newman's "If I Didn't Have You" is a catchy and whip-smart duet between Sulley (John Goodman) and Mike Wazowski (Billy Crystal). It's a bit of a riff on "You've Got A Friend In Me" but Goodman and Crystal's earnest vocals give it heart and charm.
42 "Fight For You" By D'Mile & H.E.R. (Music); H.E.R. & Tiara Thomas (Lyrics)
Judas and the Black Messiah (2021) at the 93rd Academy Awards
Judas and the Black Messiah
Cast
Algee Smith
-
Lil Rel Howery
Dominique Thorne
- Release Date
- February 12, 2021
D'Mile, H.E.R., and Tiara Thomas won an Oscar for "Fight for You" in Judas and the Black Messiah, a historical film about Fred Hampton (Daniel Kaluuya) and the Chicago chapter of the Black Panther Party. The film earned six Oscar nominations, winning in two categories. "Fight for You" was also nominated for three Grammys and won for Best Traditional R&B Performance. The song has a funky and uplifting beat that obscures the frightening and foreboding lyrics that are a warning to Hampton and his allies.
41 "I Just Called To Say I Love You" By Stevie Wonder (Music & Lyrics)
The Woman in Red (1984) at the 57th Academy Awards
Stevie Wonder's "I Just Called to Say I Love You" also earned three Grammy nominations to go along with its Oscar win for its role as the lead single on the soundtrack for The Woman in Red. It's a bubbly and optimistic song that fits well with this sex farce where Ted Pierce (Gene Wilder) becomes infatuated with a woman in a red dress and attempts to start a relationship with her.
