The Score

As the summer heats up, there’s a lot to lure you into the air-conditioned comfort of theaters. This week, host Edmund Stone shares his annual roundup of this season's blockbusters. It’s all action with 'Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga,' pure entertainment with 'The Fall Guy,' lots of laughs with 'Despicable Me 4,' and more.

What's your favorite film you've seen recently?

School’s out and summer is in! This week on The Score, it’s a show filled with music from movies that are perfect for watching with the whole family. From classics such as 'Up,' to contemporary streaming films like 'The Magician’s Elephant,' and new favorites like 'Spiderman: Across the Spider-Verse,' host Edmund Stone has your ticket to summer fun.

This week, host Edmund Stone continues his survey of movies that swept the awards competitions and their worthy competitors. Enjoy music from more monumental matchups, including 'Ben Hur' vs 'North by Northwest' (1959), 'Terms of Endearment' vs 'The Right Stuff' (1982), 'Titanic' vs 'Contact' (1997), and more.

Sometimes a movie is so popular or powerful that it sweeps through the awards competitions like a tidal wave. This week, host Edmund Stone presents music from these winner-take-all films and from some of their worthy contenders. Some of these match ups include: 'Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring' vs. 'Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl,' 'Forest Gump' vs. 'The Shawshank Redemption,' and the phenomena of “Barbenheimer” with 'Oppenheimer' and 'Barbie', and more.

You don't want to miss this!

'Despicable Me 4' (2024)
A Movie Review by Edmund Stone

Full and fair disclosure: I like those little Minions and I would go see ‘Despicable Me 4’ regardless. But as an accredited film reviewer, I can’t let personal biases get (too much) in the way. Therefore, when I went to see the new Minions-and-Gru mash-up, I brought a secret weapon with me - a 14-year-old nephew who grew up on the films. As it’s been a while since I was that age, he would be my litmus test. Are these gibberish-speaking, adorably inept guys still fun? Is Gru the Super-Bad-turned-Super-Dad still super?

The plot picks up where the last Minions movie left off… sort of. Gru and his wife Lucy are agents with the Anti-Villain League, or in Minion Speak, the AVL. Their trio of adopted girls haven’t aged a bit and are just as adorable as they were in 2010 in the first of the franchise. This time, there’s a new member of the family, Gru, Jr., who seems to love to torture his dad.

New bad guy Maxime Le Mal, a cockroach-obsessed alumnus at the exclusive villains-only high school he and Gru attended, has a personal vendetta against our favorite former evil mastermind and plans to kill Gru’s son to get back at him. The AVL puts the whole family into the Witness Protection Plan and ships them off to a safe house in an obnoxiously snooty small town. Let’s just say that they don’t blend in so well and that gives rise to some of the best sight gags I’ve seen in movies for a long time. Enter the next challenge - Poppy, the pre-teen girl next door who happens to be a wanna-be villain. She immediately identifies the undercover Gru and blackmails him into helping her pull off a heist by kidnapping Gru Jr. It’s a bit of a Minion-tinted mid-life crisis.

About those Minions… the whole collective work at the Anti Villain League where a mad scientist decides to experiment on some of them to turn them into Super Minions (think the Fantastic Four with blue overalls and utterly unable to control their superpowers). It’s a send-up that every superhero movie deserves. The multiple sub-plots converge at Maxime and Gru’s old high school.

Steve Carrel and Kirsten Wigg are back as the voices of Gru and Lucy. Will Farrell imbues Maxime Le Mal with voice and character, and Joey King is Poppy. Pierre Coffin is, as usual, the voice of all the Minions. Regular ‘Minions’ and ‘Despicable Me’ composer Heitor Pereira hits every right note with this romp.

‘Despicable Me 4’ has everything we’ve come to expect, and both my nephew and I were laughing - often at different things - the whole time. The film is packed with one-liners, wonderfully fanciful gadgets and a Bollywood-esque dance scene at the end which my 14-year-old companion said earned the movie “an eleven out of ten”. I thought it was a whole lot of fun and is likely to be one of the summer’s movie highlights. Universal’s Illumination artists have once again done what every Hollywood studio dreams of - they’ve kept the franchise fresh and yet familiar, and most importantly, fun.

Bright and beautiful, big and bold. This week, host Edmund Stone celebrates the birth of this country with music from films that make you feel proud to be an American. Enjoy sounds from 'Lincoln,' 'Born on the Fourth of July,' 'Remember the Titans,' and more.

This week on The Score, host Edmund Stone shares an exclusive interview with composer David Newman, a member of one of the royal families of film composition, which includes his father Alfred, brother Thomas, sister Maria, and cousin Randy). David shares music from some of his favorite scores including 'Galaxy Quest,' 'Ice Age,' 'Anastasia,' and more.

Archeologists try to piece together who we were - and therefore who we are - through fragments from the past. This week, host Edmund Stone digs into archeology with music from 'Lost City of Zed,' 'Raiders of the Lost Ark,' 'Tomb Raider,' and more. Plus, something a bit more down-to-earth: an exclusive conversation with Sir Tony Robinson of 'Time Team.'

The Score fans in Portland, OR are in for a special treat this weekend: extended three-hour editions during All Classical Radio's June Fundraiser! Join host Edmund Stone and special guest All Classical Radio Host John Pitman on Saturday and Sunday at 2:00 PM PT at 89.9 FM or from anywhere in the world at allclassical.org.

Join us in harmony, as we celebrate National Best Friend Day and Teamwork on Saturday. Enjoy music from movies like 'The Avengers,' 'Guardians of the Galaxy,' 'Top Gun: Maverick,' and so much more.

Occasionally frightening, but always beautiful, bugs are the superheroes of our ecosystem. This week listeners outside of Portland, OR are invited to a musical picnic with sounds from movies about all kinds of these critters. Host Edmund Stone will be joined by the brave butterflies of 'Butterfly’s Tale,' 28th century cockroaches from 'Wall-E' and, of course, the ants from 'Antz'. It’s a summer soundtrack guaranteed to get you buzzin', cousin.

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Mark Twain once said, "Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter."

This week on The Score, settle in for music from movies where older people discover a new lease on life, including 'The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel,' 'Cocoon,' 'Calendar Girls,' 'Up,' and more.

Get away from the urban jungle for a while this week with a mood-enhancing virtual visit to the Farmer’s Market on The Score. Former farm boy and your host, Edmund Stone, brings you a basket full of music from films about farms including 'Babe,' 'Shaun the Sheep Movie,' 'Food Inc.' and more.

"See" you this weekend for The Score.

Step into a magical realm as host Edmund Stone ventures into the mystical Land of Fairies. Enjoy music from films that feature these ethereal beings, from 'A Midsummer Night’s Dream,' to 'A.I.: Artificial Intelligence,' 'Maleficient,' and a double dose of Fairy Godmothers in 'Shrek 2' and 'Cinderella.'

Join us for faith, trust, and pixie dust this week on The Score.

Composer Ryuichi Sakamoto wrote his first film score in 1983. His final music for film appeared 40 years later in 2023, the same year he passed. This week on The Score, guest host All Classical Radio Host Warren Black presents a look back at Sakamoto’s four decades of music for moving images, including big-budget films like 'The Last Emperor' and 'The Revenant,' as well his scores for television and anime.

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Join us this week for The Score's first-ever episode celebrating Mexican composers in honor of Cinco de Mayo. Host Edmund Stone shares a fiesta of music as we observe an annual event that is a relatively minor holiday in Mexico, but has evolved into a boisterous commemoration of Mexican culture and heritage in other parts of the world.

Enjoy music from 'Coco,' 'The Mask of Zorro,' 'McFarland USA,' and more.

This week on The Score, host Edmund Stone celebrates the few multi-talented directors who compose their own scores - and sometimes also direct, act, write the script, and more. Enjoy music from some of these multi-faceted creatives, including Clint Eastwood, Charlie Chaplin, Julie Taymor, Michael Giacchino, and more.

See you this weekend for The Score!

This week, host Edmund Stone brings you another sparkling selection of music from movies that showcase hope and optimism in its many forms. Enjoy some feel-good music, from giving inspiration and kindness every day with 'A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood,' to extraordinary inner strength in 'Apollo 13,' Love at Last with 'As Good As It Gets,' and more.

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This week, host Edmund Stone brings you the first of two bouquets of uplifting, inspirational films. Enjoy music from movies that capture the many aspects of hope including 'The Martian,' 'Mr. Holland’s Opus,' 'Miracle,' and more.

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This week, you’re in for some more April foolery with film spoofs, movies that are parodies - and a lot of fun. Host Edmund Stone shares music from parodies of genres as disparate as westerns ('A Million Ways to Die in the West'), horror ('Scary Movie'), science fiction ('Galaxy Quest'), and more.

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There’s nothing quite like family. They can be a source of support… and also a source of frustration. This week on The Score, host Edmund Stone invites you to take a look - and a listen - to uplifting movies about all kinds of families. Enjoy music from 'The Incredibles,' 'Encanto,' 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding,' 'CODA,' and more.

Gather round, this weekend for The Score.

Listeners in Portland, OR and online are in for a treat: a special three hour edition of The Score with Edmund Stone and guest co-host John Pitman, during All Classical Radio's 2024 Spring Fundraiser. Join us at 2:00 PM PT as we go undercover in an epic dual of the spies. Do you prefer Bond...James Bond in the 007 movies – or Ethan Hunt aka Tom Cruise in the Mission Impossible films?

Let us know when you make a gift online at allclassical.org or call 888-899-5722.

Listen at 89.9 FM in Portland or from anywhere at allclassical.org.

This week on The Score, listeners outside of Portland, OR, will hear a celebration of iconic women from fact and fiction. Get inspired by women who transcend barriers and become a symbol of something greater. Enjoy music from 'Harriet,' 'On the Basis of S*x,' 'The Woman King,' 'The Color Purple,' and more.

In Portland, listeners will be treated to special three-hour editions of The Score on Saturday and Sunday at 2:00 PM PT, during All Classical Radio's Spring Fundraiser.

In honor of Saint Patrick's Day, listeners outside of Portland, OR can expect The Score to get a little Irish this week. Join host Edmund Stone for a tribute to the Emerald Isle, with music from films about Ireland and Irish immigrants, including 'The Quiet Man,' 'Far and Away,' 'Waking Ned Devine,' and more. It’s a pot of gold full of movie music!

"The Score, All Classical Radio’s nationally syndicated program that celebrates film music with inspiring and informative one-hour shows, is having a moment. Now on the cusp of its 18th year, weekly episodes of The Score are carried by 60 stations and reach an estimated 1 million listeners... With such an expansive audience, this distinctive show about music in the movies may be the most popular radio show ever produced in Portland."

Keep reading at The Oregonian: https://www.oregonlive.com/entertainment/2024/02/this-nationally-syndicated-portland-radio-show-celebrates-music-of-the-movies.html

Wanting to know our own future is a basic human trait. Today we often look to science but for thousands of years people wanting a glimpse into the future turned to soothsayers and prophets.

This week on The Score, host Edmund Stone shares music from movies about prophesy and destiny including 'The Tragedy of Macbeth,' 'Dune,' 'Alice in Wonderland,' and many more. "See" you then!

'Dune: Part Two' (2024)
A movie review by Edmund Stone

Every decade or so a movie comes out that sets a new standard and invokes a description vocabulary that, if it were not true, would sound like a pod of marketing gurus on caffeine overdrive.

'Dune: Part Two' is one of those.

The word “blockbuster” seems pale. “Stunning” seems tepid. Dune: Part Two raises the bar for visual effects, photography, music and true-to-the-novel basis that movie-goers will put this film in the same category as the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Denis Villeneuve has crafted an experience that is a grand spectacle. The director wisely chose not to condense the intricate and powerful story into one movie. Spreading it over two films and five hours allowed him to dive into the cultures and lore that have made the 1965 novel by Frank Herbert so beloved by audiences around the world.

The acting is absolutely top notch, with the returning characters developing as rich as fans of the cult favorite novel may have imagined turning the pages of the book long ago. Under director Villeneuve’s guidance, the movie creates images that are intense, massive, and gloriously filmed. The landscapes of the arid dessert world of Arrakis and the Harkonnen world under a black sun contrast sharply, and are flawlessly aligned with the characters. The music by Hans Zimmer, no stranger to blockbusters or soundtrack enthusiasts, continues his earlier Dune score, embellishing it with dimensions of the cultures and shades of oppression and victory.

For those who do not know the story, Dune is more than a “chosen one” tale, it is allegory, warning, fervor, fear and hope made spectacle. Following immediately on the heels of the first Dune creation from 2021, we now see virtually all of the members of the noble House of Atreides slaughtered in the intergalactic war that is stealthily manipulated over tens of thousands of years by the Bene Gesserit - and this film brings together the Twelve Houses, the mysterious and machiavellian Bene Gesserit and their millennia of plotting to a head as the great Holy War begins. The language of the Fremen is brilliantly crafted and used to great effect, adding yet another layer of depth. The fight scenes are superlatively executed, the best I have yet seen in any film.

Timothée Chalamet expands his character ark, morphing from the uncertain young Paul Atreides that we saw in the first film into a confident, if unwilling, leader as he takes the Fremen name Muad’Dib and the private name of Usul. His character is conflicted, bold and utterly believable.

Rebecca Ferguson portrays Lady Jessica who is pregnant with her murdered husband’s second child. When she drinks the Water of Life and becomes a Reverend Mother of the Bene Gesserit order, the unborn Alia’s mind awakens with the memories and the foresight of the Sisterhood. Zendaya gives a marvelously understated performance as the warrior Chani who falls in love with Paul. Josh Brolin makes a welcome return as Paul’s old arms master, Gurney Halleck and Javier Bardem pours equal shares of zealousness and wisdom as the Fremen leader Stilgar.

The Harkonnens are played to a delicious, disgusting viciousness. Austin Butler imbues Fayed Rautha with such psychotic venom that he commands the screen when he appears. Stellan Skarsgård is the sadistic Barron Harkonnen, loathsome to the core. Dave Bautista is “Beast” Rabban, the hulking enforcer and nephew of the Baron who is tasked with securing the Baron’s empire by any means necessary. He earns his sobriquet.

For fans of the Frank Herbert books, this is a glorious retelling, made perhaps even richer by the photography, choreography and attention to detail of the film. It completes and honors the first Dune book. For those unfamiliar with the layered lore of the worlds of Dune and the many Houses and Fremen peoples, it might feel a bit esoteric. It definitely leaves you feeling there is much more to come. If Dune: Part Two performs as well as I believe it will, then Dune Messiah, it’s script already under way, will close the circle in a way that is sure to put the Dune series in the intergalactic realms of those rare films that define the industry for decades.

It’s Hollywood’s biggest night and this week host Edmund Stone is rolling out the red carpet for a show featuring music from all five films nominated for an Oscar in the category of Best Original Score.

Will the winner be Laura Karpman for 'American Fiction,' Jerskin Hendrix for 'Poor Things,' the late Robbie Robertson for 'Killers of the Flower Moon,' John Williams for 'Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny,' or Ludwig Goransson for 'Oppenheimer?' Edmund surveys the nominees and makes his annual prediction.

Who do you want to win? Let us know in the comments, and then join us this weekend for The Score.

Awards season is upon us once again. But amid all the glitter, glamorous parties, and paparazzi, there is an oasis of inconsequential fun: The Edmunds!

These are the film awards we WISH they would hand out, with categories including Worst Monster Makeup, Best Maniacal Laugh, and Absolutely Awful Movie Sequels. Plus, join us for music from 'Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,' 'The Nutty Professor,' and much more.

"See" you on the red carpet this weekend!

This week on The Score, enjoy host Edmund Stone's sparkling conversation with award-winning composer James Newton Howard, who has created some of the most original film scores in history. They cover his work with M. Night Shyamalan (including scores for 'The Sixth Sense,' 'Unbreakable,' and 'The Village'), as well as scores for 'Maleficent' and 'The Hunger Games: Songs and Snakes,' and more.

See you this weekend for The Score!

Hollywood thrives on drama and romance on screen, but sometimes there's love off-screen, too. This week, host Edmund Stone takes us behind the curtain, sharing music from movies with stars who are/were couples in real life, like Humphrey Bogart and Loren Bacall in 'Key Largo,' Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie in 'Mr. and Mrs. Smith,' and Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson in 'Sleepless in Seattle,' plus a few more.

Love is in the air this weekend on The Score! ❤️