Golden Globes 2016: Quentin Tarantino pays tribute to his 'favourite composer' Ennio Morricone after win

The 87-year-old Italian claimed Best Original Soundtrack for Tarantino's Western 'The Hateful Eight'

Ennio Morricone was also hailed by the Italian Prime Minister as ‘the pride of Italy’ (AFP/Getty)

At 87 years old, the celebrated Italian composer Ennio Morricone boasts a back catalogue of more than 500 film and television soundtracks. At least a dozen of his scores are widely acknowledged as classics, but until now none of them has ever won an Academy Award. That could change at this year’s Oscars on 28 February, after Morricone’s music for Quentin Tarantino’s Western The Hateful Eight was named Best Original Soundtrack at the Golden Globes on Sunday.


 Quentin Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight was named Best Original Soundtrack 
 (AFP/Getty)

Mr Tarantino first asked Morricone to score his 2009 war film Inglourious Basterds, but the composer declined. He penned a song for Django Unchained, but agreed to write an entire soundtrack only after reading Tarantino’s script for The Hateful Eight, which he described as “a masterpiece”.

The director, who on Sunday accepted the award on his behalf, said Morricone was his favourite composer, adding: “When I say ‘favourite composer’, I don’t mean movie composer... I’m talking about Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert. That’s who I’m talking about.”

Morricone enjoyed a lifelong cinematic partnership with his former schoolmate, director Sergio Leone, who hired him to score the first of his so-called Spaghetti Westerns, A Fistful of Dollars, in 1964. His soundtrack for the last of the Dollars trilogy, The Good, The Bad and the Ugly, is today considered one of the most influential film scores of all time. He has been nominated for five Oscars, but his only win was an honorary lifetime achievement award in 2007. He is one of only two composers ever to be awarded an honorary Oscar by the Academy.

He has enjoyed greater success at the Golden Globes, winning Best Soundtrack prizes for his work on The Mission in 1987, and on the 1998 Italian film The Legend of 1900. He also has five Baftas.

Italy’s Prime Minister Matteo Renzi tweeted on Sunday: “Maestro Morricone, always a certainty. A source of pride for Italy.”