[Zaine]

Thought it might be fun, if we name someone who you think is a genius and is still alive. It would be worth saying why you think they are a genius. It can be anyone:

My nomination is John Williams the composer. Just look at some of the films he's being involved in, and Speilberg once said his films wouldn't have been half as successfull without his scores.

Film Scores upto 2005:

* Daddy-O (1958)
* John Goldfarb, Please Come Home! (1965)
* Valley of the Dolls (1967) Oscar nomination
* A Guide for the Married Man (1967)
* Fitzwilly (1967)
* The Reivers (1969) Oscar nomination
* Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1969) Oscar nomination
* Storia di una donna (1970) The only Williams' score written for an Italian movie
* Jane Eyre (1970)
* Fiddler on the Roof (1971) Oscar winner
* Images (1972) Oscar nomination
* The Poseidon Adventure (1972) Oscar nomination
* The Cowboys (1972)
* Cinderella Liberty (1973) Oscar nomination
* The Paper Chase (1973)
* Tom Sawyer (1973) Oscar nomination shared with Robert B. Sherman & Richard M. Sherman
* The Towering Inferno (1974) Oscar nomination
* Jaws (1975) Golden Globe, BAFTA & Oscar winner
* Family Plot (1976)
* Midway (1976)
* The Missouri Breaks (1976)
* Black Sunday (1977)
* Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (1977) Oscar, Golden Globe & BAFTA winner
* Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) Oscar nomination
* The Fury (1978)
* Superman: The Movie (1978) double Grammy & Oscar nomination
* Dracula (1979)
* Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980) double Grammy & Oscar nomination, BAFTA winner
* Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) double Grammy & Oscar nomination
* Monsignor (1982)
* Yes, Giorgio (1982) Oscar nomination
* E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) Golden Globe, Oscar & BAFTA winner
* Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (1983) Oscar nomination
* Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) Oscar nomination
* The River (1984) Oscar nomination
* SpaceCamp (1985)
* Empire of the Sun (1987) Oscar nomination, BAFTA winner
* The Witches of Eastwick (1987) Oscar nomination
* The Accidental Tourist (1988) Oscar nomination
* Born on the Fourth of July (1989) Oscar nomination
* Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) Oscar nomination
* Stanley & Iris (1990)
* Presumed Innocent (1990)
* Home Alone (1990) double Oscar nominations
* Hook (1991) Grammy & Oscar nominations
* JFK (1991) Oscar nomination
* Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (1992)
* Far and Away (1992)
* Jurassic Park (1993)
* Schindler's List (1993) Oscar, Grammy and BAFTA winner
* Nixon (1995) Oscar nomination
* Sabrina (1995) double Oscar nominations
* Sleepers (1996) Oscar nomination
* Seven Years in Tibet (1997)
* Amistad (1997) Grammy & Oscar nominations
* The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)
* Stepmom (1998)
* Saving Private Ryan (1998) Golden Globe, Grammy & Oscar nominations
* Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999) Grammy nomination
* Angela's Ashes (1999) Grammy & Oscar nomination
* The Patriot (2000) Oscar nomination
* A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (2001) Grammy & Oscar nominations
* Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001) double Grammy & Oscar nomination
* Catch Me If You Can (2002) Oscar nomination
* Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones (2002)
* Minority Report (2002)
* Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002) Grammy nomination
* Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004) Grammy & Oscar nominations
* The Terminal (2004)
* Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005) double Grammy nominations
* War of the Worlds (2005) Grammy nomination
* Memoirs of a Geisha (2005) Golden Globe, BAFTA and Grammy winner, Oscar nomination
* Munich (2005) Oscar nomination, Grammy for Best Instrumental Composition

Awards:

John Williams has won a total of five Academy Awards and four Golden Globe Awards. He has been nominated for 45 Academy Awards and holds the record for the most Oscar nominations for a living person, having the same number of nominations as Alfred Newman.

Williams has received two Emmy Awards, seven BAFTAs, twenty Grammy Awards, and has been inducted into the American Classical Music Hall of Fame and the Hollywood Bowl Hall of Fame. In 2004 he received a Kennedy Center Honor. He also won a Classical Brit award in 2005 for his soundtrack work of the previous year.

Williams's richly thematic and highly popular 1977 score to the first Star Wars film was selected in 2005 by the American Film Institute as the greatest American movie score of all time. His scores for Jaws and E.T. also appeared on the list, at #6 and #14, respectively.

Academy Awards:

* Fiddler on the Roof (1971) (Scoring: Adaptation and Original Song Score)
* Jaws (1975) (Original Score)
* Star Wars (1977) (Original Score)
* E.T. (1982) (Original Score)
* Schindler's List (1993) (Original Score)

Grammy awards:

* Jaws (1975) (Best Album of Original Score Written for a Motion Picture)
* Star Wars (1977) (Best Pop Instrumental Performance)
* Main Title from Star Wars (1977) (Best Instrumental Composition)
* Star Wars (1977) (Best Album of Original Score Written for a Motion Picture)
* Theme from Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1978) (Best Instrumental Composition)
* Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1978) (Best Album of Original Score Written for a Motion Picture)
* Main Title Theme from Superman (1979) (Best Instrumental Composition)
* Superman (1979) (Best Album of Original Score Written for a Motion Picture)
* The Empire Strikes Back (1980) (Best Instrumental Composition)
* The Empire Strikes Back (1980) (Best Album of Original Score Written for a Motion Picture)
* Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) (Best Album of Original Score Written for a Motion Picture)
* Flying (Theme from E.T.) (1982) (Best Instrumental Composition)
* E.T. (1982) (Best Album of Original Score Written for a Motion Picture)
* Flying (Theme from E.T.) (1982) (Best Arrangement on an Instrumental Recording)
* Olympic Fanfare and Theme (1984) (Best Instrumental Composition)
* Schindler's List (1993) (Instrumental Composition for a Motion Picture or Television)
* Saving Private Ryan (1998) (Best Instrumental Composition Written for a Motion Picture or for Television)
* Theme from Angela's Ashes (2000) (Best Instrumental Composition)
* Memoirs Of A Geisha (2007) (Best Score Soundtrack Album For Motion Picture, Television Or Other Visual Media)
* A Prayer For Peace (2007) (Best Instrumental Composition)

Golden Globe Awards:

* Jaws (1975) (Best Original Score)
* Star Wars (1977) (Best Original Score)
* E.T. (1982) (Best Original Score)
* Memoirs of a Geisha (2005) (Best Original Score)

Emmy Awards:

* Heidi (1968) (Outstanding Achievement in Musical Composition)
* Jane Eyre (1971) (Outstanding Achievement in Musical Composition)

* VERY IMPRESSIVE C.V!

[John Henry]

I agree. John Williams is the best.

[krish]

Whilst I admire JW for his body of work .... I prefer the styles of John Barry and the late Jerry Goldsmith; I also prefer Howard Shore's admirable scores for the LOTR trilogy, and Hans Zimmer's built up an impressive set of tunes over the years too.

JW's greatest work, is undoubtedly (IMHO) with Star Wars - and was certainly the best thing about the prequel trilogy. I just find the most of his other scores very middle of the road; and a bit too "feel good" for my liking.

I also prefer Bernard Herrmann's Psycho theme to JW's Jaws theme.


As regards the thread's title .....
I would suggest Richard Dawkins

There are only three true genious' alive today IMO.

Stephen Hawking
Bill Gates
Richard Branson

[Jammyb]

Originally Posted by jakal

There are only three true genious' alive today IMO.

Stephen Hawking
Bill Gates
Richard Branson

Apparently Stephen Hawking isn't particularly highly regarded in his field and there are other less famous people who have contributed far more.

Bill Gates stole the work of others and flogged it as his own and Richard Branson started out stealing records and went from there, both obviously impressive business men, but I wouldn't call either a genious.

edit:
This guy has impressed me recently finding out about him:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1199811/

[dannius]

Pele and Shigeru Miyamoto would both qualify for me, for different reasons.

[Seth Gecko]

Originally Posted by jakal

There are only three true genious' alive today IMO.

Stephen Hawking
Bill Gates
Richard Branson

I beg to differ. It took me 15 minutes to find it but I think you can add another one

Why did Superman Return ? SPOILERS

Originally Posted by Seth Gecko

I beg to differ. It took me 15 minutes to find it but I think you can add another one

Why did Superman Return ? SPOILERS

[krish]

Originally Posted by Jammyb

Apparently Stephen Hawking isn't particularly highly regarded in his field and there are other less famous people who have contributed far more.

I believe the fact that he is also religious (Christian) has polarised opinion amongst his peers

Originally Posted by Jammyb

... This guy has impressed me recently finding out about him:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1199811/

... and here he is on the cover of Time Magazine almost 20 years ago (centre left): www.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,19870831,00.html

Originally Posted by Jammyb

Apparently Stephen Hawking isn't particularly highly regarded in his field and there are other less famous people who have contributed far more.

Bill Gates stole the work of others and flogged it as his own and Richard Branson started out stealing records and went from there, both obviously impressive business men, but I wouldn't call either a genious.

edit:
This guy has impressed me recently finding out about him:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1199811/

All the more reason to call them genius IMO!!!!!

[Mep]

good find Seth...........they move among us!!!

[RMCF]

Any time I hear Hawking chat it seems to be about stuff that can't be proved.

Its all double Dutch to 99.9% of the population. So I don't know if he is a genius or not?

Depends how you define genius. Some people say Mozart was a genius but others don't like his work and prefer other composers.

In the sporting world I would say that Maradona would have fallen into the 'genius' category imho. No-one since has been on a par with him (or even close) and he provided me with so many great memories of football.

[shodan]

Originally Posted by RMCF

Any time I hear Hawking chat it seems to be about stuff that can't be proved.

Its all double Dutch to 99.9% of the population. So I don't know if he is a genius or not?

Depends how you define genius. Some people say Mozart was a genius but others don't like his work and prefer other composers.

In the sporting world I would say that Maradona would have fallen into the 'genius' category imho. No-one since has been on a par with him (or even close) and he provided me with so many great memories of football.

Genious? Complete farse more like!!! (I wanted to put a different word in that is like farce but without the f but I didn't want to get in trouble for swearing)...

[Jammyb]

Originally Posted by krish

I believe the fact that he is also religious (Christian) has polarised opinion amongst his peers...

Hmm I'm not sure hawking is. He's either a bad christian or a cagey atheist, or he just doesn't care either way.

Christians are always very keen claim people like einstein (who certainly wasn't) and hawking when it suits them, them right them off when it doesn't.

Hitler wasn't a vegetarian or an atheist, but he was a good painter I read somewhere

[Mep]

oh no!...don't start that again!!

[pixelpixel]

Dave Gorman.

[Alan_W]

Which one?

[Ethics Gradient]

I would be careful not to fall for the propaganda and urban myths surrounding Stephen Hawking - quite a considerable amount of misinformation is spread by neo conservatives about quite a few scientists .... and the nature of humans is that we all secretly want to believe the worst about people .... especially those that were considered smarter, faster, richer than ourselves .... so a considerable number of people actively fall for the rubbish that gets printed.

Stephen Hawkings is an Atheist - Jane Wild who became Mrs Hawkings was a Christian.

A lot of rubbish spread about him relates to the fact that he does mention god serveral times in his more public friendly published material - but this is simply there to point out that he is not trying to disprove god or that his work does so - only that he seeks an explination for things that does not 'require' there to be a god. Unfortunately that seems to have gone way over the heads of some religous types unsurprisingly

[RMCF]

Originally Posted by shodan

Genious? Complete farse more like!!! (I wanted to put a different word in that is like farce but without the f but I didn't want to get in trouble for swearing)...

Well as I said its my opinion. He was the greatest ever footballer in my opinion, so I would consider him a genius.

His off-field antics are different. But as a footballer, a genius!!

[Steven]

In we're talking on sport terms, only one name imo

"A man who views the world the same at fifty as he did at twenty has wasted thirty years of his life."
Muhammad Ali

A great man inside and outside of the ring. Many of his quotes, such as on Vietnam, can still be applied today

[Knyght_byte]

Think i'll have to go with John Williams, the mans a genius through and through.....

Although i think George Lucas needs to go on there too, for Star Wars the idea, not just the films.......for people who only watch the films they might (as much as they like them) find it hard to believe the genius, but when you go deeper in to the Galaxy, it becomes something so much more amazing. On the corny side of things you have the toys. But then you have a huge library of novels and graphic novels, RPG games (as in pencil and dice type) and computer games. Ok Lucas doesnt write/create all of them, but he approves the majority of creations/changes/new ideas that have any effect outside of that particular book/comic/datasheet........and quite frankly, I think its done very well, obviously some of the books are written for younger readers and so an adult might sneer and say its not worthy, but to a child it is.....I've read as far as i know every book set post Episode IV, and i've read a fair number of pre-Episode IV.......and to date i've only found 4 that i struggled through (in the sense that they wernt enjoyable) and 1 that i couldnt finish as it was sadly somewhat dire......otherwise its a fantastic journey, specially the NJO Vong series, wow....a very long journey but so well written given how many authors contributed.....

Originally Posted by LFC_SL

In we're talking on sport terms, only one name imo

"A man who views the world the same at fifty as he did at twenty has wasted thirty years of his life."
Muhammad Ali

A great man inside and outside of the ring. Many of his quotes, such as on Vietnam, can still be applied today

One thing I will always remember about Ali is when he was asked about his refusal to fight in Vietnam. He said: "' aint no Viet Cong ever called me n**gger".

Such a clever man and such a shame that he has paid such a price for his success in the ring.

[Steven]

Going to play advocate here

George Lucas does not deserve to be on the "genius list". I respect the man for what he has achieved and the original trilogy was mildly entertaining when I was young as a pop-corn picture, but no more than that. Crude and whiny characters. Somehow manages to make the clichéd good vs evil plot into suffocating stupidity. People are entitled to enjoy what they like. But the hype 'Star Wars' has achieved, yet escapes the same "over hyped" tag given to 'Titanic' is the mystery here

[njp]

Originally Posted by Jammyb

Apparently Stephen Hawking isn't particularly highly regarded in his field and there are other less famous people who have contributed far more.

I think the problem is his iconic status with the public as a crippled genius, the world's most famous living scientist, and author of bestselling popular science books (even if hardly anyone who buys them actually reads them!). Hence the backlash. My perception is that he is highly regarded in his field; when he makes a pronouncement, his peers listen. That doesn't mean they necessarily agree with him, however - but he is certainly in the front rank of physicists.

Oh, and he's most definitely an atheist!

[pave]

Originally Posted by pixelpixel

Dave Gorman.

Originally Posted by Alan_W

Which one?

[Mylo]

I'd nominate Sean Connery.

Who else has had such a successful acting career whilst using an Edinburgh accent for every single role, no matter what nationality the part required.

Can't think of a serious answer yet

[Knyght_byte]

Originally Posted by LFC_SL

Going to play advocate here

George Lucas does not deserve to be on the "genius list". I respect the man for what he has achieved and the original trilogy was mildly entertaining when I was young as a pop-corn picture, but no more than that. Crude and whiny characters. Somehow manages to make the clichéd good vs evil plot into suffocating stupidity. People are entitled to enjoy what they like. But the hype 'Star Wars' has achieved, yet escapes the same "over hyped" tag given to 'Titanic' is the mystery here

have you read the books though? (forget how many there are now, i think it numbers over 100) or the graphic novels? the old fashioned style RPG games?

whilst he may not have written them, they dont get the go ahead for the storylines without approval from him.....so once you do get in to the SW Galaxy properly, you realise just how massive his creation is......

although admittedly, an author called Timothy Zahn was the one responsible for jumpstarting the novels.....none of the books written in the SWG are as good as his....they really do stand out.........but it was still Lucas who gave the go ahead for the plotlines in the books....

it goes beyond just good and evil, specially in the New Jedi Order series of books (21 iirc plus a couple of ibooks), some of those delved incredibly deep in to where good and evil are not always so black and white.....

so although he isnt responsible for all the content, without him, the content wouldnt have existed in the first place...and a whole legion of fans would be without.....

[unique]

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002239/

i nominate Prince, a real musical genius, but the public probably won't recognise this for some time

oscar winner, grammy winner, golden globe winner, in fact he's probably won at least of every musical award there is in the world. i've been to his studio, where there is a cabinet with the oscar and other statue type awards, and then a huge corridor lined with literally hundreds of gold discs

he's released over 30 albums over 30 years, 100s of singles, covering rock, pop, funk, jazz and classical styles. people such as chaka khan, the bangles, tom jones and sinead o conner have had number 1 hits all over the world with his songs

by 1983 he had minor success with the songs 1999 and little red corvette, but arranged financing and a script for a movie that became purple rain, with a massive selling album that quickly made prince one of the three biggest names in the 80s, along with michael jackson and madonna. however unlike his peers, he wrote, sang, played, produced, in fact what you heard on a prince album is prince and no-one else, almost 99% of his albums are completely created by him rather than a band. he plays over 21 instruments, and with the millions made from the album and movie purple rain he built a $10m studio complex called paisley park where he has well over 500 unreleased fully completed tracks sitting in his vaults, not to mention many fully completed videos for songs that people haven't even heard

his styles emulate many of his musical heros, many of which he ended up recording with, from miles davis to george clinton, and he has performed and jammed live with the likes of james brown and carlos santana

rather than create follow up albums to purple rain that follow the same formula, he changes his sound and style from album to album, thus lead songs from albums like controversy, 1999, purple rain, raspberry beret, kiss, sign o the times, alphabet street, batdance, theives in the temple, gett off, sexy mf, etc sound nothing like each other, yet they are all written recorded and produced by the one man

sure he is weird, but thats the sign of genius. he's the mozart of our era

[unique]

Originally Posted by Mylo

I'd nominate Sean Connery.

Who else has had such a successful acting career whilst using an Edinburgh accent for every single role, no matter what nationality the part required.

Can't think of a serious answer yet

i come from edinburgh, and i don't think he has a morningside accent. i'm sure his russian and irish american accents were spot on

[steptoe]

id go with paul mccartney the beatles music still lives on (maybe john lennon would have as well if he hadnt been shot by a cretin)