Ennio Morricone, the composer most famous for providing film scores for the likes of 'The Good, The Bad And The Ugly', and 'Cinema Paradiso', is to receive an honorary Oscar when the Academy Of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences holds its annual ceremony on 25 Feb next year.
Morricone, who has composed more than 300 scores during the course of his forty five year career, has received five previous Academy Award nominations - for 1978's 'Days Of Heaven', 1986's 'The Mission', 1987's 'The Untouchables, 1991's 'Bugsy' and 2000's 'Malena' - but never actually won the Oscar, which seems like something of an oversight, really.
Anyway, the Academy are apparently ready to address that oversight with the honorary award recognising "his magnificent and multi-faceted contributions to the art of film music". Academy president Sid Ganis said: "The board was responding not just to the remarkable number of scores that Mr. Morricone has produced, but to the fact that so many of them are beloved and popular masterpieces."