Barry Levinson in the context of "Rain Man"

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⭐ Core Definition: Barry Levinson

Barry Lee Levinson (born April 6, 1942) is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. Levinson won the Academy Award for Best Director for Rain Man (1988). His other best-known works are Diner (1982), The Natural (1984), Good Morning, Vietnam (1987), Bugsy (1991), and Wag the Dog (1997). In 2021, he co-executive produced the Hulu miniseries Dopesick and directed the first two episodes.

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👉 Barry Levinson in the context of Rain Man

Rain Man is a 1988 American road comedy-drama film directed by Barry Levinson and written by Barry Morrow and Ronald Bass. It tells the story of abrasive and selfish wheeler-dealer Charlie Babbitt (Tom Cruise), who discovers that his estranged father has died and bequeathed his multimillion-dollar estate to his other son, Raymond (Dustin Hoffman), an autistic savant of whose existence Charlie was unaware. Morrow created the character of Raymond after meeting real-life savant Kim Peek; his characterization was based on both Peek and Bill Sackter, a good friend of Morrow who was the subject of Bill, an earlier film that Morrow wrote.

Rain Man competed at the 39th Berlin International Film Festival, where it won the highest prize: the Golden Bear. The film was released theatrically by MGM/UA Communications Co. under the United Artists label in the United States on December 16, 1988, to critical and commercial success. Praise was given to Levinson's direction, the performances (particularly Cruise and Hoffman), the screenplay, the musical score, the cinematography, and the film's portrayal of autism. The film grossed $354–$429.4 million on a $25 million budget, becoming the highest-grossing film of 1988, and received a leading eight nominations at the 61st Academy Awards, winning four: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (for Hoffman), and Best Original Screenplay.

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Barry Levinson in the context of John Williams

John Towner Williams (born February 8, 1932) is an American composer and conductor. Over his seven-decade career, he has composed many of the best known scores in film history. His compositional style blends romanticism, impressionism, and atonal music with complex orchestration. Best known for his collaborations with George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, he has received numerous accolades, including 26 Grammy Awards, five Academy Awards, seven BAFTA Awards, three Emmy Awards, and four Golden Globe Awards. With a total of 54 Academy Award nominations, he is the second-most nominated person in the award's history, after Walt Disney. He is also the oldest Academy Award nominee in any category, receiving a nomination at 91 years old.

Williams's early work as a film composer includes None but the Brave (1965), Valley of the Dolls (1967), Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1969), Images and The Cowboys (both 1972), The Long Goodbye (1973) and The Towering Inferno (1974). He has collaborated with Spielberg since The Sugarland Express (1974), composing music for all but five of his feature films. He received five Academy Awards for Best Score/Best Score Adaptation for Fiddler on the Roof (1971); score adaptation of the original music by Jerry Bock), Jaws (1975), Star Wars (1977), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) and Schindler's List (1993). Other memorable collaborations with Spielberg include Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), the Indiana Jones franchise (1981–2023), Hook (1991), Jurassic Park (1993) and its sequel The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), Saving Private Ryan (1998), Catch Me If You Can (2002), War Horse (2011), Lincoln (2012), and The Fabelmans (2022). He also scored Superman (1978) and two of its sequels, the first two Home Alone films (1990–1992), and the first three Harry Potter films (2001–2004). Outside of his long-term collaborations with Spielberg and Lucas, Williams has composed the scores for films directed by William Wyler, Clint Eastwood, Alfred Hitchcock, Brian De Palma, John Badham, George Miller, Oliver Stone, Chris Columbus, Ron Howard, Barry Levinson, John Singleton, Alan Parker, Alfonso Cuarón, and Rob Marshall.

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