Free Republic

The two-time Oscar winner, 61, worked on three James Cameron films, two 'Star Trek' movies and classics like 'A Beautiful Mind,' 'Field of Dreams' and 'Apollo 13.' James Horner, the consummate film composer known for his heart-tugging scores for Field of Dreams, Braveheart and Titanic, for which he won two Academy Awards, died Monday in a plane crash near Santa Barbara. He was 61. His death was confirmed by Sylvia Patrycja, who is identified on Horner's film music page as his assistant.

The pilot of a small aircraft, which is believed to have been registered to famed film composer James Horner, was killed when the plane crashed into a remote area about 60 miles north of Santa Barbara on Monday. It was not immediately clear whether or not the pilot was Horner himself.

This weekend is the twelfth anniversary of the disappearance of the 70-foot, longline swordfish boat, the Andrea Gail, which went down in the last days of October or the first days of November. For the past week, I’ve been watching a rented VCR of The Perfect Storm, the movie version of that disaster, based on Sebastian Junger’s 1997 novel of the same name. Before the movie even begins, you know it’s going to be special. As the Warner Brothers logos appear in turn, and we are told that this is based on a true story, we hear the slow, pensive...