MUMBAI: Honorary Academy Award winning film music composer, Ennio Morricone, will compose original music for famous Hollywood director Quentin Tarantino’s new film ‘The Hateful Eight’. Tarantino revealed the news at this year’s San Diego Comic Con (SDCC) recently, during a panel in which seven minutes of the film’s footage was shown to the crowd.

Morricone, who is well known for his compositions in films such as ‘Once Upon a Time in the West’, ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’ and others, will compose his first western-genre film composition in almost 40 years with ‘The Hateful Eight’.

Tarantino has previously used samples of the 86-year old Italian composer’s music in his films ‘Kill Bill’, ‘Death Proof’, ‘Inglourious Basterds’ and ‘Django Unchained’. The 52-year director originally tried to recruit Morricone to score his 2009 film – ‘Inglourious Basterds’. However, the composer was unable to contribute to the World War II-era film because he was already working on Italian director Giuseppe Tornatore’s film ‘Baaria’.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, ‘The Hateful Eight’ would not only be Morricone’s first Western music in over 40 years, but will also be the first Tarantino film to have an Ennio Morricone original score instead of used source music. Morricone is also set to score the upcoming animated feature ‘The Cantervile Ghost’, which is based on the classic story by Oscar Wilde. The film is directed by Kim Burden and features the voice talents of Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie.

‘The Hateful Eight’ is set some years after the Civil War in Wyoming and it revolves around eight westerners who seek refuge in a stagecoach stopover on a mountain pass during a blizzard. The film boasts an ensemble cast of Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Demián Bichir, Bruce Dern, Channing Tatum and many others.

The movie is set for a 70mm-only limited release on Christmas Day and a worldwide release on 8 January.