STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS - Blu-Ray Thoughts

[Paul MacLean]

Sounds like a good night for me to finally get around to seeing The Hunger Games!

[AndyDursin]

Sounds like a good night for me to finally get around to seeing The Hunger Games!

Or you could see something good instead?? lol

[AndyDursin]

I probably could have strolled in on Friday, bought a ticket, and still managed to get a decent seat, but since I was there yesterday, I figured why risk it? In the multiplex era, the odds of not being able to see a movie drop to about zero if you see a showing before 6:00 PM.

Yeah, exactly. We're going to a 10:00 show Friday night because we have to put Theo down to bed, we don't have a babysitter and my in-laws are going to stay overnight. I don't want to go to a kid-filled matinee on the weekend and the 7 shows are too early for us with Theo needing to eat and do his bedtime routine. So it'll be late, but it also won't be filled the way the earlier shows will be. I assume it won't be sold out, but I didn't want to chance it either so I bought the tickets online. (The only time I got screwed with a sell out was when we tried to see JAWS last summer, dammit). This way we can relax and still get there in plenty of time to get a good seat (I like getting there at least 30 minutes ahead of time, maybe 45). I also called to double check it was going to be in one of the main large auditoriums, which it is (I figured it would be, I just didn't know if they would have 1 showing in a smaller theater along with the 3 big screens the complex has).

With movies on multiple screens nowadays, pretty much the only shows today that are going to be sold out are -- like you said MJ -- are the 7-8 screenings, the ones where teens and adults and families are all there simultaneously comprising the crowd. Unless you live in the middle of a big metropolitan area like L.A. or NYC, and there are specific theaters you want to see a movie at -- those are the places where the tix are a problem.

[Paul MacLean]

Sounds like a good night for me to finally get around to seeing The Hunger Games!

Or you could see something good instead?? lol

I'll bet it's more enjoyable than The Force Awakens!

[AndyDursin]

Sounds like a good night for me to finally get around to seeing The Hunger Games!

Or you could see something good instead?? lol

I'll bet it's more enjoyable than The Force Awakens!

All I know is my friend who read those books hated Mockingjay and found it depressing and the ending unsatisfying as a lot of people did. The movie is apparently faithful to its source, has gotten mostly bad reviews and I fell asleep watching the first part (thanks Harry Potter for splitting these concluding books into separate cinematic parts!!) so I am wagering Star Wars is going to be more entertaining even if its underwhelming. We shall see!

[Paul MacLean]

More session footage...

[DavidBanner]

I agree that Williams has put in additional hours and days working on Abrams' attempt here. No question. But we should also keep in mind that Williams has also been almost exclusively working on this project over that time. The only other show on his plate right now is Spielberg's BFG. And he's been compensated quite well for his time. So yes, it's additional work, but it's not like Williams is in a situation where he's openly unhappy with the situation - unless he's said something I haven't heard about.

I also recall that Lucas' major re-editing of Williams' work on the prequels met with equal unhappiness from fans. I remember reading multiple opinions that the re-edits and transplants of cues had completely ruined what Williams was attempting to do. So in the one case, you have the composer reworking cues (and we don't know how extensive the reworking was) and in the other case, you have the producer/director rebuilding the score arbitrarily by moving the pieces around or by substituting other material. I recall that this was also a huge issue in Jerry Goldsmsith's score for ALIEN - where he was forced to rebuild multiple cues completely, and then watched another 20+ minutes of his score dumped in favor of cues he'd written for Freud.

All that said, what seems to be happening here reflects two major problems with the new attempt. First, they picked a director without the experience or talents to be able to truly handle a project of this size. Imagine this movie in the hands of Alfonso Cuaron or Guillermo del Toro and you'd have a much more assured pair of hands guiding the show. And then, after they'd already committed a near-fatal error, they compounded it by double rushing the release date. They started the project already behind schedule, started shooting months after the time they needed to be on the ground, and then had a major accident on set sideline one of their actors and apparently generate an emergency rewrite. When this kind of thing happened on the original 1977 movie, the release date was adjusted to give them time to finish their work. But this time around, for corporate reasons, the release date was cemented. (And frankly, I haven't heard of a project being this rushed since Star Trek The Motion Picture was shipped to theaters with the film still wet in the cans.)

We can only hope that the actual movie will have a little more to recommend it than we've seen in the previews. If this really is just a reboot/retread of the 1977 movie with a couple of quick twists, I don't know how that really generates enough new business to sustain the massive franchise Disney is hoping from Lucasfilm. Particularly if what I've read here is correct - that Han Solo will meet a brutal death after a quick appearance in the new movie. I'm honestly not sure how fans would take that - its a downer in a major way. And if all fans have to look forward to is sequels from the guy who inflicted the terrible Looper and some other side movies designed to sell more toys, the new franchise may not last long.

I have been asked to attend a DGA screening of the new Abrams' attempt next Wednesday, so I'll look at it then. It's a free screening and I'd at least be able to watch it on a decent screen without having to stand in a line. But I'm not expecting all that much out of it. But you never know, it might be a little better than I'm thinking.

[AndyDursin]

But we should also keep in mind that Williams has also been almost exclusively working on this project over that time. The only other show on his plate right now is Spielberg's BFG.

The reason for that is because he's had to work on Star Wars for all of 2015. He had to drop out of BRIDGE OF SPIES because of it.

So yes, it's additional work, but it's not like Williams is in a situation where he's openly unhappy with the situation - unless he's said something I haven't heard about.

You would seriously expect him to make a public statement if he was? lol. Besides, it's John Williams. You'd never know if he was or wasn't, but at his age, I can't see how it's a positive. And of course he was paid well -- in my mind, that's probably the sole reason he came onboard to score this film. Couldn't have been out of allegiance for the people making it, seeing as Lucas had nothing to do with it. My guess is this will be his last Star Wars score and they'll hand it over to JJ's in-house hack, Michael Giacchino, for future installments, after what Williams endured on this picture. Or he'll write a few themes and let another composer handle the heavy lifting of standing on the podium for weeks on end.

I also recall that Lucas' major re-editing of Williams' work on the prequels met with equal unhappiness from fans. I remember reading multiple opinions that the re-edits and transplants of cues had completely ruined what Williams was attempting to do. So in the one case, you have the composer reworking cues (and we don't know how extensive the reworking was) and in the other case, you have the producer/director rebuilding the score arbitrarily by moving the pieces around or by substituting other material. I recall that this was also a huge issue in Jerry Goldsmsith's score for ALIEN - where he was forced to rebuild multiple cues completely, and then watched another 20+ minutes of his score dumped in favor of cues he'd written for Freud.

Sure, it goes without saying that scores are edited all the time. As Paul wrote, the difference is how many times they hold recording sessions, forcing a composer to write, record, write, edit, and on and on. It's not unusual to hold a group of sessions, come back some time later and revise -- but this isn't the same as that. By all accounts this movie set a record and he's been at it all year long. That's not the same as the other situations you are bringing up, like ALIEN, which happen to composers constantly.

And it couldn't have been the original plan either. He was announced as the composer of BRIDGE OF SPIES and in any normal circumstance he would've had the opportunity to score both pictures in the same year -- even at his age. That they had to bring in Thomas Newman speaks to this no longer being a "normal circumstance."

[DavidBanner]

Of course, there's also the situations of James Horner on ALIENS and Elliot Goldenthal on ALIEN 3, both of which were described by the composers as nightmarish. Horner in particular, due to his cues constantly needing to be rewritten to accommodate re-editing, and due to Cameron and Hurd's abuse during the process. No indication that this was the case here.

Looking at Williams' schedule for the past few years, he's been slowing down and not composing nearly as much as he used to, which is understandable with his age. I wouldn't expect Williams to come out and slam the movie, but he's made his feelings about unhappy situations very clear in the past - for example with the very fast NO for Superman II. (At the time, he made clear that he sat down for a single meeting with Richard Lester and had no interest in working on the movie as a result.) But it's possible he was frustrated by this process with Abrams - I just haven't seen any of the signs other than fans' assumptions. The edits to the prequel scores were fairly extensive, as many fans noted, bemoaning on AOTC how Lucas had removed good pieces from the second score and replaced them with what the fans thought were inappropriate cues from Phantom Menace, etc.

I'm not sure that Lucasfilm will hire an Abrams composer after he departs and presumably returns to television production. More likely, they'll go with someone that Riann Johnson likes - such as Nathan Johnson, who did the score for Looper. One of the stranger things about the new attempted franchise is how they only wanted to have Abrams onboard for the first movie. Not sure if that was a budget thing or whether it was Abrams' idea. Either way, a rushed movie being approved by committee doesn't sound like a particularly interesting night at the movies. An attempted instant franchise for a storyline that doesn't really support it similarly sounds like a waste of time. It's simply a matter of whether Lucasfilm can make it interesting enough for fans to stick around.

If this new movie is simply a re-run of the 1977 film without the creative spark of the original and with an added contractual killing of Han Solo, I can't imagine fans wanting to stick around and pay to see more and more of that material. But I've been wrong on this stuff before.

[AndyDursin]

I wouldn't expect Williams to come out and slam the movie, but he's made his feelings about unhappy situations very clear in the past - for example with the very fast NO for Superman II. (At the time, he made clear that he sat down for a single meeting with Richard Lester and had no interest in working on the movie as a result.)

That's a single instance in a career that has spanned decades -- but he's also not on record with quotes backing up that particular story. I'm pretty sure it's all anecdotal. In fact the only time he's publicly said anything, he claimed in the DVD supplements that he had a scheduling conflict. So there are conflicting stories even there with what you consider to be a "very clear" situation.

That may not have been the case -- others are on record as saying he didn't get along with Lester after one meeting -- but the point is, you can't find him on the record saying negative things about anyone or any project. He's gone out of his way to be diplomatic and if he's had an issue, not one of us would know. He's not like Jerry Goldsmith, who typically talked about his difficulties scoring films and how disappointed he was working with different directors (Ridley Scott on ALIEN and LEGEND), or Horner working with Cameron or Malick, etc.

But it's possible he was frustrated by this process with Abrams - I just haven't seen any of the signs other than fans' assumptions.

What "signs" do you expect to see? Social media posts? An interview where he trashes Abrams? LOL. I don't think we'd ever hear a thing about it, either. The only way in my mind you'd know he's had enough is his disinterest in scoring another one of these films.

As for him being frustrated, ask yourself: do you really think any composer wants to keep going back, over and over again, revising cues for scenes that they've already written one, two, three, four, five, or however multiple times? Or recorded them over and over, throwing out an hour of music already composed in the process?

Nobody wants to do that. I've interviewed plenty of composers -- this is the kind of thing that drives them crazy, and the part of the scoring process that, no matter how used to it they may be, is the least fulfilling by far. By all accounts this tinkering has been going on all year, which is a virtually extraordinary circumstance, and if true, would make this situation even more difficult and frustrating for any composer.

More likely, they'll go with someone that Riann Johnson likes - such as Nathan Johnson, who did the score for Looper

If they didn't hire Abrams' best-friend Giacchino for THIS movie, why would they ever hire a "Director's Pet" with no experience whatsoever scoring this kind of film? More likely it'd be the typical roster of usual suspects who score the major assignments today like Giacchino (seeing as Abrams is still an Executive Producer, apparently) or Desplat (who's already scoring ROGUE ONE and worked with Edwards, but unlike Nathan Johnson, is an established big-studio guy who gets hired to score these kinds of films).

I mean Johnson getting THIS job would be utterly absurd given who he is, what he's scored, and his musical background. Stranger things have happened but Disney controls the shots here, not Johnson (or any director really). This is way bigger than him hiring his cousin to score a movie he'd have no business being involved with otherwise.

[AndyDursin]

Reactions trickling out. Sounds like it's about what we expected: safe, recycles the first STAR WARS, music doesn't have many themes (comparisons to INDY 4 on the FSM board -- oh no). Fans will be initially excited and then start complaining after sitting through it more than once.

Sound about right?

[BobaMike]

Trying to stay away from Star Wars news for fear of spoilers, and I hate to derail this thread, but I never get the Indy 4 score hate. If you've heard the complete boot that leaked a while back, it's much better than the poorly thought out cd release...there ARE themes:the russian theme gets almost no play on the soundtrack, yet it is often heard on the boot, the rest of the opening sequence (the part after the Raiders quotes) is good, as is the expanded jungle chase. Marion's theme is also more prominent.

I also like the that the Call of the Crystal theme is just a reverse of the Ark/God theme from Raiders.

(Granted I did like the Tintin score more than Indy 4. That's Williams' best action music in years.)

[Paul MacLean]

Reactions trickling out. Sounds like it's about what we expected: safe, recycles the first STAR WARS, music doesn't have many themes (comparisons to INDY 4 on the FSM board -- oh no).

My heart sank a bit when I heard that too. From what Thor said, I get the sense this might be better than Crystal Skull tho (I'm hoping anyway!)

I will say that the session footage of Williams recording Force Awakens didn't give me quite the same thrill as when 60 Minutes aired a few seconds of Williams recording "Duel of the Fates" back in '99.

[mkaroly]

Great interview with John Williams on Tavis Smiley tonight on PBS - Williams is still classy after all these years, and spoke with enthusiasm about the movie and his experiences in the sections I was able to watch. Undeniably one of the greatest film score composers to have ever lived IMO, and I am glad I got to grow up listening to his music.

[DavidBanner]

Andy, you and I agree more than it may appear on this matter. Like you, I am extremely skeptical about this movie - for many of the same reasons.

Regarding John Williams, I have always found him to be an extremely gentle and classy person. He's not one to loudly complain to strangers about the things that drove Jerry Goldsmith to distraction. I too recall Williams' interview on the Superman documentary about the Reeve films. He actually states in the interview that he doesn't remember exactly why he didn't do the second film, and that it might have been a scheduling conflict. And that may be what he remembered as of 2006 about a situation some 26 years earlier on a movie he didn't score. Or he may have simply been demonstrating the same politeness he has always shown. But I remember the same accounts we discussed about a meeting happening between Richard Lester and Williams that did not end well. It does seem clear to me that he chose not to be involved in that project, or to make himself unavailable.

If Williams were to have had a horrific experience on the new Abrams Star Wars attempt, or if he were to have been told to re-compose and present cues five times over, I agree that he would not be making public statements about it. He would indeed choose not to work with that group again. But my own experiences in this business over 21 years tell me that it wouldn't be a secret that there was a problem - too many people in the chain would know about the building frustrations. All the way from the orchestra members and recordists in the sessions to the people running between Williams and Abrams, etc. If he was working under unhappy conditions, it would be known to the people there, and there's always one good leak when there's good gossip in this business.

The scenario described sounds very much like the one that went with Star Trek TMP and Jerry Goldsmith, where there was a mad rush to get the movie into production and then into theaters. Goldsmith's repeated sessions for that movie are legendary, including multiple cues that needed to be reconceived, and multiple sessions where Goldsmith and the musicians were literally waiting on the clock for footage. And that was the result of the rushed dates - had they moved the release date back a few months, they could have saved everyone involved a lot of ridiculous overtime and heartache. The same situation appears to have occurred with the Abrams Star Wars attempt. Had they given him the time George Lucas was given with the original Star Wars in 1977, Abrams and Williams would have had time to work out what they were doing in a more organized fashion. Instead, Lucasfilm and Disney have held to a release date built to satisfy a preset schedule of tentpole releases rather than the needs of the movie at hand.

I haven't heard much about the new movie, but what I've seen of the reactions is a bit strange. I would have thought the death of Han Solo would have hit people a little harder. For most fans of the original movies, that would be a depth charge in the middle (or even early stages) of a new movie. But it may just be that the fans simply aren't that moved by Harrison Ford or the character after all these years. I'll know more after next week's screening. I debated going to the screening, but reasoned that it would give me a chance to see what Abrams was up to without needing to actually pay him for the opportunity of seeing what he does for free on network television.