mrbellamy

I went with a 3.5/5 on Letterboxd, part of me wants to go 4 and part of me is at 3, so there it is for now. I'm excited for a spoiler thread cause this movie has stuff to talk about. There are some amazing moments but I found myself waiting for THE moment where it really takes off and soars to the end. There were a couple points where I was like "Ahhh this is it" but then the energy would kinda lose me again. Incredible stuff happens at the end and yet I felt a little deflated when "Directed by Steven Spielberg" came up. My problems kinda boil down to an uninteresting villain and confusion around whether certain story elements were more science or magic. The script is kinda exposition-heavy as well and I never quite fell in love with the characters, but I was always really happy to get back to Emily Blunt and her boyfriend played by Wyatt Russell. His character is the most David Koepp-y but in a good way, it's really fun comic relief that the movie needs. I'm surprised none of the reviews I saw mentioned Russell because my audience loved him. The car chase is a favorite, it's a really really cool sequence that got a few "AHH!" type reactions out of me. And I think from the beginning, anything with Emily Blunt's character and learning more about her is where the movie always piqued my interest and sets up the best John Williams moments. The story definitely goes places, but not in my best 21st century Spielbergs.

There are definitely glimpses in the ads from the third act. Not sure if this has been mentioned but I noticed in the credits, both orchestration and conducting are credited to John Williams, William Ross, and Randy Kerber, the three of them. Definitely seems like he went to Randy Kerber for synth-y effects. I'm gonna try to be vague but this is a really low-key score and kind of a surprisingly low-key movie. I actually am not entirely sure what Spielberg was talking about saying that this moves extremely fast, I found this a pretty slow burn that occasionally spikes with some incident then comes back down. Really takes its sweet time in some good ways but also ways I got kinda impatient with. Williams's score opens up more as it goes along but yeah "listen..." is end credits and it never gets that big in the film. The two pieces from that unofficial YouTube leak are in the movie, though, and definitely film highlights for me. There's a cool cue I noticed when Emily Blunt is driving through a security area, it either had some synth doubling or just some weird orchestration in the melody....I thought it was tuba at first but no, idk what. Also the big car chase from the trailer starts off unscored but then the rest of it has some pretty aggressive John Williams, kinda War of the Worlds-y. Need a better listen to that, I wouldn't call this a scary movie but there's a pretty anxiety-inducing part in that chase that got a reaction out of me. The train sequence is unscored. I wanna listen to the whole finale again too, the music doesn't draw attention to itself but it is Williams running all the way through, there's stuff going on in there. The mysterious theme that played at the premiere and opens the score featurette....I don't think that version is 100% in the movie. It starts the credits but then transitions to "listen..." Unless I spaced out I don't think the melody ever hits the high strings like that in the film or credits. So hopefully it's on the soundtrack. The music for the crop circle shot is correct, yeah. It's hard to really think of a Spielberg movie or score to directly compare this to, I don't agree at all with Arnaud saying it's like Ready Player One. It's kind of like a PG-13 Children of Men. Parts of the movie and score also kinda made me think if Spielberg/Williams did something like Michael Clayton lol, a very muted thriller. Maybe I'm off base with this but it made me think of James Newton Howard or John Powell in that mode. But there also aren't very long stretches without any music, I don't think. I think the score is longer than the album's 64 minutes. Williams starts in the second scene with ominous low strings and brass and he keeps showing up with little things. Some nice oboe and horn solos. He kind of has a scoring strategy in the first act where he'll come in low at the end of a scene and crescendo into the cut to another character. I felt like there was a little much of that lol. I didn't notice potential source cues, and the tracklist seems out of chronological order.

I got a pass to a screening tomorrow night (!!!!!) so I'll try to keep this stuff in mind.

They don't really give lifetime achievement Oscars that much anymore to people who have already won an Oscar, and when they do, it can be kinda hard to parse why them and not others. About 25 years ago they gave Robert Redford and Sidney Poitier the honorary Oscars when both had already won before (though not Redford for acting), and since then I think they've only done it for Hayao Miyazaki, Anne V. Coates, and Mel Brooks. Weird group.

That's what I was thinking, there's any number of TV specials that could have clipped this. I wonder if it's really not possible that you did see the film many years ago and just forgot about it, or it was playing in someone else's house and it's activating a memory. Disney movies are often just hanging around as a kid, could have overheard Peter Pan somewhere. If the gut feeling on Monkey Island is nagging, though, definitely look into that.

Eve Hewson saying Disclosure Day

I think these are more key than the other factors. Odyssey isn't going to underperform at the box-office, it broke AMC yesterday. People went to the theater to stand in actual lines for tickets. But if everyone gets kinda sick of hearing about The Odyssey and it's not an awards frontrunner, the timing might be good for the first Williams win in a few decades to look more appealing to them than a fourth Goransson in one decade. I think Disclosure Day has to at least not be a bomb. It has to have a nice positive sheen to it by the end of the summer and the year, and it has to have made people feel happy and warm inside that Spielberg and John Williams went back to aliens. It does seem to have some potential for Best Picture and Best Actress nominations, not sure about Best Director. All the early reactions have routinely mentioned John Williams, and we're hearing the score peaks at the end and endings matter. I think the press and Spielberg have also done a good job mentioning over and over again that this is the 30th collaboration. They're really hitting it in a way that I felt Disney failed at celebrating Rise of Skywalker being his final Star Wars. They've also successfully framed it as Williams coming out of retirement, even if it's half-true. And not to be crass about it, but having video out there of him looking frail in a wheelchair and still kicking ass conducting might make voters finally feel like he's been taken for granted. I do think, though, that fundamentally they either think he's won even more than he has, or they've been waiting for a score and film that lives up to Jaws, Star Wars, ET, and Schindler's List. And even with all these lovely reviews, we already know Disclosure Day won't be that. But it could be a fair legacy win if they're in the mood for it. If (when) he gets nominated, he'll break his own record as the oldest nominee of all-time, and so attention could be drawn to the sentiment that he'd be a very deserving oldest winner. It seems more justifiable here than The Fabelmans or Dial of Destiny. Universal has The Odyssey too, though, so it might depend on if they think Goransson still has a better chance of winning, the passion for him might still prove too much to resist. But the fact that he's very deliberately not going orchestral might help Williams's case for winning this time, if the Disclosure Day campaign wants to appeal to honoring Hollywood's traditions and institutions, orchestral scoring and Los Angeles musicians, Oscar 99, Spielberg/Williams 30 with a big original sci-fi, and he'd be winning at 95. There'd be a lot wrapped up in it but it has to be viewed as something special, not another John Williams nomination.

If this is AI-generated, I'll jump off a bridge.

This is honestly everything I wanted it to be already

This is getting ridiculous. Am I seriously the only one hearing Cinque's Theme from Amistad?

Episode 8: Why Alexandre Desplat Loves Spielberg/Williams

I really love that shot of Spielberg listening at 0:46, barely containing his excitement. I can see the young Spielberg in there. You can tell that still to this day, all he wants is to listen to a new John Williams score, and he just so happens to be the one person left who can still make it happen. He's the #1 JWFan, the OG.

I just knew he was gonna do something badass with the crop circle shot Feeling very grateful right now. My heart's full, man.

I kinda hear that first statement of the theme in three or four distinct parts which he then reiterates and varies all together and separately. I'm wondering if these will recur in different ways as motifs.

This is kinda flying under the radar but I think it deserves to be acknowledged in this thread amidst all the excitement around John Williams's already beautiful score Spielberg's other longtime collaborator Michael Kahn has not returned for Disclosure Day, as Spielberg quickly notes here. Unknown reasons but I'd imagine retirement. He's still with us at 95, even older than Williams. It marks the end of a legendary run between Close Encounters and The Fabelmans, with ET being the only exception, edited by Carol Littleton. At the time Spielberg entrusted Poltergeist with Kahn's magic hands instead. Sarah Broshar is the heir apparent, who was hired as Kahn's assistant to operate the Avid when he and Spielberg finally threw in the towel with the flatbed and went digital with Tintin. According to interviews I've read, she effectively became his apprentice and she'd been his official co-editor on The Post, Ready Player One, West Side Story, and The Fabelmans. But hats off to Michael Kahn, a truly GOAT career.