Bespin

It's not on the same level as 'Memoirs of a Geisha', 'War Horse', Azkaban, 'Indy 4', or some of the Star Wars composed in the 21st century, but it's definitely on par with 'The Book Thief', 'War of the Worlds' and 'Munich'.

I just learned that in one of the original scripts of A New Hope, Obi-Wan was not supposed to die on the Death Star and was to guide Luke in his attack, from the command room alongside Leia. Lucas's wife, suggesting that Obi-Wan served no purpose after his intervention on the Death Star to rescue the princess, would have then suggested to Lucas to kill Obi-Wan. Lucas would have found it to be a good idea, and ultimately Obi-Wan gives exactly the same instructions to Luke during the Death Star Attack, but from beyond, rather than from the command room. Additionally, this reinforced the notion of the "Force" so dear to Lucas. If this is true, allow me to say that this is the kind of feedback that would have been useful to give to Lucas during the writing of the prequels. Many things that didn't work in this trilogy could have been improved this way. But as we know, no one, absolutely no one in Lucas's entourage during the making of the prequels dared to challenge him. With the result that we know. "Yes, George, we will do that. It will work perfectly!" - Rick "Yes man" McCallum

Is it true that a theme of 2 minutes wrote by Zimmer gives enough material for 10 hours of an actual score?

Well, since everyone is just looking at each other and nobody is really stepping in with concrete examples, I'm going to go to the page listing the breakdowns and analyze a few OSTs of the last 2 decades to see what the situation is. The first observation I made concerns the three OSTs of Howard Shore's LOTR trilogy, where I noticed that throughout the film trilogy, there were only 3 or 4 cues on the OSTs that were the cues as recorded, thus without any merge or edit. I found that to be very, very few. I won't extend my analyses to the musical scores since I don't own them. As we know, there are famous examples (for instance, the Star Wars theme) where the edited cue on the OST have become an actual score and is now performed as if it was composed that way. If you have other examples, feel free to mention them here. Oh, I almost forgot, the purpose of this thread is to prove that OSTs, with all the technical means now available to composers and producers, are becoming less and less relevant, thereby giving more value to extended versions.

Another issue with Nicole Kidman is that she continues to be cast in roles as the mother of young children, even though she has reached the age to play more of a young grandmother role.

I really like this series, but honestly, every time there's a close-up of Nicole Kidman's face, I wonder what she did to it. This woman has become a horror, and it's such a shame. In every series she's in, the appearance of her face and her extreme thinness are, for me, an inappropriate distraction.

So, are there composers who are known to use edits frequently in their OSTs while others don't? Is it solely a matter of budget and time? Is the composition of 'Concert Suites' a trend that is fading away?

All of this is simply a matter of personal taste, but as I tried to figure out which works of the 21st century were significant and "major" to me... I first chose the LOTR Trilogy by Howard Shore, then the 3 Harry Potter films by Williams... then, well, the beginning of this 21st century is probably the era of Hans Zimmer too (The Dark Knight, Inception, name your favorite scores here)... but, but, but... also... John Powell and his Dragon trilogy... I think that's major too. Note: BTW I'm curious to know how much of Powell's OSTs contain micro-edited material compared to the originally recorded cues. Is John Powell known for incorporating many micro-edits into his OSTs?

I started the TV series yesterday. I just realized that the series is set thousands of years before the events of LOTR, as Sauron hadn't forged the rings yet. From now on, Mr. Bear's music seems very appropriate, and its praise seems well deserved.

I would like the opinion of experts on the subject of over-editing music in film OSTs now that it's so easy with technical means. I know that editing film music for albums has always been done, but sparingly, with makeshift means, often yielding mediocre results. For instance, in the first Star Wars soundtrack, some tracks were edited and combined, including the theme, but the album still contained many tracks as they were recorded. Today, with technology, we can make dozens of micro-edits in a single cue, which I find somewhat excessive. I would like to know, from your perspective as experts with a better overview of soundtracks released in recent decades, what is your take on this? Are soundtracks where 99% of the tracks are micro-edited becoming obsolete, or are they still relevant? Also, I'm curious to know, around which years there was a decisive turning point (if there was one), or with which soundtrack it became apparent that "Oh, OSTs will never be the same again." Do you have any concrete examples?

I'm completely amazed to discover today that there are only, what... 4 tracks in the OSTs of the trilogy that are exactly the same as the recorded material? All the rest on the OSTs are heavily edited material. That's HUGE. Note: I can't wait for Jay to answer that pretty much all OSTs in this century are now heavily edited.

I don't know if it's because I'm getting older (I'll be 50 next week), if I feel time speeding up, or if I'm noticing that film music is changing, or all of this at once... but anyway, I just realized that among the most significant works of the 21st century, we have Howard Shore's Lord of the Rings trilogy. I think it's unanimous. Note that to this monumental work, I would also add the first 3 Harry Potter films by John Williams. With this in mind, I'm starting to explore the complete scores of Howard Shore for LOTR, as until now I had only devoted myself to listening to the OSTs. I started with the complete recordings set of The Two Towers. It's a fascinating world!

Interesting article where Denis Villeneuve talk about how his roots in Catholic Quebec influenced the way that he wrote and directed the Dune movies. He calls himself a product of the Quiet Revolution and the new film focuses on danger of mixing politics and religion. https://montrealgazette.com/entertainment/movies/growing-up-catholic-in-quebec-shaped-denis-villeneuves-vision-of-dune#:~:text=Villeneuve talks of how his,Quiet Revolution of the 1960s

Have you considered that the missing music might have been composed by someone who "assisted" Elfman, but they simply didn't want to credit ($$$) that person?

I loved that movie, it was very moving by moments: All the Light We Cannot See. And great score too!

I finally watched The Queen's Gambit. Great miniseries and great music!

🤖🚀 L'Umanoide from the Morricone boxset 🌌🔫 "L'Umanoide," released in 1979, is an Italian science fiction film directed by Aldo Lado. The movie falls into the genres of science fiction and adventure. It blends elements of futuristic technology, extraterrestrial encounters, and adventurous storytelling.

@Jon Broxton I wonder how many IFMCA voters helped finance the production of Stromberg's album.

From the way you're speaking, it seems Hook wasn't chosen because John Williams has already won twice. Speaking of this, I don't really see the point of awarding two 'best score' awards to the same score. If Indy is chosen for the best score of the year, why not give the best adventure prize to another score? I'm having trouble understanding the way you proceeded. And on Twitter, Jon Broxton seems to imply that Herrmann's re-recording was chosen because its production required a lot of talent and money. So, was making Hook easy and cheap? What are your selection criteria exactly?

And there goes the fragile reputation of the IMFCA.

A suite from the The Book Thief?

I just learned that the OST of the movie includes some dialogues from the film. Whaaaattt??? Including dialogue on a soundtrack is an unforgivable lapse of taste. It may have been a trend in the last century when, after a film's theatrical release, one only had the chance to watch it again when it aired on television. However, this practice should be abolished. Now, if people want to watch the film, it is available on any platform, and if they want to listen to the music, they should be able to do so without the clutter of dialogue.

John Powell is extremely fortunate to have his scores expanded so 'quickly' after the release of the OSTs.

I watched two "recent" movies in the last few days: 'The Exorcist: Believer' and 'Oppenheimer'. One is a movie made by a pretentious director... and so is the other. That's okay; you don't make movies if you're not a bit pretentious. I'm not a fan of Nolan, whose movies generally need more than one viewing to be fully appreciated. I rarely give him that pleasure. As for Gordon Green, you'll probably never want to watch his movies more than once, except if you want to point out exactly what doesn't work in them. A 21st-century sequel to The Exorcist could have gone in any direction. But everyone would expect it to be really shocking, like the original movie was in 1973. I won't make a list of all the shocking elements of the original movie; watch it. I think the mistake of that sequel was trying not to be as shocking as the first movie. Is American Cinema in 2024 more frivolous about religion than it was in 1973? Maybe. The final edit of 111 minutes of Believer and the way it looks so butchered and uneven (some scenes are too long, some are not enough, and the end is doubtful and rushed) made us think that the original cut would have been too shocking for some eyes and ears. The treatment given to the Actress from the first film, Ellen Burstyn, is disappointing. She enters the Adventure a bit too easily, and her exit is rather rushed. It remains a film that is okay but doesn't deliver what we would have expected. At the end, it's a big disappointment. Now regarding Oppenheimer, I almost wanted to stop the movie in the first 30 minutes, as the editing was schizophrenic. Then the witch hunt began, and it was interesting. It's really an actor-performance movie, and both Murphy and Downey Jr. are fantastic. I was happily surprised to see Josh Hartnett, less so to see Matt Damon (a miscast?). Anyway, on the whole, it was a good movie, but as I said, maybe better on the 2nd and 3rd viewing, but in my case, that will never happen. Boom!

We need that for all kind of researches. And the date have to be added on the left bar too: