oierem

Chen G. · Monday at 01:05 PM

1 hour ago, Chen G. said:

Eh. All the Indy films are kind of aware of their own ridiculousness: not the degenerate Marvel sense, Lor forbid, but still. I like the more comedic touch of The Last Crusade the best.

It does. I still have trouble disentangling how much of that is Lucas' personal life and how much of that is his, by then, belief that the second film should feel more intense than the first. The timeframe of Lucas' marriage coming undone and the earliest sketched ideas for Temple of Death (as it was initially called) is a little elusive, although for the moment I'm happy to defer to Brian Jay Jones' spectacular biography, which presented them as a one-two punch.

Having said that, the fact that some conceptual elements like the "all that glitters is not gold" aspect of both Pankot Palace and Cloud City are mirrored between the two films, alongside comments made by both Lucas and Spielberg, suggest that the autobigraphical motive is certainly not the only factor at play there.

The earliest story ideas for Temple of Doom are from fall 1981/early 1982, when Lucas had just adopted a baby and was in a "happy" moment of his marriage, as far as we know.

The story conferences were held in April 1982. Lucas wrote the treatment in May 1982. The first draft was delivered in August 1982.

Marcia Lucas asked for the divorce around summer 1982, I believe. It wasn't officially announced until June 1983.

So yeah, I don't believe the basic elements from Temple of Doom come from Lucas' personal crisis.

bollemanneke · April 11

Philosopher's Stone was the first OST album I owned. At that time, I only had the 1997 SW set and the TPM UE, so I assumed that a soundtrack album always included the complete soundtrack.

I had seen the film and the Diagon Alley/Great Hall music was one of my favourite pieces... and I just couldn't believe it wasn't on the set. That was my first encounter with the frustrating nature of the OST albums.

April 6

6 hours ago, Jay said:

I don't even remember having any conversations about the name, but the film version is actually different from what's on the LLL set.

The LLL set debuts Williams intentions for this pick-up take, which was to start isolated but then be mixed over the original cue's pizzacato section.

In the final film dub, they muted the pizzacato strings,letting the pick-up take play clean during that part.

So I guess technically calling it an alternate makes sense.

Which means, the actual film version is missing!!!

Jokes aside, this is a great set, one of the best ever for sure, both for the awesome music and the presentation.

I do wonder, though, why do so many of you think that the original Banning Back Home is so superior? Not counting the free improv section (which is really fun) I don't really see any objective reason to call it superior to the revised version.

Brando · April 1

3 hours ago, Brando said:

So the insert ends at roughly the 2.5ish second mark?

Yes. The insert includes both the new music and part of the original cue in a shortened form, until it fades back into the ending of the original cue.

March 31

On 26/03/2024 at 8:42 PM, Jay said:

I'm afraid I don't understand what you are saying.

The OST album track The Neverfeast contains the cue Cornucopia followed by the cue Cutting The Coconut.

The LLL track The Neverfeast (Film Version) contains the cue Cornucopia with an Insert inserted, followed by the cue Cutting The Coconut.

Does that clear things up?

Do you know the exact ending point of the Insert? I always thought that it ended when it segues into the original cue material, but now I'm not sure, because I realize the original cue is shortened (I always thought it was a film edit).

February 8

19 minutes ago, Richard Penna said:

I was trying to be diplomatic using the term 'understand'. In the context of the Hook score, I don't think it fits the listening experience at all. It's more mystifying because there are other examples of Williams leaving certain cues off an album because he wants to maintain a certain mood for the album (for example, leaving the TV cue off The Terminal perhaps because it's otherwise a happy album).

I wonder whether it's Williams enjoying writing a jazz piece and deciding he wants it on the album, despite not really fitting stylistically.

As Jay put it, it fits in the sense that it contrast with the orchestral score that comes later. It's a gradual introduction to the world of magic.

In fact, removing the Prologue track from the beginning of the soundtrack creates a better listening experience, in my opinion, as it's such a spoilery track.

Brando · February 7

1 hour ago, Jay said:

I think the point of it is to set the opening Los Angeles sequence apart from the rest of the film.

The early LA scenes have their own musical identity, just the diagetic piano at the school play, and then Banning Back Home for the montage of everything else that happens. Once they get to London - a "magical place", the actual score properly kicks in with the Childhood theme as Wendy is seen at the top of the stairs.

Yes.

Furthermore, in the London scenes, there is no music whenever the scene deals with the "real word". The music is used for when the "magic" creeps into the scenes (Wendy's first appearance, the haunted nursery scene, Wendy telling her story...) and is interrupted when Peter breaks the magic (when he closes the window for example).

Once we get to Neverland, the film is scored pretty much wall-to-wall (although some sections were ultimately unused).

It's an interesting way of scoring the film, similar to the first Harry Potter films. No music when there's no magic.

January 21

I find TLJ to be the weakest SW score, or at least, the one that I'm least interested in. Despite its great moments, thematically is lacking and relying heavily on reused music.

ROS has stronger new themes and some good developments or previous themes (Ben, Rey). The result is quite stronger, in my opinion.

TFA is the best of the trilogy, without a doubt. Much less dependent of previous scores, with awesome new themes, it has a strong and coherent narrative.

But all three prequel scores are way above any of those three in every possible way.

Jay · January 8

10 hours ago, Schilkeman said:

I love Crusade, but I think it is second to Raiders, if only because the structure of it is rather dull. It feels like a long string of chase scenes, not unlike Raiders, but not as well done. It’s the father/son stuff that sells the movie. Connery and Ford are a lot of fun to watch, and the writing has heart.

The structure of Crusade is, at least on paper, perfectly balanced.

Each 20-minute segment has a beginning, middle and a chase at the end.

Part 1: Double prologue.

Part 2: Venice and the boat chase.

Part 3: Nazi castle and the motocycle chase.

Part 4: Berlin and the aereal chase.

Part 5: Desert and the tank chase.

Part 6: Emotional climax.

It's way more "perfect" than any of the other two films.

Which is why it feels almost "too" neat.

January 5

13 hours ago, Jay said:

May I also humbly recommend trying the original, first version of Banning Back Home to be what's in your new main playlist instead of the revised film version? I personally find it to be a superior composition and performance, and it's really what John Williams always intended, until the revision was done at the VERY last minute purely because Spielberg carved a minute out of the sequence.

We actually discussed having that original version be the one in the main program, but the CD length limitations were so tight, they couldn't be swapped!

It's a good recommendation, but I don't agree with the idea. Even though the first Banning Back Home is great, and maybe even superior, my criteria for what's in the main playlist is to always follow the actual film score.

"What Williams always intended" would include the original Never Feast, Ultimate War, or The Flight to Neverland. Or The Departure from E.T. without "Steven's fix". Or the original Binary Sunset.

The final film score is always a result of the collaboration between composer and director.

Jay · January 4

Having listened to all 3 Discs as presented (in three consecutive evenings), I've changed the placement of a few tracks, and I've just listened to the complete film score (without all the extras) for the second time, from beginning to end. It's now impossible to listen to all the themes without thinking about the lyrics, which creates a very different listening experience indeed!

I've made three small changes:

-I've removed the prologue (it's a musical spoiler and it's not part of the film score, so I've moved the first track to the very end of the additional music section.)

-I've incorporated both non-Williams source cues to the main score presentation. (I always include the source music if it's composed or arranged by Williams. For me, it's part of the score, the same way When You're Alone or the Pirate Town music is).

-I've swaped the Lost Boy Chase tracks, to include the film version on the main programme.

Awesome set and awesome score.

December 30, 2023

I've listened to the first two discs (planning to listen to Disc 3 tonight) - and I'm reading the liner notes for each CD after the first listen.

As everyone else has said, magnificent release of one of the best soundtracks ever.

Couple of comments/nitpicks.

The liner notes (which are awesome) say that both versions of Banning Back Home are longer than the actual scene in the film. That's not correct, is it? The film version is featured without edits in the final film, as far as I know. (The album version, which I always liked less than the film version, is FANTASTIC in its extended form! Great solos!)

Thinking about how to create my own playlist while keeping the Film Presentation & Musical Album concept, I'm thinking that the five additional tracks at the end of Disc 2 could be incorporated into the Disc 3 program, right? I'm assuming the only reason they are not there is because lack of space, but I think it would be a more logical place. After all, Disc 3 contains a lot of alternates, so the "Additional Music" belongs there, I think.

JTN · December 26, 2023

Jane Eyre and The Force Awakens, I would say.

I don't think TLJ and ROS are great as a whole (though they have great highlights of course).

The Post and The Fabelmans are too small to be considered great (although I love the simplicity and the beauty of the two themes from the Fablemans).

And Indy 5 has great themes, but is a very uneven score because of the copy-pasting.

Brando · December 10, 2023

9 hours ago, Jay said:

John Williams wanted it that way.

It's fascinating that Williams actually remembers and/or cares about such small details.

That being said, I will probably switch those cues, as I prefer to have the actual film verion on the main program.

November 29, 2023

The lenght of track 12 is wrong, if I'm not mistaken.

Yavar Moradi · November 28, 2023

17 minutes ago, Brónach said:

yeah

to me, The Lost World score starts with The Island's Voice. (which it does). I can see the argument against that, but my sensibilities also prevent me from things such as "play the Raider's march at the beginning of Raiders instead of the mysterious jungle opening" and it's the same logic that makes E.T. start with weird sounds instead of a musical spoiler (i see you reedited version of the movie).

I agree with that. I don't like to "spoil" the score by placing the final/concert/end-credits version of the main theme at the beginning.

That being said, what's your opinion about the "Prologue" from Hook? In a way, it's a spoilery track, and it doesn't belong to the opening of the film. On the other hand, it was composed for the teaser, and the beginning is just magical. So I don't know about my playlist yet.

Will · November 28, 2023

31 minutes ago, Arpy said:

I can't tell you how my heart sunk when I heard all these other cues ripped from other scores, but the more I think over it, the more likely I think it wasn't Williams' choice; it's the editor and Mangold going through Williams' past scores and going 'right, this fits here perfectly and that's that'.

Yes, but that's still baffling because it's not tracked music. It's newly recorded. Which means, once Williams / Ross is given the tempt-track, he goes through the old scores, searching for those couple of bars that the editor has chosen, which don't fit musically with anything before or after, and just copy-paste them, with slight and seemingly-random differences ("let's just add a cymbal crash for the sake of it"). The result is something almost impossible to conduct, or even play, and yet they do it. Why? Isn't is easier just to track music?

Again, if those copy-pasted cues came from a single source, that would be more logical. A good example is the "Cornish Pixies" music from Chamber of Secrets. It's a copy-paste/expansion on a cue from PS. But it's musically coherent, and it works well. It's based on an existing cue, but it's adapted to the new scene. Ok, fine.

But a cue made up of dozens of previous cues, randomly chosen, and often just a couple of bars... I don't know, I can't imagine why they bother, because it's too complicated and the result is just not good.

November 27, 2023

29 minutes ago, QuartalHarmony said:

Since there isn't room on this for an OST remaster (a la the recent JP and Superman releases) without going to a fourth disc, is it going to be possible to make a playlist from this new set to recreate the OST?

Some of the combined cues are split up (Granny Wendy, Hook-napped, and The Face of Pan).

By the way, what happened to Banning Back Home album verion? This set seems to have the film version and a significantly longer alternative....

Falstaft · November 27, 2023

Having listened to the full Isolated Score, I still find some of the copy-pasted sections hard to listen to on their own: they sound jarring, and unnatural (I don't know how Williams was able to conduct some of these), and I find myself trying to identify every small segment before it jumps to another.

I'm OK with taking an idea from a previous score and expanding it (Spiders from MR or The Duel from Tintin). I can even accept taking a big chunk from a previous score and copy-pasting it (Belly of the Steal Beast or On The Tank). But I just can't stand the almost-random usage of a couple of bars from a previous score pasted together with another couple of bars from another score (and on and on)... It doesn't sound good, it doesn't sound musical.

On the other hand, the score is wonderful in many other areas: the variations on Helena's theme, the new Nazi themes and, particularly, the Dial and Archimides themes are lovely, exotic and unique.

It's definitely a mixed bag, this one.

Yavar Moradi · November 18, 2023

18 minutes ago, Edmilson said:

I love how some JW fans think: "if it is quoting an older score, then it was probably done by William Ross".

Almost every composer in Hollywood likes to borrow from him/herself sometimes (or a lot of times if we're talking about James Horner), and that includes Williams.

It's not like he went: "Hmm, not sure how I would score this scene... I'll take a look on my sheets from Jurassic Park or Attack of the Clones or whatever, maybe it'll give me some ideas!". I'm not even sure if it is a conscious thing. Perhaps it's just the way his brain works. Some motifs are probably so ingrained into his mindset that he just re-uses them.

That's one thing. But many of the cues of DoD are not just that. They literally copy/paste bars from previous scores, lifting and juxtaposing cues that have nothing in common, in a rather unnatural way, I might add. It's more than concious: it's the equivalent of parts of Chamber of Secrets being copy/pasted from the previous score.

August 31, 2023

5 hours ago, Signals said:

Isn't there some cues on the AOTC OST that also does this?

Yes, "Love Pledge and The Arena" has a manufactured ending using the end of "Arrival at Kamino".

ThePenitentMan1 · August 29, 2023

1 hour ago, Chen G. said:

I was thinking this. If you really presume to tell the story in music - which I think is perfectly achievable - you can't facilitate that through the playing of concert suites: you have to play film cues.

Agreed. Even if a reworking/combination of different cues would probably be the most effective way to tell the whole story, you could select 3-4 cues from each film to represent the different sections of the story.

For example, if I had to choose a handful of cues from Empire Strikes Back, I would select:

-The Asteroid Chase (which features both the Imperial March and the Love Theme, and reflects the action of the first act of the film)

-Yoda and the Force (which features Luke's theme in minor mode, The Force theme, Yoda's theme and the Imperial March, and represents the more introspective middle act of the film)

-The Clash of Lightsabers (which features a brutal rendition of the Imperial March, an action driven Yoda's theme, the Cloud City March and a dramatic version of the Love Theme, and represents the dramatic third act)

-The Rebel Fleet & End Credits

There you have it: a 19-minute selection of cues representing the story of the film, which feature different variations of the main themes.

Brónach · August 29, 2023

1 hour ago, Fabulin said:

The gates that prevented random Star Wars tracks as heard in the films from being played in concert begin to crack.

And they need to crack a lot more!

I'd much rather hear actual cues from the films than the concert suites (a lot of which have been played to death, and are much more boring -and less "story-driven"- than the actual cues).

At the very least they should play the end credit suites! That way, you'd get most of the themes in one continuous musical piece, which flows much better than 3-minute concert suites!

Martinland · July 13, 2023

Really cool!

My top 5 for each decade:

1970s

Star Wars

Superman - The Movie

Jane Eyre

Jaws

Close Encounters of the Third Kind

1980s

The Empire Strikes Back

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

E.T. the Extra Terrestrial

Return of the Jedi

Raiders of the Lost Ark

1990s

Hook

Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace

Jurassic Park

Schindler's List

Far and Away

2000s

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith

Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

A.I. Artificial Intelligence

2010s

War Horse

The Adventures of Tintin

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

Out of the top 25:

-11 Spielberg films

-8 Star Wars films

-2 Harry Potter films

-3 Indy films

July 7, 2023

Can anyone post a breakdown of the OST? I'm still not sure about the music of some of the cues...

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