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A Soundtrack better than E.T.?


Swordfish392

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Sure - I'll take Raiders of the Lost Ark, Star Wars, or The Empire Strikes Back over it any day, for starters. That's not a knock on E.T. - it's a great score, and yes, the string writing (and performance) is excellent. But it's not my favorite Williams score.

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ET is the greatest work ever by John Williams, hands down, sadly others don't agree

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Am I realy the only guy here who enjoyed it? Even Spielberg called E.T. the best score Wiliams ever made for him.

But opinions are like assholes...

EDIT:

ET is the greatest work ever by John Williams, hands down, sadly others don't agree

:lol:

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Whilst I don't necessarily disagree with Joey, I will say I personally PREFER Star Wars, Raiders and Empire Strikes Back.

Whichever way one looks at it, E.T. remains one of the Greatest Scores Of All Time™.

But opinions are like assholes...

Some stink more than others and usually more than my own.

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Sure - I'll take Raiders of the Lost Ark, Star Wars, or The Empire Strikes Back over it any day, for starters. That's not a knock on E.T. - it's a great score, and yes, the string writing (and performance) is excellent. But it's not my favorite Williams score.

Same here. (And I'd add Schindler's List to the list of scores I prefer over E.T.)

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I'd say the departure is the best ending cue he's written, or at least my favorite by far, given the emotional impact it has on me.

Just playing it in my head gives me chills.

How all the instruments are woven together, strings, french horns, oboe, flute, trumpets ,trombones...is just sheer beauty to my ears.

Now to say the entire score is the best ever, I wouldn't..!

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sadly others don't agree

Yes, it is very sad that some of us obtain even greater satisfaction from other scores. If you'd like to help us out of this pathetic situation, I take donations.

I can't help your mental retardation, I'm an auditor not a physician.

However I can refer you to certain types of income tax deductions.

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ROTLA and Schindler's List over E.T.? Uhh...nope, can't say I'll ever agree with that.

E.T. is on its own level. The only JW scores that come close are Jaws and Star Wars. By many accounts, perhaps Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

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ROTLA and Schindler's List over E.T.? Uhh...nope, can't say I'll ever agree with that.

E.T. is on its own level. The only JW scores that come close are Jaws and Star Wars. By many accounts, perhaps Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

voice of reason here. Schindler's List is the weakest JW Oscar winning score.

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ROTLA and Schindler's List over E.T.? Uhh...nope, can't say I'll ever agree with that.

E.T. is on its own level. The only JW scores that come close are Jaws and Star Wars. By many accounts, perhaps Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

At the very worst, I admire your taste.

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Yes, it is very sad that some of us obtain even greater satisfaction from other scores. If you'd like to help us out of this pathetic situation, I take donations.

I can't help your mental retardation, I'm an auditor not a physician.

However I can refer you to certain types of income tax deductions.

Ah, phooey. Guess I'll just have to continue wallowing in my self-pity. Yessir, it's a hard knock life when you like a score even more than you like E.T.

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ET is certainly good, but it's never been one of my absolute favorites. It gets a lot less playing time than a good portion of my Williams collection, though I just happened to listen to it last night.

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E.T. is an incredible film score, its just that on headphones parts of it can be a tad boring. Nowt wrong with that.

Sometimes people on here confuse quality of film score with musical listenability, which is their problem.

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I don't fall into that extreme, either. I think the first and last sequences are scored with breathtaking brilliance, and I wouldn't call the stuff between unbearably boring. It's just not top-notch as a whole. As an album listening experience, it's too monotonous, despite most individual moments being somewhere between quite good and utterly outstanding. I just need more variety from a score than that.

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I'd say the departure is the best ending cue he's written, or at least my favorite by far, given the emotional impact it has on me.

Just playing it in my head gives me chills.

....

Same here.

Maybe the opening-post was wrong phrased, in fact I don't wanted to start a fucking discusion. I just want some listening tips. Still wondering if there is anything equal or better than the end credits (and as touching as the departure)...

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I don't fall into that extreme, either. I think the first and last sequences are scored with breathtaking brilliance, and I wouldn't call the stuff between unbearably boring. It's just not top-notch as a whole. As an album listening experience, it's too monotonous, despite most individual moments being somewhere between quite good and utterly outstanding. I just need more variety from a score than that.

I will certainly agree that there are some "individual moments" of brilliance throughout. They just aren't long enough and there aren't enough of them. Which is why the suite at the end works so well. It ties all the individually brilliant cues together into one full fantastic piece.

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I'm actually not that big on the end credits. I'd rather have it bring more new stuff to the table - or more new stuff that I like, to be more accurate. I love the intro, but the middle portion seems like just more of the same stuff from the score itself, and then the ending is a bit of a mixed bag. Williams has done much better end credits, IMO.

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You phrased it negatively.

Yeah, when I said "Not to phrase it negatively" I didn't actually mean I was making an effort to not phrase it negatively, I just meant that the goal of my sentence was something other than phrasing it negatively. Sorta like when people say "Not to dampen your spirits, but [something that will obviously dampen their spirits]."

To clarify a bit, I think "Adventures on Earth" is among the greatest cues ever written, and the final moments of it are among the greatest moments every composed. There are other extreme highs, but like others I agree that it does have some moments of boredom that take make it my least favorite of JW's masterpieces (keep in mind, I still think it's a masterpiece). This is also one of the rare cases where I will admit that Williams overscored the film. Just one scene, when E.T. is hiding with the stuffed animals, I think the scene would have been better off without Williams' eerie strings.

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I think the middle of E.T. is pretty underrated. I'm assuming the boring stuff people refer to is the several statements/variations of the friendship theme. But hey, it's lovely, and there's other stuff mixed throughout. "E.T. and Elliot Get Drunk" and "Frogs" are a lot of fun. "The Magic of Halloween" is wonderful. In fact, I need to listen again, because at least parts of other cues are sticking out to me, like the start of "Searching For E.T." I enjoy it all. But then, I'm one of those psychos that enjoys "Secret Doors and Scorpions" and "Oxley's Dilemma," so who am I kidding? :lol:

I can't help your mental retardation, I'm an auditor not a physician.

Dammit, Jim...

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Oh, I agree... I do think E.T is the best film score ever written, and probably ever will be.

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It is a fact that many people prefer E.T. over any other soundtrack ever written, which is undeniable and easily proven.

However, it is not a fact that everybody agrees with this preference, and this is also easily proven.

It is my opinion that E.T. is.......<connection severed>

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I don't fall into that extreme, either. I think the first and last sequences are scored with breathtaking brilliance, and I wouldn't call the stuff between unbearably boring. It's just not top-notch as a whole. As an album listening experience, it's too monotonous, despite most individual moments being somewhere between quite good and utterly outstanding. I just need more variety from a score than that.

I understand you might like something more!

but you really think Raiders is "better"?

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If E.T. is the best soundtrack ever written, it's probably the best soundtrack that I don't listen to as much as I ought to. The lost on Earth music is spectacular, the villain theme is truly creepy, but like the movie itself, the middle chunk of the score does drag a bit. At least for me.

But the score from trick-or-treating through the end credits is a massive musical tour de force that easily rivals anything ever written.

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Isn't E.T. something more of a generation thing? I wonder, does the new generation (who have posters of District 9 hanging on their walls) still relate to the score and film as much as people did in 1982?

Alex

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Isn't that the case with almost every film, and score?

And in pop music, and in TV, and in art... etc...etc...

Of course but true art transcends generations: The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Scorsese's Raging Bull, Van Gogh, Welles' Citizen Kane, ... There is a lot of art that artists still refer to (in interviews and their work). I seldom hear them making references to ET. Sometimes the biggest blockbusters aren't the most lasting ones.

Alex

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Huh, true art polarizes? I'm afraid I don't follow ya.

Something that is universally praised is often not as good as something that divides opinions.

All great art is controversial at first.

Alex

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Schindler's List was very controversial. Here was a powerful movie about one of the most tragic disasters still etched in memory, and certainly worth showing to students for its educational value. Yet the tale was framed in a rated R film with language, nudity, and scenes of great graphic distress, which prevent it from being shown to students. It attracted a lot of controversy in my school district as my eighth grade class petitioned the schoolboard to show it in class, to no avail.

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Schindler's List was very controversial. Here was a powerful movie about one of the most tragic disasters still etched in memory, and certainly worth showing to students for its educational value. Yet the tale was framed in a rated R film with language, nudity, and scenes of great graphic distress, which prevent it from being shown to students. It attracted a lot of controversy in my school district as my eighth grade class petitioned the schoolboard to show it in class, to no avail.

Schindlers List was never controversial, and was almost completely universally praised in 1993.

The question wether it should be shown to young children despite it's violence and nudity illustates that.

Fortunatly, coming from an enlightened country, I did have the opportunity to see it with my school.

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