The Rise of Skywalker Star Wars IX The Rise of Skywalker (JJ Abrams 2019)

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,488]

While the Lucasian Star Wars movies have been rightfully compared to soap operas including by the man himself, the last Disney one felt closer to a soap opera or a long-running TV show ending stupidly with a dead villain returning, characters making sudden pivotal decisions to align with one another, more characters coming back from the dead, dream ghost sequence, kissy wissy etc. Also, Rey absorbing all the power of the Jedi or whatever felt like Buffy.

[Chen G. 3,940]

5 hours ago, Bofur01 said:

Nah, it’s definitely prettier than TFA, IMO 

 

"Prettier" and "well-shot" aren't the same thing. The Force Awakens had those wonderfully smooth long-takes that a) made a lot of sense for the first film of a trilogy b) were refreshingly out-of-character for Abrams who usually prefers very frenetic camerawork and c) were just well-done: its like someone put a little Spielberg in my Lucas!

 

The Rise of Skywalker has a bit of that, but nothing that stands out. Its just a well-shot movie (if you don't mind loads of lens flare and rack-focus transitions with anamorphic lenses) and that's all there is to say about its cinematography.

 

1 hour ago, Gruesome Son of a Bitch said:

While the Lucasian Star Wars movies have been rightfully compared to soap operas including by the man himself, the last Disney one felt closer to a soap opera.

 

Lucas was never above retconning even the very nature of the series. There was nothing about the original Star Wars that was soap-opera like, and even in The Empire Strikes Back its only in the fringes.

 

Star Wars is NOT a soap-opera and the soap-opera-like elements that it unfortunately accumulated over time are easily the least compelling aspect of the series. Sadly, The Rise of Skywalker leans into them as hard as possible.

 

1 hour ago, Not Mr. Big said:

TLJ has a more refined color palette/grain structure

 

Umm, DP Steven Yedlin actually used a lot of digital cameras on The Last Jedi, just to show people that they can't actually tell the difference. Judging by your response, he clearly succeeded!

 

On the whole, I do consider The Force Awakens (and, looking back, The Empire Strikes Back) the better shot because the photography never draws too much attention to itself.

[Fabulin 3,506]

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[Chen G. 3,940]

Yes. Soap opera, along with space opera and horse opera (i.e. westerns), is a very derogative term.

 

It really has nothing to do with Star Wars. There’s nothing soapy about the original film.

[Arpy 4,145]

Though, wouldn't you say Lucas and many who would label these films as 'Space Operas' or even Soap Operas are appropriating the term in a positive light? I mean, I would say a great many people enjoyed watching what might be relatively cheap and hollow entertainment. 

[Chen G. 3,940]

Kinda, but Star Wars is still not a soap opera. Lucas tried to make into one, but it ain’t.

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

[Bofur01 245]

13 hours ago, Chen G. said:

Umm, DP Steven Yedlin actually used a lot of digital cameras on The Last Jedi, just to show people that they can't actually tell the difference. Judging by your response, he clearly succeeded!

 

Wasn't it just for 2 shots where a shallower DoF was needed, if I'm remembering the commentary track correctly? The shot with Paige's eye coming into focus in the bombing sequence was definitely one of them

[Chen G. 3,940]

Yedlin said he alternated between film cameras and digital cameras frequently, just to prove to people they wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

Should have used the digital video tape they used on AOTC.

[mstrox 6,637]

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

It'd be a shame if they taped over it.

[gkgyver 1,645]

On 4/9/2020 at 11:58 AM, crumbs said:

At least Rian Johnson and everyone involved in TLJ has the dignity not to come out and call TROS the embarrassing dumpster fire it is.

 

No no, he reserves the dignity to insult critics of his pretentious piece of crap as idiots, misogynists and racists. 

Now that's class. 

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

He wants those pronoun points on Twitter!

[Chen G. 3,940]

 

9 minutes ago, mstrox said:

"The other half was captured digitally in the ARRIRAW codec (at 2.8, 3.4 and 6.5K) using Arri Alexa cameras. It was finished as a 4K Digital Intermediate."

 

Huh, I had no idea so much of it was captured on such small formats. 6.5K would create good 4K images, but 2.8K digital resolves more like 2K in practice. Goes to show one of Yedlin's other points, that being that resolution isn't the only parameter of good photography.

[mstrox 6,637]

I wouldn’t assume Lucas was riffing on Gladiator in AOTC, since principal photography for Clones began shortly after Gladiator was released, meaning that would have been written and conceptualized well before Gladiator’s release.  I’d also personally have my doubts that TPM’s “battle outdoors” was at all reactive to Braveheart, unless Mel Gibson runs away from a big boomer at some point.

[Chen G. 3,940]

4 minutes ago, mstrox said:

principal photography for Clones began shortly after Gladiator was released, meaning that would have been written and conceptualized well before Gladiator’s release.

 

Yeah, but he would have known there's a big sword-and-sandal epic coming. Michael Kaminski lists it as a possibly in The Secret History of Star Wars.

 

[Fabulin 3,506]

.

 

 

[Not Mr. Big 4,639]

Weesa goin hoooooome!!!!

[Wojo 2,453]

We watched Ep 9 last night for the very first time. 

 

As prepared for it to be a smoldering dumpster fire, it had some genuinely good moments. It doesn't completely undo TLJ, it just reshapes some of that movie's story bits. 

 

The entire trilogy is depressing because they could have been something special, but this movie probably did the best with what it had to work with. 

 

I'm not keen on being able to beam objects using the Force between Force users. Maybe it's because they were a dyad? The necklace was annoying, but it was just plain cool with the lightsaber. 

[Chen G. 3,940]

It’s a bad movie. Breakneck in its pacing, corrupt in its treatment of Kylo Ren, soapy in its drama and moronic in its plotting. Even the photography and acting aren’t as good as with previous outings: Daisy Ridley is having a hard time playing all these beats of dumbfoundednees.

 

At least it’s not the ameaturishly-acted tedium of Attack of the Clones (which is similarly corrupt with its cavalier “to be angry is to be human”).

[Arpy 4,145]

22 hours ago, woj said:

We watched Ep 9 last night for the very first time. 

 

As prepared for it to be a smoldering dumpster fire, it had some genuinely good moments. It doesn't completely undo TLJ, it just reshapes some of that movie's story bits. 

 

The entire trilogy is depressing because they could have been something special, but this movie probably did the best with what it had to work with. 

 

I'm not keen on being able to beam objects using the Force between Force users. Maybe it's because they were a dyad? The necklace was annoying, but it was just plain cool with the lightsaber. 

The Force teleportation powers were hinted at in TLJ - with Kylo having droplets of water on his hands from Ahch To.

 

Yeah, I've heard people complai about how the film tries to retcon TLJ, but it doesn't do that at all.

 

What gets me is when people say TRoS or TLJ were the worst movies they've ever seen. I mean, c'mon 'the worst'?

 

 

[Smaug The Iron 510]

So both Williams and Giacchino have a cameo in this one. 

[Smeltington 1,436]

They should have had a duel!

[Jay 37,249]

Rise of Skywalker's color timing has been completely redone, streaming now on Disney+

[Fabulin 3,506]

I saw "Rise of Skywalker ... completely redone" and for a split second...

 

 

[crumbs 14,287]

Good to see they have their priorities in order. Of all the issues with that bowel movement of a movie, colour timing was the least. Who was even complaining about something so insignificant, in a film so heavily flawed? Is anyone seriously going to sit through it again just because the grading is slightly less green?

 

If they had their priorities straight, they'd fix the abysmal sound mix and rectify the insulting treatment of JW's score.

 

Maybe after that they can hire some competent writers to start the project from scratch.

[Holko 9,491]

Talk about polishing a turd. So now with streaming, movies just get content updates and patches, too, no need to be finished at launch.

[GerateWohl 4,320]

they should change the color timing to complete black. Then remove the voices and sound effects, so we could simply enjoy the music.

[Nick1Ø66 4,687]

Just another reminder of what a missed opportunity the sequels were.
 

Star Wars needed a Kevin Feige. It still does.

[crumbs 14,287]

This must have been a problem exclusive to the Disney+ version of the film. The Bluray doesn't have that teal/green filter at all; it resembles the "new" Disney+ colour grade.

 

 

Bluray:

 

 

Bluray:

 

So I suspect someone just screwed up the original Disney+ version with a green tint, and they've reverted to the intended grade as used on the Bluray.

 

[Holko 9,491]

3 minutes ago, crumbs said:

 

 

Bluray:

 

From these, to me the bluray one looks more similar to the "original" than to the "updated", just darker and less saturated. I could certainly imagine that site bumping up the saturation to make things look worse. Can you still access the lower res original stream and post proper unaltered screenshots maybe?

[Nick1Ø66 4,687]

26 minutes ago, GerateWohl said:

they should change the color timing to complete black. Then remove the voices and sound effects, so we could simply enjoy the music.

Well, you could always turn off your TV, put on the OST and stare at the black screen if that’s your thing.

[Holko 9,491]

1 minute ago, Nick1066 said:

Well, you could always turn off your TV, put on the OST and stare at the black screen if that’s your thing.

That way you don't get the authentic "hacked to shit" experience. The wildly nonchronological assembly is not enough to approximate that.

[Jay 37,249]

I think his point was that the film has boatloads of amazing music that isn't on the OST album (or even FYC album)

[crumbs 14,287]

52 minutes ago, Holko said:

 

From these, to me the bluray one looks more similar to the "original" than to the "updated", just darker and less saturated. I could certainly imagine that site bumping up the saturation to make things look worse. Can you still access the lower res original stream and post proper unaltered screenshots maybe?

 

They've absolutely manipulated the images to make the difference more drastic.

 

Bluray

 

Old Disney+

 

New Disney+

 

Another shot.

 

Bluray

 

Disney+ Old

 

Disney+ New

 

[Nick1Ø66 4,687]

Between this and the new Indy films losing some of the overly agressive grading, I'm starting to wonder if someone at Disney is actually taking notice of these things. Or perhaps they're now going to start grading everything with a Disney+ streaming experience in mind.  I can see streaming customers bombarding customer service complaining that their Disney+ must be broken because Star Wars looks green.

[GerateWohl 4,320]

1 hour ago, Nick1066 said:

Well, you could always turn off your TV, put on the OST and stare at the black screen if that’s your thing.

What else should I do?

It's just, I think, everyone would benefit from that improvement.

And OST doesn't have all the music.

[Nick1Ø66 4,687]

7 minutes ago, GerateWohl said:

What else should I do?

 

Become a marine biologist, devoting yourself to the study of cetaceans.  Because everyone needs a porpoise in their life.

[crumbs 14,287]

Unfortunately there's nothing any of us can do until Disney come to the party and hire Mike Matessino to produce expansions of the sequels. 

 

Maybe we'll get lucky and unreleased music will be in the Lego game later this year. 

[mstrox 6,637]

I have more hope for the previous six Star Wars scores.  I’m worried that the union fees for the sequels (and Rogue One) will make them financially un-viable.

[GerateWohl 4,320]

10 minutes ago, Nick1066 said:

Become a cetacean biologist, devoting yourself to the study of Phocoenidae.  Because everyone needs porpoise in their life.

If watching The Rise of Skywalker would be the purpose of my life I would really be screwed.

 

Thanks for the proposal.

13 minutes ago, crumbs said:

Maybe we'll get lucky and unreleased music will be in the Lego game later this year. 

The expansion of my dreams. Unreleased music in a Lego game.

[Fabulin 3,506]

58 minutes ago, GerateWohl said:

Thanks for the proposal.

porpoisal!

[Manakin Skywalker 4,889]

5 hours ago, Holko said:

Talk about polishing a turd. So now with streaming, movies just get content updates and patches, too, no need to be finished at launch.

 

Oh shit, I didn't know EA was making these movies now.

[Luke Skywalker 1,791]

Can we get a season pass?

 

I dont want to track every single update they do...

[Jay 37,249]

J.J. Abrams Reflects on 'Star Wars' and When It's Critical to Have a Plan

[Arpy 4,145]

Before everyone piles on Abrams, there is, given Lucasfilm and Disney's track record, reason to think that the screwup with the ST is beyond even his shortcomings as a writer/director...

 

The biggest issue was letting three different directors have a crack at a Star Wars film without it being one whole vision. 

[Luke Skywalker 1,791]

A little late...but if he has learnt from it..then at least it served a purpose...

[Holko 9,491]

3 minutes ago, Arpy said:

three different directors

*two 

 

The OT had three different directors too. I know what you mean and hopefully everyone else too, but mislabeling and misunderstanding and misplaced blame are Internet plagues so let's call it what it is: it's not necessarily their directorship that's the problem but that they wrote the scripts too with their own helpers without much apparent overarching external guidance. It worked for TLJ but sure as hell didn't for TROS.

5 minutes ago, Luke Skywalker said:

A little late...but if he has learnt from it..then at least it served a purpose...

Well, he built his entire career on not knowing/caring where things would go and not being the one who has to finish it. Now it bit him back.

[Arpy 4,145]

It's not mislabelling when everyone knows it was at the discretion of the directors in how their stories were told and what kind of films they would be.

 

We wouldn't be in this turgid position if Abrams had an entire trilogy unto himself, or the same for Johnson, but because one had to pass the torch to the other with the third director ousted (rightfully so), it was a shitshow.

9 minutes ago, Holko said:

*two 

 

The OT had three different directors too.

With a watchful Lucas!