Why is a large part of the Battle of Yavin not scored?

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

The ability to block a user is insignificant next to the power of the quote.

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,488]

Vader uses the force and there's a rumble. We've made you hear that rumble now.

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

I find your lack of bass disturbing.

[Fabulin 3,510]

I think the 20:40-23:40 fragment of this interview with Paul Hirsch fits the discussion perfectly. Although he does not talk about Star Wars, he did work at it just 4 years after this story/lesson about spotting.

[Silly Guy 2]

Oops!

[Jurassic Shark 12,033]

On 04/04/2019 at 9:30 PM, Jurassic Shark said:

Sometimes the music makes more impact if it's preceded by silence.

 

[Tom 4,640]

.  

[Tallguy 3,381]

Because it's perfect? Because there is actually a balance between what is scored and what isn't? Because it lets the audience hear the world the way the characters do?

 

I think those are all pretty good explanations.

[Brónach 1,301]

the scene is just better like this

[Poor_Man_S_HirschFeld 16]

One shouldn't forget the final battle was very hard to cut together. It very differently written (with Luke taking two turns to bullseye the exhaust port and no countdown to the destruction of the rebel base), plus the effect shots were coming in very late. The first assembly wasn't particularly successful and Marcia Lucas had to rebuild the sequence from the ground up using placeholder footage. I suppose during this phase the filmmakers started playing around with temp music as well and decided which beats played better with or without score.

I should also re-watch the scenes from The Battle of Britain, Squadron 633 or The Dam Busters that inspired the final battle to see how they were scored.

I find the scene works superbly as it is. Wall-to-wall scoring of the finale works better in E.T. for instance because the different beats that compose the sequence are vastly different in emotion, whereas the SW finale is more about the military tactics (but as already duly noted, the music kicks back in as it all becomes about Luke fulfilling his destiny)

[Tallguy 3,381]

22 minutes ago, Poor_Man_S_HirschFeld said:

I should also re-watch the scenes from The Battle of Britain, Squadron 633 or The Dam Busters that inspired the final battle to see how they were scored.

 

I had the same thought. As it is I haven't even had time to watch Ted Lasso, so I'll let you go look and report back.

[ThePenitentMan1 742]

6 hours ago, Poor_Man_S_HirschFeld said:

One shouldn't forget the final battle was very hard to cut together. It very differently written (with Luke taking two turns to bullseye the exhaust port and no countdown to the destruction of the rebel base), plus the effect shots were coming in very late. The first assembly wasn't particularly successful and Marcia Lucas had to rebuild the sequence from the ground up using placeholder footage.

 

@Chen G.  Is this true?  IIRC this information was from "How Star Wars was saved in the edit", which I think was debunked.

[Andy 4,092]

11 hours ago, Silly Guy said:

 WHAT WERE THEY THINKING? 

They were thinking

 

• No music will give it a quasi documentary feel, consistent with some of the editing and direction. 
   
• The brilliant sonics alone would mirror the WWII airplane engines and rat-a-tat-tat sounds from the old dogfight footage that inspired and temped the scenes. 
   
• The first initial bombing runs would leave suspense up to the viewers and not telegraph what would happen if there was no score. 
   
• The final bombing run by Luke would have more dramatic intensity and catharsis if the music picked up after Red Leader got vaporized, and Luke Skywalker was now in charge of the final chance. 

[Schilkeman 957]

12 hours ago, Silly Guy said:

Yeah, and I hate it! It makes the music feel incomplete, it feels underwhelming, and less epic, and the TIE Fighter sounds get grating after a while, even worse, they leave the music out for 4 whole minutes, WHAT WERE THEY THINKING? and, I can't even find any good music to add to the scene cause it will end up being unfitting, I hate this, this is worse than any other musicless Star Wars scene, this is, without a doubt, the biggest mistake John Williams ever made!

As much as I like the battles throughout the series, the Yavin battle sequence is the only one with genuine tension. Tension in film is made the same way it is in music, with contrast and rhythm. in this case, the contrast was to have no music to give the ears a breather in the middle of a very long action sequence. The build-up from the time of Red Leader's death to when the Death Star blows up is what makes that scene. Its impact would be less, I imagine, if it had been scored wall-to-wall.

 

Even the prequals had music-less segments, but he wallpaper scoring of todays action films would never allow for this. 

[artguy360 1,843]

I really like how the Battle of Yavin is spotted and scored. It's all very effective. SW didn't use to be wall to wall music.

[Brónach 1,301]

also if the viewer choses to retroactively believe the music-is-the-force (at least sometimes) (instead of the force as it appears in this movie which is more of a vague believe in yourself thing), this also works

[Chen G. 3,944]

7 hours ago, ThePenitentMan1 said:

@Chen G.  Is this true?  IIRC this information was from "How Star Wars was saved in the edit", which I think was debunked.

 

No, we do know Marcia did the lion's share work of editing on the Death Star attack, which as scripted did have a first, failed bombing run by Luke (which is not a bad idea).

 

That, in and of itself, does not support the trite "saved in the edit" argument.

[Tallguy 3,381]

8 hours ago, ThePenitentMan1 said:

 

@Chen G.  Is this true?  IIRC this information was from "How Star Wars was saved in the edit", which I think was debunked.

 

I don't think any of the info in "How Star Wars..." is false, is it? I think people argue with the conclusion. Or the title? "How Star Wars was Finished in the Edit"? Hell, even G. Lucas himself famously said that he directs in the editing room. It's not like Marcia went behind his back.

 

I'm not sure why people get in a twist about this. Star Wars was a famously collaborative effort. I mean if you think it means "Star Wars really sucked, but Marcia Lucas made it OK." Star Wars sucked but John Williams made it OK too. Star Wars sucked but Harrison Ford made it OK. The reason nobody believed in Star Wars is because you can't see it until it actually becomes Star Wars!

 

The prequels went down hill (IMHO) because it became LESS collaborative. Or it had more collaborators who saw Lucas in a different light than the original teams.

[Chen G. 3,944]

1 hour ago, Tallguy said:

The reason nobody believed in Star Wars is because you can't see it until it actually becomes Star Wars!

 

Fox believed in it enough to pump a very substantial amount of money into it, and pretty much leaving Lucas to his own devices creativelly. I don't buy this "little engine that could" narrative anymore than I do the "saved in the edit" one.

 

1 hour ago, Tallguy said:

The prequels went down hill (IMHO) because it became LESS collaborative. Or it had more collaborators who saw Lucas in a different light than the original teams.

 

I don't buy that either. The issue of "explaining" why the prequel trilogy is worst than the classic trilogy (and I'd say its a small dip than many would grant, especially taking Return of the Jedi into account) is compounded by the fact that Lucas' directorial output is so slim, making it all but impossible to establish "trends" in his ouvre - we just have an insufficient sample size.

 

But, really, could it not simply be that twenty years off of the director's chair, coupled with a huge change in lifestyle - Lucas having went from a struggling editor to a multimillionaire, businessman, divorcee and father - have changed the man? Could it not be that he - and the series - became a little behind the times? Star Wars having been very much a product of the 1970s?

 

There are lots of reasons to cite beyond just directorial hubris.

[Tallguy 3,381]

23 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

Fox believed in it enough to pump a very substantial amount of money into it, and pretty much leaving Lucas to his own devices creativelly. I don't buy this "little engine that could" narrative anymore than I do the "saved in the edit" one.

 

Fox certainly didn't and was ready to cut their losses before the film was finished. Alan Ladd believed in it. But Fox taking a chance on it to begin with was "Hey, nobody understood American Graffiti and look at how much money THAT made. We don't want to miss out on the next one of those".

 

That's not The Little Engine that Could as much as it was William Goldman's "Nobody knows anything."

 

Sometimes you get Star Wars. Sometimes you get Sean Connery (after passing on Lord of the Rings because he didn't understand it) joining The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

 

29 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

especially taking Return of the Jedi into account

 

I admit I should have included that in the trend.

[Chen G. 3,944]

28 minutes ago, Tallguy said:

Fox certainly didn't and was ready to cut their losses before the film was finished. Alan Ladd believed in it. But Fox taking a chance on it to begin with was "Hey, nobody understood American Graffiti and look at how much money THAT made. We don't want to miss out on the next one of those".

 

Oh really? Because Fox' contract with Lucas specifically states that "the picture falls into the category of a blockbuster picture. The picture has substantial domestic and international appeal.” Fox also signed with Lucas for sequels (Lucas had signed his actors for two of those, hardly the actions of someone expecting to make a flop) and had a cut of the merchandising. As Chris Taylor points out: "the fact that the lawyers would keep fighting the precise details for the next two years shows that was Fox was not as asleep at the switch as we've been led to believe."

 

At one point, Lucas did try to shop the production around to the other studios, and while they all rejected it as being risky, the fully admitted in their internal correspondences that its "a very commercial venture" (Universal), "the best kind of motion picture" (UA's Marcia Nasatir) and that "the film could be quite extraordinary" (Mike Medavoy). Lucas himself, even at his worst, bet with Spielberg that the film could make between $16 and 25 million domestic. Spielberg thought it'd make $50 or more!

 

Producers don't just through $11 million dollars (which is not the baubles Lucas sometimes passes it for) on a game of long odds. It was a risky project, but one that EVERYONE knew may well pay off big-time. There are newspaper articles from before the airing of the film talking about how “there is much talk among those in the film business who should know that “Star Wars” might well be the largest box office movie of the summer.”

[GerateWohl 4,343]

The final battle, especially in the special edition, is perfect the way it is. I rather wondered, why the whole sequence at the rebel bay is left unscored, especially since it was painfully prolonged in the special edition.

 

On the other had, the sequence at the same rebel bay in Rogue One is covered under music and it actually feels too much. Seems scoring reasonably scenes at this rebel base on Yavin 4 is a difficult task for any composer.

[Jurassic Shark 12,033]

25 minutes ago, GerateWohl said:

I rather wondered, why the whole sequence at the rebel bay is left unscored, especially since it was painfully prolonged in the special edition.

 

Quiet before the storm.

 

What did they add for the SE now again?

[Chen G. 3,944]

6 minutes ago, Jurassic Shark said:

What did they add for the SE now again?

 

An (honestly welcomed) little bit of dialogue with Biggs. Lucas had to comp-in someone walking across the foreground to cut around a little line of the captain's about meeting Luke's father "when I was just a boy."

[ThePenitentMan1 742]

2 hours ago, Tallguy said:

 

I don't think any of the info in "How Star Wars..." is false, is it? I think people argue with the conclusion. Or the title? "How Star Wars was Finished in the Edit"? Hell, even G. Lucas himself famously said that he directs in the editing room. It's not like Marcia went behind his back.

 

I'm not sure why people get in a twist about this. Star Wars was a famously collaborative effort. I mean if you think it means "Star Wars really sucked, but Marcia Lucas made it OK." Star Wars sucked but John Williams made it OK too. Star Wars sucked but Harrison Ford made it OK. The reason nobody believed in Star Wars is because you can't see it until it actually becomes Star Wars!

 

The prequels went down hill (IMHO) because it became LESS collaborative. Or it had more collaborators who saw Lucas in a different light than the original teams.

 

I don't think I'm in a twist about it.

 

Anyway, the reason I pinged Chen about it was because I knew if I had any misconceptions about what happened, he'd put them to rest.

 

And he did, so I'm happy now. 

 

11 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

 

An (honestly welcomed) little bit of dialogue with Biggs. Lucas had to comp-in someone walking across the foreground to cut around a little line of the captain's about meeting Luke's father "when I was just a boy."

 

This was done in 1997, right?  What a shame Lucas didn't keep the line and just write him into one of the Prequels.

[Chen G. 3,944]

13 minutes ago, ThePenitentMan1 said:

 What a shame Lucas didn't keep the line and just write him into one of the Prequels.

 

I think the idea was that he was too old to have concievably meet Anakin "when I was just a boy." I keep harping on it but even though its never said outright, in watching the original film it was always painfully obvious to me that the republic fell not a meagre 19 years prior, but more like 30 or 35.

[GerateWohl 4,343]

12 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

An (honestly welcomed) little bit of dialogue with Biggs. Lucas had to comp-in someone walking across the foreground to cut around a little line of the captain's about meeting Luke's father "when I was just a boy."

As Lucas still left out Biggs introduction at the beginning of the movie this scene somehow made little sense to me. But I seem to be the only one seing it that way. Everyone else seems to like the scene with Biggs in the SE. 

And this sequence where you see the rebels plugging the tank hoses in and out of the space ships and pilots jumping into their cockpits felt longer to me in the special edition. But that might be same as before. Haven't watched that in the original version for ages.

[Marian Schedenig 8,178]

1 hour ago, Jurassic Shark said:

1 hour ago, GerateWohl said:

I rather wondered, why the whole sequence at the rebel bay is left unscored, especially since it was painfully prolonged in the special edition.

 

Quiet before the storm.

 

I was going to say that, because that's exactly how it's always felt to me.

[Holko 9,499]

Yep, it's great.

[Tallguy 3,381]

57 minutes ago, ThePenitentMan1 said:

I don't think I'm in a twist about it.

 

Excellent.

 

42 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

I think the idea was that he was too old to have concievably meet Anakin "when I was just a boy." I keep harping on it but even though its never said outright, in watching the original film it was always painfully obvious to me that the republic fell not a meagre 19 years prior, but more like 30 or 35.

 

Disregarding the PT, but acknowledging that Vader is Anakin: If Obi-Wan is 60, Vader could be 50. Red leader is 40 (the actor was 37) then he can meet a young Anakin Skywalker when he's around 10.

 

Even taking a "Star Wars only" approach (where Luke's Father can be a contemporary of Ob-Wan) then Luke is still a limiting factor.

 

But then I don't make spreadsheets for this stuff like I do for Star Trek.

 

1 hour ago, Chen G. said:

 

Oh really? Because Fox' contract with Lucas specifically states that "the picture falls into the category of a blockbuster picture. The picture has substantial domestic and international appeal.” Fox also signed with Lucas for sequels (Lucas had signed his actors for two of those, hardly the actions of someone expecting to make a flop) and had a cut of the merchandising. As Chris Taylor points out: "the fact that the lawyers would keep fighting the precise details for the next two years shows that was Fox was not as asleep at the switch as we've been led to believe."

 

At one point, Lucas did try to shop the production around to the other studios, and while they all rejected it as being risky, the fully admitted in their internal correspondences that its "a very commercial venture" (Universal), "the best kind of motion picture" (UA's Marcia Nasatir) and that "the film could be quite extraordinary" (Mike Medavoy). Lucas himself, even at his worst, bet with Spielberg that the film could make between $16 and 25 million domestic. Spielberg thought it'd make $50 or more!

 

Producers don't just through $11 million dollars (which is not the baubles Lucas sometimes passes it for) on a game of long odds. It was a risky project, but one that EVERYONE knew may well pay off big-time. There are newspaper articles from before the airing of the film talking about how “there is much talk among those in the film business who should know that “Star Wars” might well be the largest box office movie of the summer.”

 

I don't have the encyclopedic grasp of this stuff that many here do. But LUCAS clearly thought it would be successful.

 

"Lucas did try to shop the production around to the other studios" -- Yes, that's how it ended up at Fox. Universal had right of refusal.

 

No, I don't buy into "Lucas had it all figured out and the studios didn't know what they had there." But nobody knew Star Wars was going to be Star Wars.

[Chen G. 3,944]

19 minutes ago, Tallguy said:

Lucas did try to shop the production around to the other studios" -- Yes, that's how it ended up at Fox. Universal had right of refusal.

No. Lucas tried shopping it around A SECOND TIME while the film was very much heading towards being shot. The rejection letters we have are from that point.

[oierem 151]

15 hours ago, ThePenitentMan1 said:

 

@Chen G.  Is this true?  IIRC this information was from "How Star Wars was saved in the edit", which I think was debunked.

 

-The first cut of the battle was done (mainly) by Marcia Lucas, following the script and using WWII footage, without temp music. (circa october 1976)

 

-The second cut of the battle was done (mainly) by Marcia Lucas, changing the structure and adding the countdown, using WWII footage, without temp music. It is unclear exactly which editor came up with the idea of the countdown. It doesn't really matter, since it was a collaborative effort anyway. (circa november 1976)

 

-The third cut of the film didn't change the final battle, still used WWII footage but added temp music. This was done by Paul Hirsch (who gives a lot of info about this whole process in his autobiography). Marcia had already left the film. This is the cut that Williams scored in January 1977.

 

-The special effects did come very late but didn't alter the edit in any significant way. They just swaped placeholder WWII footage with SF shots.

 

Paul Hirsch gives himself a lot of credit about the temp music choices, by the way.

[Jurassic Shark 12,033]

What was the battle temped with?

[oierem 151]

6 hours ago, Tallguy said:

 

I don't think any of the info in "How Star Wars..." is false, is it? I think people argue with the conclusion. Or the title? "How Star Wars was Finished in the Edit"? Hell, even G. Lucas himself famously said that he directs in the editing room. It's not like Marcia went behind his back.

 

 

The very first sentence of the video is false. "In february 1977 Lucas gathered a bunch of his friends to show them a rough cut of the film....". 

 

That february 1977 cut already included most of the changes that the video mentions, was done by the three editors (and in fact, Marcia and Richard Chew had already left the editing team months before), and was almost identical to the final cut, except for the fact that the SF and the music was missing. In fact, that was pretty much the cut Williams scored.

[Brando 1,857]

Do you guys remember the music edit of The Battle of Yavin from the '04 release? @Manakin SkywalkerSent it to me a little while ago and I didn't realize they cut out a chunk of the first cue.

[Manakin Skywalker 4,891]

Yeah that was a weird edit.

[Not Mr. Big 4,639]

Dramatic contrast

[enderdrag64 624]

2 hours ago, Brando said:

Do you guys remember the music edit of The Battle of Yavin from the '04 release? @Manakin SkywalkerSent it to me a little while ago and I didn't realize they cut out a chunk of the first cue.

Wait what? I have the 1997 and 1993 sets pulled up in audacity and I don't see anything obvious missing. I thought the 2004 was just a rerelease of the 1997. Where is the edit?

[Schilkeman 957]

7 hours ago, enderdrag64 said:

Wait what? I have the 1997 and 1993 sets pulled up in audacity and I don't see anything obvious missing. I thought the 2004 was just a rerelease of the 1997. Where is the edit?

I think they’re referring to the 2004 DVD release, which was mixed poorly at the start of the battle when the X-Wings start attacking. I’m not sure if it’s mixed out, but it’s definitely mixed low, and is hard to hear. I think the rear channels get swapped at some point, as well.

 

Despite their issues, I’ve probably seen those versions more than any of the others, and have a lot of nostalgia for them.

[Richard Penna 3,676]

On 24/05/2023 at 4:41 PM, Silly Guy said:

they leave the music out for 4 whole minutes, WHAT WERE THEY THINKING? and, I can't even find any good music to add to the scene cause it will end up being unfitting

 

If you can't imagine music that would fit the scene, I think you've answered your own question to an extent.

 

You're probably imagining it from the same perspective of those who would love there to have been an unused T-Rex attack cue in Jurassic - we want to hear more music from Williams.

 

But if the filmmakers are going for change in tone or something to spark the audience's attention when the scene doesn't otherwise explicitly indicate it, then I've found a period unscored followed by music suddenly coming in to be very effective.

 

I reckon LotR could've done with a bit of that - definitely has some overscoring here and there.

[Tallguy 3,381]

11 minutes ago, Richard Penna said:

You're probably imagining it from the same perspective of those who would love there to have been an unused T-Rex attack cue in Jurassic - we want to hear more music from Williams.

 

Isn't THAT just one of the gold medal winners for unscored scenes? Along with, you know, the unscored parts of the Death Star Battle.

[Schilkeman 957]

I also wouldn't want all his writing from the beginning of ESB put back in the film. It's great to listen to, but the film needs room to breathe.

 

Directors don't seem to trust their audiences much these days. I can't imagine something that purposefully quiet and slow starting out a modern blockbuster. And we must have rhythmically plodding underscore at all times, otherwise how do we know that Things Are Happening?

 

Composers understand the need for contrast. Great film directors understand the inherent musicality of cinema, the rhythm of editing, and the timing of actors. Like the music, things just happen in a lot of current movies. Big moments are either given too little time to land, or way too much time to land, robbing them of their momentum. Imagine something as simple as having kids fly their bikes across a moon for a few seconds being the biggest moment of a film, and people still remembering it, vividly, 40 years later. Craft seems to be in short supply at the moment.

[Richard Penna 3,676]

40 minutes ago, Tallguy said:

 

Isn't THAT just one of the gold medal winners for unscored scenes? Along with, you know, the unscored parts of the Death Star Battle.

 

Yeah, I read someone mention it recently and in the complete score it always feels like there's an odd hole there. It would've been great for something to have been composed for it before SS decided it didn't need music.

[Tallguy 3,381]

25 minutes ago, Schilkeman said:

I also wouldn't want all his writing from the beginning of ESB put back in the film. It's great to listen to, but the film needs room to breathe.

 

I was thinking of that too. Wonderful music. (When Chewie is introduced is probably my favorite statement of Luke's B theme.) Very glad they dialed it out.

 

The doors closing at the Hoth base are MUCH better unscored.

 

EDIT: For that matter, Luke and Vader's duel is better unscored as well! Who is this Williams fellow and why do people think they need him so much?

[Brónach 1,301]

1 hour ago, Schilkeman said:

Craft seems to be in short supply at the moment.

 

bah. watch more movies.

[Datameister 2,037]

1 hour ago, Tallguy said:

 

I was thinking of that too. Wonderful music. (When Chewie is introduced is probably my favorite statement of Luke's B theme.) Very glad they dialed it out.

 

The doors closing at the Hoth base are MUCH better unscored.

 

EDIT: For that matter, Luke and Vader's duel is better unscored as well! Who is this Williams fellow and why do people think they need him so much?

 

Yup. I support every single music removal in ESB—those are moments and scenes that don't need music. But I'm sure glad to have all of that incredible music to listen to on its own!

[Schilkeman 957]

38 minutes ago, Brónach said:

 

bah. watch more movies.

I’m speaking mostly of the big budget space. Still, I think The Lighthouse and Marriage Story were the last films I watched that I really liked, and that had more to do with the acting than anything else. West Side story was good, but it was already good before Spielberg got to it. I could go on.

[Jurassic Shark 12,033]

50 minutes ago, Brónach said:

 

bah. watch more movies.

 

Yeah, compensate for a lack of quality with an increase in quantity.

[Chen G. 3,944]

Star Wars is scoreds much more sparsely than the other films in the series: the wall-to-wall score tradition really started with The Empire Strikes Back, although Kershner tempered with it somewhat. From memory, Return of the Jedi is wall-to-wall.

[Brando 1,857]

4 hours ago, Schilkeman said:

I think they’re referring to the 2004 DVD release

Yes. I had no idea about it until @Manakin Skywalkersent me a a clip a little while ago. Not sure why they felt the need to remove that bit.