Restored Isolated Score: Superman: The Movie

[Holko 9,526]

While I'm not a big fan of this movie, I do love the score. When talking about the next potential iso score project, @Jay slightly nudged me towards it, saying it has a lot of edits and dialed out music so it's be worth doing. Well, a big thanks to him because I ended up having a ton of fun doing this!

 

I took the longest, Extended cut as the base, but for most cues it really wasn't as simple as that. For some it was fine, for some I had to use the Theatrical, for some the cue was even longer than the Extended cut, for some it was even shorter than the Theatrical cut, for many it was between the two. In some cases what I had to do was obvious, in some cases I decided to just go completely freehanded and cut the footage to the music however I felt like.

 

 

 

New 1m1 Opening Introduction
New 1m1 Pt.2 Main Title (Part 2) - The bulk of this one is replaced with End Title in all cuts, but it still fits.
New 1m1A Krypton - A new opening for 1m2 recorded in a lower key to match the revised Main Title.
1m2 Kryptonopolis - The cue is definitely longer than the footage, so I had to stretch it or leave it blank in places.
1m3R The Dome Opens (Revised) - The film dials out the very ending, I had to stretch it here and there a bit.

 

 

2m1 The Council's Decision - For the first half, I had to use the Theatrical cut, the second half is too short even in the Extended. A lot of the cue (The parents' discussion, and everything from the fanfare cutaway before the closing of the pod onwards except for the very last note overlapped with the first of the next cue) is dialed out in the Theatrical.
New 2m2 The Krypton Quake - This is a mess: the Theatrical has too little footage for the scene and drops most of the cue except for the very opening and the explosion's final buildup (but the ending with the explosion itself is still removed), the Extended has far too much footage and loops the cue a lot. I decided to just edit it however I felt like, the 3 certain points were the opening, the Fanfare over the pod leaving Krypton, and the ending, otherwise I tried to put shots of Kal-El's parents over main theme and Personal theme statements, bigger wide shots over sudden changes, etc.
3m2 Baby's Trip to Earth - The Extended's added footage doesn't fit particularly great under the cue and the timing's still off so I had to cut that short and extend the footage later.

 

 

New 3m2 Baby Makes an Entrance

 

 

3m5 Baby Lifts Lorry

 

 

4m2 Racing the Train - The base Theatrical footage is too short, the Extended adds the wrong footage for the wrong section so I had to loop shots instead.

 

 

4m4/5m1 Jonathan's Death - I love the sweeping americana Smallville theme and the Cowboys theme cameo in this one.

 

 

Orig. 5m3 Kryptonite Calls - Used the Theatrical cut here...
New 4m4/5m1 The Fortress of Solitude - And for this cue too.
New 5m2 Father's Instruction - And also for this, but I had to insert a bit from the Extended.
New 5m3, A/B Father's Instruction Part 2

 

 

 

Orig. 7m1 More Mugger - A very fun way to score the scene and emphasise the comedy of Superman posing as Clark - note the pizzicato for the thug's finger calling! The film dials out most of the exchange with the mugger and all but the first Superman theme (for the bullet reveal).

 

 

New 6m2/7m1 Introducing Otis - This was a pain, though the second half fits with the Theatrical cut, none of the cuts fit the first half so I had to hack something up again. The Theatrical dials out everything from entering the station to entering the lair.

 

 

 

New 7m1/8m1 Helicopter Sequence - A real tragedy that 3 cuts later we still don't have the footage JW scored for the first major action setpiece in the score so I had to cut up the footage in all kinds of ways to make the very satisfying sync points fit. For shorter gaps I could slow down shots but for the longer ones there was just nothing to do. I followed the Theatrical for the very last shot of Supes flying.
New 8m2 The Burglar Sequence - Used the theatrical edit here with one shot slowed down.
Orig. 9m2 Chasing Crooks - Even the Extended is too short here, so I had to extend it here and there.

 

 

New 8m4 The Cat Rescue - The Extended adds too much, had to use the Theatrical for this one.

 

 

 

New 8m5 Air Force One - Again, I used the theatrical, but the only difference is the last shot, cutting away to the TVs instead of the Fortress.

 

 

Orig. 10m2 The Penthouse

 

 

Orig. 10m3 I Like Pink
Orig. 10m4/11m1 I Can Fly - The flying around the Statue of Liberty was cut shorter, so I had to loop a shot and extend the transition to the next cue.
Orig. 11m2 To the Moon
Orig. 11m3 Flying Part III - I had to cut the shot of them arriving a tiny bit shorter.

 

 

Orig. 11m4 Clark Loses His Nerve

 

 

New 11m1 The Truck Convoy - Had to use the Theatrical again, the Extended adds a lot to this part.

 

 

New 11m1A The Truck Convoy Pt.2
New 11m2 Miss T. Helps - Theatrical again for both (which doesn't actually use the first March part in 11m1A), and I had to overlap the cues a bit.

 

 

New 12m1 To the Lair - Had to lengthen a couple shots but otherwise fits. The Theatrical dials out the part where he turns into a drill.

 

 

New 12m2X Trajectory Malfunction - I used the Theatrical but had to shorten it just a bit. The film dials out the ending under the rocket noises.

 

 

New 12m3 Luthor's Lethal Weapon

 

 

New 13m1 Miss T.'s Rescue - I had to extend the Extended just very slightly.
New 13m2 Chasing Rockets - The Theatrical doesn't have enough flying around, the Extended has too much of it and way too much of Lois driving and sitting at the fuel station. The Theatrical dials out everything after the cut from "15 seconds and counting" to Lois' car.
New 13m3 The Golden Gate Bridge - Works perfectly with the Theatrical, surprisingly, since it dials out everything before Superman arrives to save the bus.
New 13m4 The Rescue of Jimmy - The key to this cue and the next was moving the part where the earthquake catches up with Lois' car later. I also had to grab some shots from the Extended for the end, otherwise it mostly fits with the Theatrical (which dials out everything until Superman flies in to rescue Jimmy, and some after he leaves him).
New 14m1 Pushing Boulders - A segment of this cue covers the moved part of Lois' car starting to sink, and from then on it was just a matter of chopping up all the other shots of her sinking and dropping them in after that part (as well as looping some shots to cover gaps). I can see why they moved that part earlier though - this cut makes it seem like Supes causes the boulders and quakes that make the car sink and Lois die!
New 14m2 Flying to Lois - Not sure exactly where the break is between the cues, but everything starting right before Supes notices her fits perfectly.
New 14m3 Turning Back the World - Also fits perfectly with no changes.

 

 

New 14m4/15m1 The Prison Yard - Used the theatrical, there's a gap but the Extended doesn't fill it in.
End Title - Shortened it seriously since in the LLL booklet, the Love Theme's slate (Love Theme) doesn't seem to indicate in any way that it was intended as an End Credits Part 2. The film switches it with the Main Title.

 

 

 

7m1 The Mugger - Starting off with this fascinating one - one of the weakest ways I can remember JW scoring a scene! Only emphasising the tension of the scene, injecting it with none of the cheeky humour it should have, even ending before the bullet reveal etc. where it would've had more chances to do that. rejected very much rightfully IMO.

 

 

1m1 Main Title - This was great fun to hack up for this much shorter take. Shots had to be sped up or slowed down, the Brando and Hackman credits were moved later to the front of the cast roll and reversed to go in the right direction, credits for executives and shit could be thrown out. I especially love the way the final director credit is scored.

 

 

1m3 The Dome Opens - The booklet says this was for a shorter cut where we saw the dome closing, so I tried to replicate that somehow.

 

 

5m4/6m1 The Fortress of Solitude - The booklet says this was for a cut with the Fortress already being there, so I cut everything from the wide vista of its future place until the wide vista of it already being built, found the spot most likely to score that reveal, and filled in the opening with extra shots from the Extended.

[JohnnyD 1,223]

Awesome!

[Faleel 5,353]

Not to steal any Thunder, just as additional viewing, my takes:

 

 

[HunterTech 994]

2 hours ago, Holko said:

End Title - Shortened it seriously since in the LLL booklet, the Love Theme's slate (Love Theme) doesn't seem to indicate in any way that it was intended as an End Credits Part 2. The film switches it with the Main Title.

 

The FSM book states that it was originally written to just be an album arrangement, but the credits were the longest any film had been up to that point, so it got used in an edited form to fill the rest of it out. Now, the manuscript does list it as "Love Theme From Superman (End Credits Part II)," but the cue sheet only refers to it as "Love Theme From S.M.," so I guess the latter came first.

Now, when you say extended cut, you are referring to the 3 hour TV cut, yes? It likely has no relevance to this project, but it is quite intriguing how all three versions can treat certain cues differently, so I do wonder if that was something you got to pick up on at any point. Definitely am looking forward to watching this!

[Holko 9,526]

26 minutes ago, HunterTech said:

The FSM book states that it was originally written to just be an album arrangement, but the credits were the longest any film had been up to that point, so it got used in an edited form to fill the rest of it out. Now, the manuscript does list it as "Love Theme From Superman (End Credits Part II)," but the cue sheet only refers to it as "Love Theme From S.M.," so I guess the latter came first.

Ah, good, so if we're going by JW's original intentions and compositions then taking the Credits as the only Credits piece should be the correct choice.

 

27 minutes ago, HunterTech said:

Now, when you say extended cut, you are referring to the 3 hour TV cut, yes?

Yes, yes, you gotta have as much as possible to be able to edit it down!

 

27 minutes ago, HunterTech said:

It likely has no relevance to this project, but it is quite intriguing how all three versions can treat certain cues differently, so I do wonder if that was something you got to pick up on at any point.

The Theatrical drops a lot of music as I noted, the Extended restores a lot of it but also loops and tracks a ton of cues to cover the added material. There were definitely places where the music was out of sync or obviously wasn't in the original intended sync. I mostly ignored the Special cut since it adds relatively little which is all covered by the Extended I think? The best reference for doing all this was my gut feeling of rightness for certain sync points after trying and trying and recutting and reshuffling. I gotta say, I grinned a lot this past week for all these exhilirating Superman statements for him launching and landing and flying and popping up!

[Pat_S 69]

On 03/09/2023 at 3:22 AM, Holko said:

New 2m2 The Krypton Quake - This is a mess: the Theatrical has too little footage for the scene and drops most of the cue except for the very opening and the explosion's final buildup (but the ending with the explosion itself is still removed), the Extended has far too much footage and loops the cue a lot. I decided to just edit it however I felt like, the 3 certain points were the opening, the Fanfare over the pod leaving Krypton, and the ending, otherwise I tried to put shots of Kal-El's parents over main theme and Personal theme statements, bigger wide shots over sudden changes, etc.

Amazing, amazing work! Very glad to see this on the forum. 

I just have one suggestion here - the sketches (and I believe something MM said in an interview? can't locate it) suggest that the ascending runs at 8:58 of this video (which recall similar ones from The Dome Opens), were meant to accompany the shot of the "starship" flying past Zod and co in the phantom zone (a shot which was moved to 10:14 of this same video). Baby's Trip to Earth seems to have been scored in the 'second half' of Williams' colossal time on the project (since it was orchestrated by Arthur Morton, who orchestrated almost all the cues in this second half), so I believe that it was scored with the change, but Kryptonquake may have been scored when that shot was still in there. Would you be willing to try and experiment by putting that shot into the Kryptonquake restoration and seeing where it takes you?

That's a bunch of words but I hope that makes sense.

[Holko 9,526]

1 hour ago, Pat_S said:

Amazing, amazing work! Very glad to see this on the forum. 

I just have one suggestion here - the sketches (and I believe something MM said in an interview? can't locate it) suggest that the ascending runs at 8:58 of this video (which recall similar ones from The Dome Opens), were meant to accompany the shot of the "starship" flying past Zod and co in the phantom zone (a shot which was moved to 10:14 of this same video). Baby's Trip to Earth seems to have been scored in the 'second half' of Williams' colossal time on the project (since it was orchestrated by Arthur Morton, who orchestrated almost all the cues in this second half), so I believe that it was scored with the change, but Kryptonquake may have been scored when that shot was still in there. Would you be willing to try and experiment by putting that shot into the Kryptonquake restoration and seeing where it takes you?

That's a bunch of words but I hope that makes sense.

Yep, I'll definitely try it, thanks!

[Holko 9,526]

12 hours ago, Pat_S said:

that the ascending runs at 8:58 of this video (which recall similar ones from The Dome Opens)

That's actually why I put a shot of the dome's destruction under it.

 

The Theatrical is still too short with these 2 shots added to it, so I just plopped them into my Frankenedit and adjusted the part right after. The video's now replaced!

 

 

[Pat_S 69]

8 hours ago, Holko said:

That's actually why I put a shot of the dome's destruction under it.

 

The Theatrical is still too short with these 2 shots added to it, so I just plopped them into my Frankenedit and adjusted the part right after. The video's now replaced!

 

 

Thanks a bunch! Despite being inevitably a little rough around the edges, I think the result works really well! 

[Brando 1,864]

I was recently going thru the isolated score bonus feature, and I noticed something a little odd in the edited cue for "Pushing Boulders and Flying to Lois". So a chunk of this cue gets dropped and then they decided to track in a section from "Golden Gate Bridge and Rescue of Jimmy", now before the tracked section plays, theres a tiny fragment of a cue not in either of the tracks listed above (I think). Here's the audio clip of the isolated score, and it is in the film audio, unlike a few other instances where the isolated score does not match the film. The fragment in question is at about the 4 second mark, and it literally lasts for a microsecond, so its curious why its there: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Yd7D1iBE1M67rwtP-U8sVTxZqD5dHF6A/view?usp=sharing

[Faleel 5,353]

It just sounds like the cue crossfading into the tracking?

[Brando 1,864]

27 minutes ago, Faleel said:

It just sounds like the cue crossfading into the tracking?

I suppose it could be, but the little twinkling makes it seem like it was from something else. That is a possibility due to the tape being cut.

 

Never mind, my friend @Pat_S Found it. Its in the cue Pushing Boulders right before the tracked section, the isolated score and film have a different mix, and it's there underneath oboes and clarinets.