It’s like a math problem as much as it is a tone and feeling problem. You only have about 23 seconds or so to find a piece that evokes the right emotion, flows with the scene, and is in the right key. Which means you’re probably gonna have to edit, cut, and stretch other pieces to make that all work.
Here’s a low-res, and lo-fi mockup I did.
I think them licensing the OT to a boutique home video company like Criterion or ShoutFactory is unlikely as well, but it’s a couple degrees more likely than letting a fan-restoration become official product. IF an official release of the original theatrical versions ever happens again, they’ll do their own restoration work in-house (if it’s not already done) and they’ll put it on Disney+ as a bonus feature. They won’t re-release it in theaters or put it on disc. If you want the original theatrical versions in 4K, they’ll be there, and you gotta pay 6.99 a month to watch them legally.
It probably wouldn’t even take that much effort. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s already done, they just haven’t said anything about it, mostly because they don’t have any actual plans to do anything with it.
I have always found it highly doubtful there was ever a time when Lucasfilm was honestly considering using Verta’s restoration. I couldn’t explain why they supposedly took a meeting with him to discuss that restoration other than I’m sure someone cashed in a friendly favor, but I just don’t think it was ever going to happen.
The premise was always sort of self-defeating, for one thing: They don’t want to spend money on a restoration, so they’ll just license (? if that’s even the right term) a fan’s. OK. But if they were willing to go any sort of licensing route, why would they be talking to Verta instead of any other film company (namely, Criterion) who would be more than willing to PAY THEM for the opportunity to do it instead of the other way around. And then lets say this restoration is financially successful: They either got for free, or paid a small fee to use, Verta’s restoration and then hypothetically made a bunch of money on it. There’s still two other films in the trilogy that are completely unrestored now. Do we just only have the restored Star Wars and that’s it? Where do the other two restorations come from? How long do people have to wait to get them? Who is paying who to do them?
If ever there was going to be a restoration that became salable product, it was only ever going to be done in-house, or a licensed deal with a third party company who could do all three at once to a consistent level, and who would likely be willing to pay a decent price for the opportunity to do it.
And honestly, if they were ever going to make whatever restoration efforts a salable product intended for the consumer market, THAT’S probably when you’d see a bunch copyright strikes, DMCA takedowns, and the sorts of actions that we’ve been afraid of for over 20 years now. I think we’ll have a good idea if and when a original theatrical versions is actually coming to market because the fan-restoration “market” will get noticeably disrupted ahead of time.
Hey, I prefaced it with “Last grasp at straws” and it’s been literally MONTHS since I last brought it up, LOL. The endgame is close and even though it’s likely not going to go our way here, I don’t think there’s any harm to making that last grasp, and I’d hope there’s no hard feelings. I can say there’s no ill will intended on my part, and I’m not going to be mad if the hail mary gets deflected out of bounds. I expect it, and I’m still looking forward to sitting down in front of the final product (or one of the versions of the final product, if the Rey Nobody edit is still on its way).
It’s one final bit of feedback before last call, is all. If anything, it says a lot about the amount of work, time, energy, and results that this thread has shown to everyone reading it that of all the changes, cuts, and additions to the movie being made by the fans here, that the only two things that still stand out ot me as “fixable” are those two things. That’s a hell of a better ratio than the ACTUAL RELEASED FILM had. 😃
I watched the whole opening section that way to try it out and it felt rushed to me.
I don’t understand how it could feel rushed when there’s no actual RUSHING happening, as opposed to the Mustafar Minute, which is nothing but 15 bad cuts and a bunch of audio/visual mess shoved inbetween them. The pacing from Kylo jumping into Exegol’s orbit up until the end of that scene with Palpatine is fairly slow and measured. Things are happening, but they’re happening in an orderly, interesting fashion, as opposed to the jumble of disconnected and inarguably confusing images that is the whole of Mustafar - a whole that is ultimately meaningless in the larger storytelling context.
Leaving Mustafar in doesn’t offset TROS’ “breakneck” pace, it contributes to it (it sets the film’s tone, honestly), because it’s a bunch of visual junk “storytelling” with all of the point and purpose cut out of it, happening right up front, for little-to-no narrative return. It’s part of why the movie FEELS breakneck and exhausting overall - because the first thing you’re exposed to is sloppy editing of disjointed imagery going for a couple minutes straight before it actually settles down and STARTS THE STORY on Exegol.
Oh, and one last (Columbo-esque) thing - if we’re still poking around for music changes, I think sticking with Burning Homestead for Rey and the Force Ghosts is a mistake. It doesn’t fit either tonally OR musically (it’s in the wrong key and transitions poorly, just on a technical level) and of all the music choices made, it’s the one that seems the most stereotypically “Fan-edit”-esque. It’s going to the easy fanservice well nakedly, and one time too many. Better NO music for that moment than the second tracked re-usage of Burning Homestead.
poppasketti mocked it up once, and it just feels 100% correct, not just for a fan-edit, but for the movie. It’s also a really strong opening shot across the bow so far as the first cut in a fan-edit goes.
2016 Ghostbusters was… okay. It should have been funnier.
Then again, that goes for Ghostbusters 2, and basically everything ever Ghosbustered since 1984.
…fwiw, last grasp at the straws of a request: I think the best possible opening to Rise of Skywalker is to just cut from the opening crawl to Kylo jumping in to frame in front of the nebula. Excise Mustafar entirely. It’s pointless, confusing, ugly, and mostly meaningless. The jump-in is cleaner, and honestly way more in keeping with Star Wars tradition (pan down to ship on the way to a planet - not to that enemy ship parked over it waiting for a bad and incongruous cut to that planets surface before immediately jumping back into space again)
I understand that people think leaving the Mustafar Minute in has some worth, but I figure since everyone else is asking for under-the-wire changes and additions to this edit, I should go on record one last time as saying this one edit will engender so much more goodwill than any post-production attempts to save the Mustafar Minute without any of the actual meat that segment needs to justify itself (the Oracle, Vader’s Castle). Just start already on the way to Exegol. It’s so much more clean and purposeful from a storytelling AND a filmmaking perspective than throwing more globs of clay at the broken, misshapen vase that is this movie’s ungainly opening on Mustafar.
I also understand this won’t happen, but I figure one last hail mary attempt at getting it out there wouldn’t hurt. 😃
Now that the trilogy is finished, I gotta say the D+ versions by Oohteedee are definitely the go-tos. Maybe the stuff Harmy and Dre are cooking up for Despecialized v3 will top that due to the combo of Dre’s grades and Harmys abilities with mattes, rotoscoping, etc… but for now, using the 4K UHDs as the base and the 4K77/80/83 raw scans as the sources for replacement shots/scenes:
Star Wars D+77 v2.3
Empire D+80 v2.2
Jedi OTD83 v1.0
That’s the OT for me for the foreseeable future. Despecialized might change that, but these versions are as good as the original Star Wars has ever looked and sounded on home video.
But nothing past DVD, right?
I didn’t even click on the tile when I saw it, I just figured it’d be at best an upscale of the original DVD release, but I guess it’s full-on 4K.
This (and Fang’s post above) lends credence to the idea that they’re not going to do anything with their catalog on physical media. They’ll restore their movies and give them new 4K transfers, but it definitely seems like they want you to see them on their platform, and not on a disc.
Haha! I was pretty surprised to actually see it on Disney+ when I was scrolling thru the other day. I thought for sure they were going to try burying the evidence of it ever having existed, but there it was! And it turns out the only thing I actually remember about the movie is John Byner voicing Gurgi (munchies and crunchies!)
Oh wow, just checked - apparently it’s available in 4K HDR10 there. I didn’t even know until just now.
I believe that’s the case, yeah: If you buy the individual 4K releases, you get the new blu-ray pressing as a pack-in w/ the new 4K disc. But since the individual blu-ray-only releases came out BEFORE the 4K releases (before they were even announced, I think?) those discs are just repackaged 2011 blu-rays.
The covers, aside from the top banner saying whether it’s a 4K UHD or blu-ray only release, are identical otherwise.
Keep in mind those are only available in the box with the 4K, the individual releases are still the 2011 version.
Have we ever gotten confirmation of that? Only one source said that, and it only said it was a rumor, so I’m not sure.
I believe that’s correct: the new masters on blu-ray are only included as a pack-in on the 4K UHD releases (either the full box or the individual titles). The discs in the blu-ray only release are from 2011. I believe there is no way to buy the new masters on blu-ray unless you are buying the 4K discs.
The UK blu-ray only Skywalker Saga box that was talked about frequently in this thread before the release might be different, but I don’t know that anyone who bought that one (the Wal-Mart link that kept getting posted was essentially a link to import the UK set) has written about it since they got it.
LexX said:
Even VHS tapes are now in high demand on crappy films that don’t have any later releases. Just wait and see.
But those companies aren’t re-releasing VHS tapes to respond to that secondary market demand. You seem to be suggesting that because old, dead media fetches a high price on the resale market due to scarcity, it’s a no brainer that Disney will re-release that media.
If Disney is really deciding to call it a day with physical media releases for catalog product, as the report states, the used market gouging itself isn’t going to be justification for their starting it back up again a decade later, I don’t think. In 10 years what’s a little more likely is that physical releases end up occupying the same collector’s niche that vinyl and cassettes occupy now, IF that. But considering what the last 10 years of home entertainment has looked like, barring a significant disruption of internet access worldwide, it seems pretty clear that physical media distribution isn’t going to enjoy a renaissance, especially not if one of its major producers decides they’re done with it for the most part.
Too M-U-C-H assumptions. Move along.
How was that post “assumptive?” I’m speaking on the report I shared. I didn’t file the report, or do the reporting, so I’m not trying to make a bunch of declarative, concrete statements, because I don’t have the firsthand knowledge to do so. Why is that worthy of criticism? And what other way SHOULD there be a conversation about things you don’t have firsthand access to?
While that may be true for now, it can change easily.
If they’re moving forward with discontinuing the release of catalog titles (or possibly licensing those titles to boutique labels) they obviously don’t believe there’s much money here. Disney could “cash in” now if they want, and they don’t. They sent the Skywalker Saga set out to die, basically, and they hardly promote any of the new releases they do have. Physical media is dying and it seems like Disney has decided to (pun intended) let it go. It seems very, very much like they’re going to address the “do you want to own something from our catalog” situation by pointing people to Disney+. That’s the “cash-in” they’re pursuing.
If Mulan clears a profit (and it might be able to considering Disney doesn’t have to share any of that revenue with anyone, so the amount of money it needs to gross is much smaller) it seems like Disney+ is going to be how they move forward for everything. The physical media audience is niche enough that they don’t need to cater to it anymore, so they won’t. They’ll maybe accept money from some boutique label to press up limited edition blu-rays, but I wouldn’t be surprised if those licenses aren’t cheap and so whatever hopes of a Criterion-esque (or even Criterion) release of Disney/Fox classics will be limited. That’s if Disney decides to let those titles be licensed.
Piracy really isn’t that much of a concern to the bottom line, and hasn’t been for long while. It’s been more of a boogeyman than an actual threat to business, especially not to any business the size of Disney. Pirated copies of Hamilton and Black is King aren’t even denting Disney’s subscription numbers, for example.
I think if there are hopes for a future Star Wars release that maybe someday possibly involves an official release of the theatrical versions, that release is going to be on Disney+. It’ll be a bonus feature they add one day. This announcement seems to be pointing that way.
As the characters exist currently this would feel totally out of character.
That’s why its a reboot.
This probably isn’t a great sign when it comes to any future physical releases of Star Wars
https://thedigitalbits.com/columns/my-two-cents/080720-1600
The article makes room for possible Star Wars releases still, but it really sounds like Disney’s about done with physical media, period. No catalog releases going forward. No promotion for the catalog releases they’ve already got.
If you were waiting for a 50th/60th anniversary box-set, you might never stop waiting.
Padme openly forms the rebellion with Mon Mothma
Padme tries to kill Anakin
Padme and Obi-Wan are a thing
Palpatine’s ascension is less “machiavellian 4-D chess” and more “Fascist strongman preys on the weak”
Boba Fett has nothing to do with the clones.
Luke and Leia aren’t related
Rey Nobody
Finn and Rey are both openly force sensitive
Finn and Poe are soulmates
The music transition IS really good.
Quick corrections: There’s no H in “Jon Favreau” and (I just looked this up) he didn’t direct any of the Mandalorian’s episodes. I knew he was the executive producer and the primary showrunner - but he never did direct any of the Mandalorian’s episodes.
The Guardians of the Whills suite is so gooooood.
People don’t talk a lot about Giacchino’s score for that movie but it’s really one of my favorites.
I almost put down “The Spark” for TLJ but while that’s my favorite musical bit in that movie I don’t think you could call it the movie’s theme. Same with Asteroid Field and ESB.
I also really like The Droid March as it was heard in Attack of the Clones. That piece could have been the PT’s “Imperial March” - I guess it kind of is, but it could have been MORE so. But that would have necessitated writing the droid army completely differently, I think.
Johnson just seemed bent on the angle of “I’m going to shake up the Star Wars franchise and turn it on it’s ear”. Where did he get off deciding the franchise needed shaking up? What it needs are great characters and stories.
Those two things aren’t mutually exclusive. See: The Empire Strikes Back.
He didn’t “get off” anywhere, I don’t think? Not looking at all the behind-the-scenes footage and interviews, at least. It seems like the “angle” he was bent on WAS “great characters and stories.” If that happened to “shake up” people who watched it, all the better, but the idea he superficially went in to trash Lucasfilm’s hotel room seems weird and unfounded to me. He’s not Josh Trank or anything, LOL.
But it seemed like a fairly traditional Star Wars movie to me in most aspects. For as controversial as the film’s since become, there isn’t much in it that you can’t source back to earlier films setting precedent.
Anyway, the themes of the Star Wars movies are:
The Throne Room
The Imperial March
The Forest Battle
Duel of the Fates
Across the Stars
Battle of the Heroes
The Scavenger
The Resistance is Reborn
We Go Together
Special mention to The Asteroid Field, TIE Fighter Attack, Luke & Leia, and Han Solo & the Princess.
I think if the visual is too subtle only nerdy forum geeks like us will pick it up.
Who do you think is going to be watching this, LOL.
Seriously though, it’s kind of a jump to describe the suggestion as being too subtle for a thing I’m comparing to the V-hold on a TV being broken. That’s not a subtle thing. It’s just not constant
I’m not saying the effect, as-is, is bad. It looks very good, especially considering it’s placed right next to the professionally done effect that is Kylo’s saber, and it blends right in. But I’m saying maybe it shouldn’t look exactly like Kylo’s saber - it should be broken in a slightly different manner. Maybe not as constantly noisy and crackly, but more of a rolling, wave-like fluctuation.
Looking at the effect, I think maybe it could/should be a little more subtle? In keeping with the audio mix also being more subtle. Maybe less of a constant crackle? Not only would this be less work (from a practical standpoint) but if you choose which shots should have the blade sort of shimmer/undulate with energy every now and again, it’d make it obvious that the reforged blade isn’t fully whole, but not as in-turmoil or disturbed as Kylo’s is.
Right now, it looks like its’ effectively the same energy moving through both blades, and the idea here is, from what I’ve gathered, that Rey’s blade is SIMILAR, but not exactly the same on that note. She did a better job fixing the blade that was broken (LOTR, I know, but still) and I think the best way to get that across is by only subtly manipulating the image - essentially, every 5-10 seconds or so there’s a ripple of unstable energy that crackles and rolls from hilt to point and back again.
LOL, I just realized that the effect I’m kind of describing is (and this is for the old-folks here) a faulty vertical hold on a tube tv. Not EXACTLY that same effect, but something along those lines. The picture is mostly stable, but it jitters some, and every now and again it just ROLLS before settling back down.
Finally saw The Bold One!
There is definitely a tendency to over-correct that pops up here and there. There’s also some scenes where it almost looks like a slightly-off HDR-to-SDR conversion in the highlights. It seems to mostly happen in the scene where Han meets Q’ira again.
If the Bold One’s… boldness, LOL… could be tamed just a smidge, it’d be perfect. I think as a guideline for what Chase is trying to do, it’s a good one. It serves as a good example of just how much color information is still there under all that low-contrast imagery, and how much the movie can pop with a few solid adjustments. It also serves as an example of what going just a bit too far can look like.
Honestly, someone could probably do a general full-movie adjustment of Bold One that reduces some of the blue and green, pulls the contrast down just a smidgen, maybe ups the brightness just a touch, and turns down the saturation mildly, and it would fit RIGHT in next to Empire Strikes Back, Rogue One, or The Last Jedi in terms of visual appearance.
(edit: Although applying an adjustment to “The Bold One” in its release form would probably be not great as there are quite a few compression artifacts going on with that file. It wasn’t encoded as well as it could have been, I don’t think)
I think it might be the settings on whatever you’re viewing the rips with? I’m doing an A-B and the first cap isn’t just noisier, it’s blurrier and darker, too. Granted, it’s Laserdisc - there’s only so much detail to be found, but I don’t think the dynamic range of the image is lacking. The Phantom Menace is a pretty contrasty disc, and I’ve seen it on some monitors/TVs where the shadow detail DOES get lost and crushed. But in this case, if that’s happening, it looks like it’d be more likely to happen in Cap A than in Cap B.
For example, take a look at the difference between the shadows playing across Qui-Gon’s eyes and brow. In Cap A, they’re not only darker, but there are wrinkles under the eyes and at the corner of his mouth that get lost completely in the shadows being cast. In Cap B, you can see, even in the shadows, those wrinkles.