There’s really no logical reason to think this reduces the chances of an OUT release.
Unless of course the chances already were zero, in which case they literally can’t be lowered anymore.
I remember reading in the earlier days of digital projection that the audio was simply “linear pcm essence.”
Since the digital version was already being delivered on a hard drive, it wouldn’t make much sense to have the dts audio on a separate disc. The whole reason dts worked that way was because it couldn’t be recorded as a track on the actual print the way dd and sdds were. They figured out a way to fit the dts timecode onto the print, which would sync to the dts cd. So whatever dts cd(s) we have for AotC are more than likely the 35mm version.
It’s been 16 years, but I’m still kicking myself for not catching the digital version when it was still playing at one of the closest theaters to where I lived. It was the only theater in Virginia showing it in digital, and of course there were only a hundred or so theaters in the country showing it digitally. After seeing the movie in DC on 35mm opening day, I just wasn’t in a rush to revisit it. It wasn’t until three or four weeks later that I fancied a rewatch, but by that point they’d moved it out of the digital auditorium for Scooby-Doo.
Either way, I’m still 99% certain the “to be angry…” scene wasn’t added until the dvd release. That summer was when I first started lurking and occasionally posting on the TFN boards (shudder). I remember plenty of talk about the alternate shot of Padme holding Anakin by his mechanical hand at the end and not a single mention of an extended bit of dialogue in the garage. Since one of those changes is quite a bit more noticeable than the other, I think it’s safe to say the “to be angry…” exchange wasn’t in the dlp version.
There was one person who swore they saw two different edits of the beginning of the arena scene (when padme is picking her lock), but that’s the only thing aside from the hand-holding that people were talking about that summer.
One last funny story I’ll share. I remember listening to the dvd commentary that November and George mentioning during the big Arena battle that he’d decided after the movie’s release to go back and add sparks to Jango Fett’s backpack. Well, he must not have expected it to already be showing up in the version he was actually sitting down to watch because he stops mid-sentence in surprise, pauses for a moment, and then says to the vfx guys “I just put that in yesterday for crying out loud!”
I’m like 99.99999% certain that that part of the scene wasn’t added until the dvd.
I think it’s likely that Lucasfilm will restore the OOT once Disney’s buyout of Fox is complete since ANH will no longer be a factor.
Whether or not we ever see the ‘97 SE and the theatrical prequels restored is another story. In a world where we got five different cuts of Blade Runner spread across three separate discs, it seems pretty backwards to not at least include the original/‘97/“final” versions of each OT film.
I don’t think TV is part of the deal, so they wouldn’t get The Simpsons.
Disney would get any and all IP owned by Fox, so they would get The Simpsons.
The Murdochs would hold on to the Fox network itself since Disney owning more than one of the “big four” (they already own ABC) would violate antitrust regulations.
The IMAX place here just reopened after months of renovation. Should I see Solo there, or not worth it?
Meh. I saw it on a small screen and it didn’t seem like I missed out on much.
There were no scenes shot in IMAX that I noticed. If you don’t have to go too far out of your way to get there it’s a fine way to see it. I don’t think the sound system at my local IMAX is up to snuff as it was the when I saw the first Abrams Trek movie there. Almost like they’ve dialed back the subwoofers.
Really blows there were no IMAX film prints made this time. I worry they aren’t going to bother for Episode IX now. 😕
Solo was an Alexa 65 production like Rogue One. They shot with spherical lenses, which means they could have opened up the frame for the IMAX version for any scene in the movie if they’d wanted to.
As far as I know, they kept it at 2.40:1 for the entire movie in the Imax version.
I guess there would’ve been something wrong about shooting parts of The Last Jedi in actual 15-perf 65mm film only to keep everything at 2.40:1 in the Imax version and then opening up the frame in the Imax version of the movie that didn’t even shoot on actual celluloid.
Does anyone else get the feeling that this film will serve as an introduction/segue to the upcoming Boba Fett / Bounty Hunters movie? Even though I knew Maul was going to show up in advance, I was still surprised at how much of him they revealed. I figured they’d only show him wit his hood on, and that’s it. Fan will recognize him, casual viewers won’t. But no, he pulled out his lightsaber and everything. I find it weird that Lucasfilm will just drop that scene ad just expect peope to google how Maul is alive. Plus, the whole Qi-Ra subplot wasn’t resolved, so I have a feeling that Crimson Dawn might be a big part of the upcoming Boba Fett movie. And since Han and Fett have knew each other prior to ANH, they might bring back Alden Ehrenreich as well.
As for my opinion of the movie itself; I don’t really have much more to add than what’s already been said here. It was quite fun. A few oddities here and there, but it worked just fine. L3 got a bit too close to Jar Jar territory for me, but she never crossed the line and she ended up being a somewhat small character. Ehenreich worked fine for me. I saw more of Ford in him towards the end of the film, which makes sense as he’s more cynical towards the end (e.g more like ANH Han). If she returns I think he’ll be more Ford-like then. And I’m overall impressed by how much depth they added to his characters. I was surprised by just how sympathetic and engaging (to me at least) the Han/Qi-Ra subplot was.
I do think it’s funny how they made L3 the reason for Threepio’s comment in ESB about the Falcon’s computer having a weird personality. And I don’t think I’ve ever seen some many EU references in a movie before. Even the Pykes showed up, and I find it amusing that they mentioned Teräs Käsi, considering how generally negative opinions are about that game(though I guess that might be part of the joke). (Did anyone else get the impression that the EU stuff might be Jon Kasdan’s work?)
I suspect they’ll fold this into the Boba Fett movie.
It’s sorta reminding me how X-Men Origins: Magneto simply became X-Men: First Class.
So what were the names of all the planets visited in this movie?
I feel like I can only remember half of them:
Corellia
Mimban
Vandor
(where did we meet Lando?)
Kessel
Beach Planet
Forest Planet at the very end
Pretty sure when Threepio says “Your ship has a most peculiar dialect” in Episode V it’s now referring to L3 being part of the Falcon.
My thoughts exactly!
So what did people catch in terms of EU references? The film was chock full. I counted a reference to possibly each of the Smith Lando novels (mentions of Oseon, a “Starcave,” and being inside a temple which I can only assume is a nod to the first book), yet I didn’t notice any reference to the Daley books, oddly enough. Beckett killed Aurra Sing apparently. There were a few other good ones I’m forgetting.
Dryden is eating Colo Claw Fish in that one scene. Qi’Ra mentions she learned Teras Kasi from Dryden, but I guess she was lying since it was obviously Maul who trained her.
Oh, and I love how we’ve arrived at that point in our pop culture where we get to hear Woody Harrelson pronounce “Glee Anselm” in his own special way multiple times throughout a movie.
Welp, I just now bought my ticket and got into what has to be the shortest line I’ve ever seen for a Star Wars movie here for the 10pm regular 2D showing at AMC Mazza Gallerie. TFA 10:something early Thursday night was the last time I saw a Star War here.
I’ve been in line maybe fifteen minutes and it’s barely increased in that time from twenty people to only fourty or so.
Granted, ticket prices here are the lowest in DC for a reason. No reserved seating, though. That’s why I didn’t want to risk cutting it too close.
If Disney’s buyout of Fox actually goes through, Lucasfilm-under-Disney is officially out of excuses re: an OOT restoration.
Maybe someone could do a 16:9 crop of the 2.35:1 image area from the GOUT and see how it compares?
per a suggestion on the blu-ray.com forums, I turned off 24p output on the BD player. Now it works.
That you have to turn that off is ridiculous in the first place. They probably instituted some new copy protection scheme that isn’t compatible with older players.
Probably. But what doesn’t make sense to me is that 24p settings have anything to do with copy protection schemes.
It kinda/sorta makes sense.
I had the exact same problem on my sony S5200 player as well. I picked up the 4k combo thursday morning at best buy on my way into work. I don’t have any 4k gear, but I’ve been future-proofing the physical media purchases whenever possible. In any event, that part is irrelevant since this issue has also been affecting people who only bought the regular blu. It’s the exact same bd whether it comes with a dvd or a uhd.
Anyway, finally got home late that night, unwrapped the plastic, threw the blu-ray into the player, saw what I assumed to be the background for the language select screen Disney always loves showing us first on all their titles and … the languages didn’t appear. Worse, my player completely locked up and I had to unplug the power just so I could start over. It randomly worked the second time, and I watched the movie all the way through (my first viewing since catching a 12:45 AM screening at the Uptown here in DC back on that first Thursday night in December!) before starting the audio commentary and getting a few scenes in before passing out. When I tried it again the next day it froze up again forcing me to unplug the power, and kept doing so even after nearly a dozen attempts. I have no idea why it randomly worked the second time the night before.
I tried messing with some of the player’s other settings. It should go without saying I made sure the firmware was up to date. I swear this is the very first disc I’ve had any problems with since getting the player three years ago. Finally I tried turning off 24p as suggested on the blu-ray.com forums, and the disc loaded successfully.
My theory?
This new breed of DRM that Disney put on the disc is finding something suspicious about the hardware chain in the player and thinks something on the other end of the hdmi connection might be trying to capture the native 24p signal coming off the disc. That’s why switching to 60p gets the disc working, because the DRM doesn’t care as much (I guess?) about the hdmi signal being captured on the other end if it’s had 3:2 pulldown applied to it and is no longer the pure 24p source itself.
HDTV
That’s what I thought.
I’m guessing we’re seeing more vertical info in the 1.78:1 hdtv version because the blu-ray was probably cropped on all four sides (in order to keep the aspect ratio at 2.40:1 without resizing/scaling the pixels down to 3840:1600 / 1920:800 from 4096:1706 / 2048:853) whereas the hdtv version simply crops off the sides to get the picture from 4096:1706 / 2048:853 to 3036:1706 / 1518:853. Hence we’re getting the full vertical information in the 1.78:1 version.
Has anyone done a similar comparison between the blu-ray and hdtv versions of TFA aside from the imax scene?
Force Awakens was filmed in anamorphic Panavision, thus the HDTV is pure pan and scan.
That’s a separate issue from what I was talking about.
Even if a movie is native 2.40:1, the 4,096/2,048 width cinema master either needs its pixels resized (which results in scaling artifacts) or needs to be evenly cropped on all four sides (so that the aspect ratio stays the same) in order to match the pixels 1:1 to the 3,840/1,920 width tv master.
But if they don’t need to worry about preserving the theatrical AR and simply want to fill out the 16:9 tv frame, well, then they only need to crop information off the sides and not the top and bottom.
Again, I’d love for someone to check the non-imax scenes of TFA’s hd broadcast to see if we’re getting just a little more vertical information from the original source.
HDTV
That’s what I thought.
I’m guessing we’re seeing more vertical info in the 1.78:1 hdtv version because the blu-ray was probably cropped on all four sides (in order to keep the aspect ratio at 2.40:1 without resizing/scaling the pixels down to 3840:1600 / 1920:800 from 4096:1706 / 2048:853) whereas the hdtv version simply crops off the sides to get the picture from 4096:1706 / 2048:853 to 3036:1706 / 1518:853. Hence we’re getting the full vertical information in the 1.78:1 version.
Has anyone done a similar comparison between the blu-ray and hdtv versions of TFA aside from the imax scene?
What’s the source for the taller AR?
Interesting that he hasn’t really done much TV, but either way he is talented.
Not on the writing end of things, but he’s dabbled in tv a bit over the last few years.
He directed the pilot episodes of Revolution, The Orville and Young Sheldon and executive produced The Shannara Chronicles.
Will 3.0 use 35mm scans for the vfx shots that were re-comp’d in the SE or is there too much of a discrepancy in quality from the blu-ray?
I’ve still never acquired a fan project simply out of my desire never to purchase the official blu-rays in order to watch one,* but once this 1080p version happens I might just need to get the saga on the cheap and spend the rest on three dual-layered dvd-r’s and/or a nice big usb stick.
*Between the Disney/Fox deal and everything else going on with the franchise these days, I’ve just been patiently waiting for it to happen for real. I mean, for crying out loud, they’re using clips from despecialized in EW videos now!
John Knoll broke it down in an interview with Slashfilm last year when asked how many vfx shots were in Rogue One:
“It’s about 1,700. The original A New Hope was about 360. Empire Strikes Back was about 700. Return of the Jedi was about 900 or 950. Episode I was 1,900-something, 1950, I think. Episode II was 2,200. Episode III was 2,400. Episode VII was, I think just under 2,000. So we’re kind of in the middle.”
We do have Carnival Magic on Blu-ray, but we still don’t have Star Wars '77!
I barely survived the MST3K version! And how the hell did that thing get a G rating? There’s an attempted vivesection scene for pete’s sake!
The MPAA ratings for many older films are baffling to me.
2001: A Space Odyssey got a G rating, as did Star Trek: The Motion Picture. The audio remix done for the TMP director’s edition actually bumped it up to a PG, if you could believe it.
Also, I remember reading once that Star Wars ‘77 was actually going to get a G rating but George himself requested it be PG.
The single most confusing rating of all time in my book has got to be Spaceballs getting a PG in 1987, three years after the pg-13 was introduced.
While we’re on the subject, the most well-known Star Wars parody has a decent-looking blu-ray transfer and Star Wars doesn’t.
TPM had trailers for American Pie and Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, both of which mentioned Star Wars. Fox put together a “sizzle reel” of three short trailers for Anna and the King, Fight Club, and Titan AE. There was a news story several days earlier IIRC that Lucasfilm had actually demanded the total runtime of trailers in front of TPM not exceed ten minutes or so (maybe it was more like 15 minutes, can’t remember now, it was almost 19 years ago).
The trailer for Like Mike played in front of my opening day screening of AotC. I only remember that because a friend joked as we were leaving the theater during the end credits that AotC had no chance of beating its box office.
The first teaser for the Matrix sequels was also in front of AotC. I had just seen the official upload online the night before in what must’ve been tiny quicktime, but I remember my friend sitting next to me going “Zion!” when they showed that wide shot of all the people assembled in the cave.
I can’t for the life of me remember what played in front of RotS. If I had to guess, I’d say Batman Begins and Fantastic Four were probably among them.
The documentary Side by Side covers this whole topic pretty well. It’s basically about how digital technology has changed every aspect of the film industry over the last several decades. Lucas and David Tattersall are both interviewed, among many others.
Tattersall makes an interesting analogy regarding the criticism at the time that they were taking a giant step backwards quality-wise by choosing to shoot Ep2 in digital:
“You’ve got to lean back in order to spring forward.”
It does bother me that AotC and RotS will never have the same unified look as TPM, the OT and now the ST, but it was George’s money being spent on the PT and he didn’t want several million dollars going just towards scanning in all of the 35mm footage on the last two prequels like he had to do with TPM.
There were 4 different versions of the movie in 2002 alone:
The digital cinema version that played in a hundred or so theaters in the U.S. had Anakin and Padme holding hands at the end whereas the 35mm version simply had Anakin’s metal hand hanging there in that shot.
The Imax version released later that year in November is about twenty minutes shorter since this was still the very earliest days of full-length Hollywood movies being released in 15/70 and the projector platters could only hold 120 minutes worth of film.
Apollo 13 was the first to get the Imax DMR treatment earlier that year and was also shortened. AotC was the second IIRC.
The platter problem was rectified soon after since the Matrix sequels released the very next year were not shortened for Imax.
The current limit is apparently 167 minutes, so there’s a reason the theatrical versions of Watchmen, Avatar, and the only version of Dark Knight Rises all happen to fit just within that running time. Interstellar just barely fit and apparently used a slide-show version of the end credits to shave off three minutes without removing anything from the actual movie.
Anyway, this brings us finally to the dvd/vhs version which was released within only a week or so of the Imax version (which never made any sense to me from a business perspective but then again this is the same Lucasfilm that decided to release TPM 3D in theaters several months after the blu-ray).
The main change made for the dvd/vhs (yes, they’re identical outside of obvious differences like framing) was the extended scene of Anakin’s confession to Padme about the Tusken slaughter. In the theatrical versions, it wipes to the next scene before Padme’s “to be flawed is to be human” (or whatever she says) and Anakin’s “I’m a Jedi, I know I’m better than this.” Btw, the audio of Anakin saying “I’m a Jedi” was used in that web-exclusive teaser-teaser trailer in October/November of ‘01, so it was a nice surprise when it showed up in the movie a year later.
Maybe they just need to recoup their investment as soon as possible.
Ron Howard reshooting most of Lord/Miller’s principle photography must have run the budget up quite a bit.
