SpilkaBilka

I'm basically a fan of 2 SW movies.  Star Wars is my absolute favorite movie of all time.  The sense of adventure, excitement, the great characters, the build-up and release of tension, the incredible environment/universe, and the absolute flawless pacing make it, IMHO, the greatest movie ever made.

I do like ESB a lot... it's a great movie, but for me, it's not even close to SW.  Gonna be totally honest here- and I swear I'm not trying to troll anyone... I'm not a fan of Vader being Luke's father- in fact I think it's kind of silly and takes everything to soap-opera land.  I often wonder what other SW movies could've been like if Vader was not Luke's dad.  The universe would've been much bigger, that's for sure.

ROTJ... I like purely out of nostalgic value.  It was actually possibly my favorite SW movie when I was a kid, but now I think it's a below-average movie.  It's got some cool scenes in it, but really the only interest I have in it is that it wraps up the story of these characters that I'm incredibly invested in.

I've got nothing to say about the prequels that hasn't already been said.

Not to derail the thread, but is that guy in the background with the funny hat supposed to be the same guy who's an advisor to Palpatine in ROTJ?

So today I was thinking about film preservation, but more specifically, the process that goes into scanning a movie for home video release (eg, blu ray).  I kind of had an “ah ha” moment (that could very well be wrong!).

Now, I know very, very little about this subject, so this may be an ignorant question… but for home video releases, doesn’t it make the most sense to scan a theatrical print of a film, rather than an earlier generation source, such as an interpositive?

I could be totally off-base with this, but my reasoning is: when filmmakers make a movie, don’t they take into consideration the generational losses that occur when going from the original camera negative to the interpositive, from the interpositive to the internegative, and finally from the internegative to the theatrical print?  And aren’t those losses part of what makes the movie “the movie”?

That is, I would assume they make filmmaking decisions knowing that grain will increase, and resolution will be lost by the time theatrical prints are made.  For example, when doing practical effects, perhaps they realize that the harness cables that yank the stunt man across the room may be clearly visible on early generation prints, but won’t show up on theatrical prints.

So, when a digital master is struck using an earlier generation print, is it possible the audience might see things that the filmmakers did not intend them to see?  Other than the filmmakers themselves, does anyone actually ever get to see an interpositive projected?  It sounds crazy, but wouldn’t a scan of an interpositive be too good, and not represent what the film was actually supposed to look like?

In other words, isn’t the theatrical print the final product, and is in fact “the movie”?  As Star Wars fans who want to see what audiences saw in 1977, shouldn’t we actually want a (preferably pristine) scan of what would’ve been projected in theaters?  Wouldn’t a digital scan of an interpositive not represent that?

Of course, I assume there are no “pristine” theatrical prints floating around, and scanning one and cleaning it up takes a tremendous amount of effort (thank you team_negative1!).  But couldn’t a studio that’s releasing an old movie clean up the interpositive, print a new internegative from it, and then print a new “theatrical” print from that (all on film), and then scan this new “theatrical” print for the blu ray release?  I know this sounds crazy, but wouldn’t the resulting digital master be the closest thing to what was projected in theaters when the film was released?

Does this make sense?  I know I have a lot to learn, so please be gentle. 😃

I love Mark Hamill.  He's funny and really seems like a great guy.

pittrek said:

Can you try this please ? http://www.ulozto.sk/xZ9T6RS/wampa-edit-mpg

This is awesome!  It's great seeing it all pieced together.

Man, those wampa suits look bad.

Another addition to my Ignore list.

Threat.

h_h, you've done amazing work.  Your 5.1 mix is just incredible.

I was reading through some of the earlier posts in this thread, and I had a question about Luke's "spit" sound on the Death Star that you removed.  This is right after Luke says "what good will it do us if he gets himself killed.  Come on," right?  Just wanted to make sure I'm understanding those earlier posts correctly, because it sounds like you actually put it back in (which I think is a great decision by the way).

Harmy, regarding audio tracks, have you considered adding the 1985 stereo mix?  (I believe it debuted on 1985 VHS releases and was first found on LD in 1989).  I don't think it's a whole lot different from the 1977 stereo mix, except it does have C3PO's tractor beam line from the mono mix.  It would be interesting to have, just for the sake of completeness.

I don't know much about this project but I've always been curious- would an LD captured on the X0 come close at all to matching the quality of the GOUT?

VII: Chewbacca's Gambit

VIII: Live at Budokan

IX: Sithfall

And some of these newly composited elements are in slightly different positions in the frame, right?  Eg, the training remote is a little bit off in the SE.

I finally added someone to my Ignore list.

Am I the only one who thinks ROTS is actually even more horrible than AOTC?

TPM was terrible, and they just got worse and worse.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qi5gWk2H5Xc

Looks great, Harmy.  You can definitely see the difference switching between pictures in your second link.  I think the darkened image is more pleasing to the eye.

One other thing I noticed is that the cropping differs a bit in the shot with Ben, Luke, and R2 (42549 and 42550).  Not a big deal at all, just curious as to the reason for the change.

Keep up the great work!

I don't think Crusade is awful per se, but after watching it recently, it's really not a very good movie.  I used to love it, but it really does come across as an Indiana Jones spoof.  Though Raiders definitely had humor, it seems like every other line in Crusade is a joke.

I can't comment on Temple of Doom, because I haven't watched it in 10 years.  I can never get in the mood for it.  When I want to watch me some Indy, it's always Raiders.

Imrahil said:

Eh, that whole "this is the skywalker family saga" is revisionist stuff from the PT.  This is about Luke and Vader, sure, but to pretend it isn't also about Han and Chewie and Leia and the droids is silly, and missing the point.  Enough with the Jedi being the focus; get back to the rest of the universe which was the fun stuff in the first two movies.

This.  A thousand times this.

EDIT to add: I'm sure I'm in a very small minority of SW fans on this, but I am honestly sick of the Jedi.  I have lightsaber fatigue.

Though I despise Jar Jar and the prequels, this is actually an interesting idea.  It would be a movie for little kids, set in the SW universe, but not connected to the main saga in any way, kind of like those Ewok TV-movies (Caravan of Courage and Battle for Endor).

I was watching some RLM thing recently (can't remember if it was Half in the Bag or the TPM 3D commentary), and they talked about how JJ was the only character in TPM to actually have a character arc.

Maybe the movie really was supposed to be about JJ?  In the TPM webisodes and the "making-of" documentary, Lucas does say, "Jar Jar is the key to all of this..."

On a side note, I think JJ wouldn't have been nearly as annoying if he simply had a different VOICE.  That's probably the most irritating thing about him.

Just watched the sample.  Looks awesome!

I hope it's an adventure movie, like Star Wars.

I get where he's coming from though.

The films were already ruined when the SEs became the official versions of the movies.

Call me crazy, but the more these films are ruined, the more fans come over to "our side."

Obviously this is only anecdotal, and a small sample, but on sites such as AVSForum and blu-ray.com, there were lots of people who were disgusted by the 2011 blus.  A lot of them said things like, "you know, I could tolerate Greedo shooting first, and Jedi Rocks, and all that crap, but adding "Nooooo" to ROTJ just ruins it for me.  Now, I totally understand and sympathize with the POV of those SW 'purists.'  Fuck you, George."

If there's another OT release that still uses the SEs as a foundation, I hope even more ridiculous changes are made.  There'll be an even bigger backlash.  The movies can't be any more ruined than they already are.

He was really good in Shattered Glass.  Pretty good movie too.  But I don't think I've seen him in anything else.

Bingowings said:

It really does start to resemble a religious text when you have five different reasons for the big nosed bounty hunter to be on that street corner that day and they all have to be reconciled.

Which guy is this?  Would love to read about it on Wookieepedia.

What worries me the most is how much they'll try to make the new movies mesh with the PT...

Found these really cool 3D "walkthroughs" of the Millennium Falcon:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZbMjMb2qgY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iintEBWVAX8

He's uploaded some other cool stuff too.