My updated list:
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)
It Follows
The Conjuring 2
The Brood
The Evil Dead (1981)
The Witch
Hellbound: Hellraiser II (I don’t feel like reviewing all of these, but I want to note that this movie was an absolute dumpster fire)
The Others
Hoping to knock out Psycho and a few others this weekend.
I am beyond pleased about the prospect of a de-noised version. This is going to be one hell of a wait.
I switched to the regular track after the podrace, so I’m not actually sure about the second half.
Yes, the new LPs are reprints of the original soundtrack albums. I’ve got the picture LPs for Star Wars and content-wise they’re identical to my '77 soundtrack album. And I’ve got the new gold LPs for ESB and ROTJ and they also seem to be identical to their '80 and '83 counterparts, Lapti Nek, Yub-Nub and all - and the cover-art seems the same as the old ones too.
I ordered the hologram TFA LP soundtrack about a month ago too but it still has not arrived - can’t wait for that one.
Before seeing this post I had no idea there were new LPs apart from the picture discs. I’ve never been very fond of picture discs, but I had just ordered the ANH one an hour before and was prepared to wait however many months for the other two just because I’ve wanted these on vinyl for ages and I’m not willing to dish out the insane prices for used copies on Amazon. Luckily I popped into this thread, cancelled the order, drove to Barnes & Noble and snagged the whole set. So thanks.
Also, I picked up the hologram TFA LP last month. You have to basically be shining a flashlight straight into it for it to work, but it’s pretty cool.
I’m watching this now via Plex with the alternate audio track without the additional music in the podrace, and the sound has cut out for 20 or so seconds at a time more than once (so far: Watto’s and Anakin’s exchange in the junk shop after Qui-Gon and company’s first visit, the morning-of-the-race deleted scene, and the deleted scene with the podrace salvage droids). Without having to dig through the thread, is this a known issue? I believe I’ve got the latest release.
Thrawn has just been pitch perfect. I’m so happy this is how they brought him back into the canon.
I am finding that the Legends stuff is a lot more interesting and since the canon stories have been accumulating. I don’t mean that in a “Legends seems better because the new stuff is so bad” way at all, I just find I’m getting a kick out of comparing and contrasting between the two continuities that was never there before. I recently decided to give the NJO another go, and I’m finding it a lot more enjoyable and engaging than I did when it was the only game in town, so to speak.
[Camille Paglia said:]
The thing is once I had written about it, I realized, as I went out in the world, how few people had actually seen the movie, because people had given up on the prequels long before.
Therefore, I think anyone who dismisses what I say about the sublime quality, the vision, the execution, the emotions, and the passions of that scene, they don’t know what I’m talking about, because they haven’t exposed themselves to it.
This may be the single dumbest assumption I’ve ever seen (in a Star Wars context, that is).
Oh God damn it.
Lord Haseo said:
Plus James Earl Jones still does good Vader voice work so it would be a missed opportunity not to use him while he’s still alive.
This. He’s what, in his eighties? Vader is inevitably going to show up in something. I’d rather they get some Vader in while Jones is still around than hold off in the name of originality and recast.
Egg.
Of course, Ann Veal’s father was played by none other than Rogue One’s Alan Tudyk. It’s all connected, man.
Was anyone else into this card game? I collected the hell out of these cards when I was a kid, but I could never get any friends into it, owing largely to the fact that it was a much slower game than Pokémon, which had just blown up. Anyway, here in the present I’ve become interested in dusting off the old cards and and seeing what the game’s like with an adult attention span. I came across this site a while ago when I was looking for a good way to explain it to a couple of buddies I have who are into Magic: The Gathering, and I figured some folks here might be interested as well. I’m seriously rusty on the rules, and I haven’t finished making decks yet, but eventually I wouldn’t mind getting some games going. So uh . . . yeah. Check it out I guess.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say they suck, but I’ve come to prefer the theatrical cuts as well. I find most of the added humor to be pretty cringe-y (looking at you, Gimli). Really the only thing I miss from the extended cuts when I watch the theatrical ones is the flashback with Boromir and Faramir in The Two Towers.
I just watched the '78 Body Snatchers as well. It was good, but I think I prefer the original. I thought the remake had some pacing issues.
I certainly won’t be reaching 31 films this month, but I am going to try to watch as much as I can. So far I’ve seen the 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers (good), It Follows (great), and The Conjuring 2 (meh).
But my optimism is more with this site and the projects people are doing. Even if nothing is released officially, projects here and only getting better and better. If we think Despecialized looks good now, it’ll look even better after utilizing DrDre’s tools and cleaned up Silver Screen Edition scans (& perhaps Technicolor scans in the future?).
Assuming the Reliance scan is used for subsequent SE home releases and that it’s better than the Lowry transfer, I imagine even that will be a huge resource for future iterations of Despecialized.
Don’t know if this is too much of a spoiler (if it is, it may be time for a separate spoiler thread for this, as we’re now starting to get actual news), but apparently Zoe Kravitz, Naomi Scott, and Tessa Thompson are being considered for a role in the film. Since these actresses are all women of color, there’s speculation that the role is in fact Sana Starros, Han’s former fake wife from the current Marvel comics. It makes enough sense with the timeline that I’m willing to buy it for now.
source: https://www.inverse.com/article/21825-han-solo-star-wars-movie-casting-news-comic-character
I know a couple different folks were working on 2011 regrades a few months ago, but I haven’t heard anything new in a while.
FYI, if anyone is still curious about the presentation of these, they’re all free on xfinity on demand.
I’m amending my list as well to put ANH and ESB on equal ground (before I had ESB coming out ahead, but in the intervening months I’ve come to regret that placement).
ANH - 10
ESB - 10
TFA - 8
ROTJ - 7
TPM - 4
ROTS - 3
AOTC - 3
And since I’ve seen fan edits mentioned in a couple other posts, I’ll note that all of the prequels shoot up to around a 6 if we’re talking about Hal’s versions.
A friend of a friend is having a kegger today to raise money for her dog that needs like eight different surgeries. Finally, a chance to use my drinking for good!
Malafrena by Ursula K. LeGuin. Unlike her more well-known fantasy and science fiction works, this is a sort of fake 19th century European novel set in a fictional country. It’s damned good, she really nails that Tolstoy tone.
I also just finished The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson (nonfiction account of the production of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair and H. H. Holmes’s concurrent murder spree) and The Girls by Emma Cline (new novel loosely based on/inspired by the Manson family). I thought both were very good, though the Larson dragged in places and the Cline wasn’t exactly a pleasant reading experience.
Ugh, can we please kill off Maul for real already? Bringing him back was one of the most ridiculous decisions in the history of the franchise. I am glad to see the Bendu’s sticking around, though; I was worried he’d be a one-and-done.
I picked up the newish remastered Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? a little while ago to commemorate Edward Albee’s passing. Still haven’t watched it, though.
As far as the idea that the Zahn books would have made a better movie than TFA is concerned, I reread Heir earlier this year, and while I still like the book an awful lot, it’s so much more flawed and bizarre than people seem to want to admit. A lot of what worked on the page in 1991 would not translate to the screen in 2016. And anyway, piss and moan all you want about the lack of originality, but the character dynamics in TFA are a whole lot more interesting than the Super Best Friends Club of the cherished early EU. I’ll take shell-shocked Luke and backsliding Han over their well-adjusted Legends counterparts any day.
