# The Last Jedi "silent movie" edition



## packetslave (Mar 16, 2018)

According to the director, "The Last Jedi" (both digital and Blu-ray release) will have a special "silent movie" version included, with no dialogue or no sound effects, just Williams' score from beginning to end. 

http://www.nme.com/news/film/star-wars-last-jedi-music-only-release-2263356

Very cool idea! I wish more films did this.


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## ghostnote (Mar 16, 2018)

Still the pictures in it!


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## angeruroth (Mar 16, 2018)

They could also include a no-music version so we could try to emulate the masters


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## Consona (Mar 16, 2018)

I'd appreciate no-movie version of that movie.


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## Alex Fraser (Mar 16, 2018)

Trailer for the score only edition.
Sadly for a limited time only and not available in the UK as far as I can see. Such a shame when something as important as this is used for marketing leverage..


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## whinecellar (Mar 16, 2018)

Consona said:


> I'd appreciate no-movie version of that movie.



HA! Couldn’t agree more. First SW movie I only saw once - and that was enough. Hopeful JJ can redeem it in IX...


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## TGV (Mar 17, 2018)

If they didn't do anything odd that changes phase or frequency balance, you could subtract the soundtrack from the movie, and have a dialog and FX only version.


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## d.healey (Mar 17, 2018)

TGV said:


> If they didn't do anything odd that changes phase or frequency balance, you could subtract the soundtrack from the movie, and have a dialog and FX only version.


Tell me more


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## NoamL (Mar 17, 2018)

d.healey said:


> Tell me more



How to:

1. Split every channel of the music-only version to mono.
2. Split every channel of the full movie to mono.
3. Pair up each set of mono tracks into a stereo track with the movie on the left and the music on the right. SYNC MUST BE SAMPLE ACCURATE
4. Use the Audacity VST kn0ck0ut with highest quality settings and "extract center = off"
5. Split the resulting stereo track to mono again, throw away the empty right track.
6. Reassemble the mono tracks into the surround configuration.


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## NoamL (Mar 17, 2018)

Alex Fraser said:


> Trailer for the score only edition.
> Sadly for a limited time only and not available in the UK as far as I can see. Such a shame when something as important as this is used for marketing leverage..



BTW people have been crapping on this movie for some reason, but this trailer shows the director really does understand the music and how it makes his movie so much better. Especially his line about "not just the big action scenes but the beats of every emotional scene, every nuance in the dialogue."

I wrote this after first seeing the movie -

_"Musically it is one of the best Star Wars scores that John Williams has EVER written. "The Last Jedi" is an action movie & it's about 30 minutes too long. So the music has some heavy lifting to do to keep the audience excited. Besides the action sequences, TLJ is also all about people acting without talking. Close up shots, characters riven with indecision and all that. The music brings the thoughts and feelings of the characters to life with such expertise, care and nuance."_

And about the directing -

_"The cinematography is easily the best Star Wars has ever had. The way Rian Johnson conceives action scenes is so fluid and creative. He manages to inject some "Wow, never seen that before" magic back into the fights and battles that definitely wasn't there in TFA or Rogue 1, at least for me. While his action directing will be lauded by every reviewer, he brought a similar magic to the character driven sequences and a little more... mystical/psychological? film making. There is one sequence in this film that made me sad he never got to direct a Potter movie.

When you put the acting, directing and music together and just leave them alone you get some of the most thrilling sequences ever in a Star Wars movie.

Where it all falls apart of course is the larger story and the script."
_
The way Rian Johnson "directed" John Williams is exactly how I'd direct him if I were a director. With humility. I'd say "These are the beats of the emotional scenes, now do it your way." That hands off approach resulted in the best Star Wars score since 1982. While the prequel scores are some of the best things JW has ever written when you listen to the soundtrack, they sure aren't given any respect in the movies. Whoever edited and mixed the prequels treated the score like a total afterthought, mixing it way down, ripping tracks to shreds and frankensteining bits together to make action scenes work. RJ let the score have a massive role in TLJ and it elevates the movie. Again, humility. Of all the people yet living who are still involved in Star Wars, haven't written themselves out, sold out, or been sidelined etc, no two people can really have a better claim to "owning Star Wars" than John Williams and Mark Hamill. TLJ is a movie that recognizes that.


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## ghostnote (Mar 17, 2018)

Alex Fraser said:


> Trailer for the score only edition.
> Sadly for a limited time only and not available in the UK as far as I can see. Such a shame when something as important as this is used for marketing leverage..


Watching this gives me the feeling that the only Star in this Star Wars is John Williams. The rest is just Fanboys who got the chance to work on a franchise movie. The whole series is just a mediocre hommage.


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## NoamL (Mar 17, 2018)

ghostnote said:


> Fanboys who got the chance to work on a franchise movie. The whole series is just a mediocre hommage.



For real? It's a movie series from 40 years ago. Of course the current generation of people working on it are fanboys. JJ Abrams was 16 when _Empire Strikes Back_ came out. 

The problem is not that these movies are homages but that they seem to have no idea of what to do to extend the story other than resurrect the Empire vs Rebels galactic civil war ... everything is just a big retread which undermines the end of ROTJ. There is no problem with creating a new chapter of the saga but there doesn't seem to be any big-picture and _finite _(beginning, middle, _end_) vision for what these new movies should do. It's the triumph of "content" and "product" and "cinematic universe" over saga and story. That sure isn't Rian Johnson's fault, blame Disney.


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## TGV (Mar 18, 2018)

I should also be possible to do it in a DAW with an inverter on the music track, and careful riding of the faders.


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## Alex Fraser (Mar 23, 2018)

Rian Johnson just confirmed via Twitter that the score only version is now available as a bonus extra when buying the movie on iTunes. So that’s international folks sorted.


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