Well, I finally saw it, now that it's on iTunes. It was better than I expected, the acting ranged from passable to excellent, and the droid had me laughing out loud. Glad I read the books first though, I'm not sure I would have really understood what was going on. Great locations and visuals, as usual, and I loved some of the forgotten cockpit footage from E4 thrown in during the space battles. I didn't even mind the CGI Tarkin and Leia. And the darker underbelly of the Rebellion was good to explore.

The only thing I didn't like was the soundtrack: it was terrible, like a toddler randomly whacking five different "soaring emotion" buttons at once.

But overall, good job.

I like the little bits that sound tribal and vaguely middle eastern, but even those aren't memorable.

6 minutes ago, Stan Fresh said:

I like the little bits that sound tribal and vaguely middle eastern, but even those aren't memorable.

I find that to be the case with most modern movie soundtracks.

No, the soundtrack could definitely have been a lot better. Actually, lets start with more subtle.

25 minutes ago, Nytwyng said:

I find that to be the case with most modern movie soundtracks.

Yeah? I can think of a bunch of memorable scores right away. Brick, Man of Steel, Gladiator, Arrival, Way of the Gun...

Even Force Awakens had Rey's Theme, which I find instantly recognisable.

What disappoints me the most about the movie is that apparently they did a bunch of reshoots and editing to make the female lead less abrasive. And so we end up with an indistinct character with a confused arc just because Girls Should Be Nice And Likeable instead of a hardcore freedom fighter that challenges the other rebels.

This came out a few days ago, and it pretty fairly sums up my opinions on the movie. Except for the "I liked it, and then didn't" aspect. I never really enjoyed it.

Holy crap that's a big window for it.

22 minutes ago, Stan Fresh said:

Yeah? I can think of a bunch of memorable scores right away. Brick, Man of Steel, Gladiator, Arrival, Way of the Gun...

Even Force Awakens had Rey's Theme, which I find instantly recognisable.

I did say "most," not "all."

Haven't seen Brick, Arrival, or Way of the Gun, so can't comment on their soundtracks.

Man of Steel, when playing in my head, tends to morph into Avengers, and a few other soundtracks.

I honestly can't remember Gladiator's soundtrack.

TFA, while technically a modern movie, has the benefit of Williams giving us a "legacy" old school score with some wonderful new additions.

In short, I don't leave the theater with the soundtrack easily accessible to my mind nearly as much as I used to.

As always, mileage varies.

OhI'm not trying to contradict you, just saying it's very different for me.

Winter Soldier! That was a great score, too! The dissonant electronic sound really worked for me.

The movies I mentioned are great, check 'em out if you have the time.

I cant think of the last really, really good modern soundtrack - and that includes E7, which was pretty tepid and boring. The Bond soundtracks have been terrible, the Marvel movies don't have that awesome "superman" touch about them and leave me cold*, and the DC movies are even worse. The R1 score was serviceable but not a classic.

*Save for Guardians of the Galaxy - but then Marvin Gaye and David Bowie makes everything better.

39 minutes ago, Stan Fresh said:

OhI'm not trying to contradict you, just saying it's very different for me.

Winter Soldier! That was a great score, too! The dissonant electronic sound really worked for me.

The movies I mentioned are great, check 'em out if you have the time.

Winter Soldier was indeed a good one.

Arrival's on the "to watch" list, but I haven't figured out how to squeeze more hours into a day.

The other two, I don't even recall having heard of.

32 minutes ago, Desslok said:

I cant think of the last really, really good modern soundtrack - and that includes E7, which was pretty tepid and boring. The Bond soundtracks have been terrible, the Marvel movies don't have that awesome "superman" touch about them and leave me cold*, and the DC movies are even worse. The R1 score was serviceable but not a classic.

I thought the LotR movies had a great soundtrack (and I think Howard Shore is great talent), this is a pretty interesting analysis:

6 minutes ago, Nytwyng said:

Winter Soldier was indeed a good one.

Arrival's on the "to watch" list, but I haven't figured out how to squeeze more hours into a day.

The other two, I don't even recall having heard of.

They're a couple years old. Brick is a neo-noir crime thriller with hyper-stylized hardboiled dialogue set around a high school.

The Way of the Gun is a thriller about a pair of criminal drifters played by Benicio del Toro and Ryan Philippe who abduct a surrogate mother carrying a shady rich guy's child in order to blackmail him, and the ensuing cat and mouse games. Pretty much everyone in that movie fits the definition of scum and villainy. Excellent, intelligent action and beautiful gunplay.

And now the Winter Soldier closing music is running through my head....

22 minutes ago, whafrog said:

I thought the LotR movies had a great soundtrack (and I think Howard Shore is great talent), this is a pretty interesting analysis:

Interesting. Does this really have that much emotional impact on most people?

Can't speak for anyone else, but it does for me. A good soundtrack can add emotional depth, and a lousy one can flatten it. It can also ruin a movie, like Inception (see South Park's take on it...)

But not everyone cares about music.

Just now, whafrog said:

Can't speak for anyone else, but it does for me. A good soundtrack can add emotional depth, and a lousy one can flatten it. It can also ruin a movie, like Inception (see South Park's take on it...)

But not everyone cares about music.

A bad soundtrack is awful and intrusive... but I don't get the other end of the scale.

1 hour ago, MaxKilljoy said:

Interesting. Does this really have that much emotional impact on most people?

Oh god, absolutely. A good soundtrack can elevate a mediocre scene to greatness and a terrible one can utterly kill a masterpiece. Check out the best example I could think of:

With Bernard Herrmann's trilling strings, the shower scene is utterly terrifying. Without it, it's - well it tells the story it needs to, but without any of the punch.

EDIT - another good example: Jaws. Throughout the whole movie, the soundtrack has been training you that Shark = Music and that No Music = No Shark (fake out moments like the boys with the cardboard fin). All the time, we get hints and suggestions and fleeting glimpses of the Shark, and every time we get John Williams leaning hard on the Bass section. Later in the movie, it's been a while without an attack, the audience has gotten relaxed, Brody is throwing out chum and suddenly BAM! SHARK! Our first good look at the beast, and there was no "okay, here comes the monster" music. It completely catches you off guard, creating one of the most memorable moments in the movie, and it's all because the soundtrack suckerpunched you.

1 hour ago, MaxKilljoy said:

Interesting. Does this really have that much emotional impact on most people?

Yes.

1 hour ago, MaxKilljoy said:

Interesting. Does this really have that much emotional impact on most people?

"Sometimes people have feelings. I'm referrin' here to people."

-Kaylee Frye

Just listening to a score and remembering an emotional scene it accompanied can move me to tears or make me giddy with joy.

With the release of the Blu-ray, I noticed a new Imperial shuttle. Yes, yet another one. There is a capital-sized shuttle (so not shuttle, but freighter a better name?) seen near the center of the shield gate at Scarif. It appears similar to the new 4-winged cargo shuttle, but much larger. It has the same wings, but there are eight of them (4 front and 4 back) plus it appears to be carrying several of the large, orange cargo containers atop its very flat top and bottom.

Googling I failed to find a good reference or what it might be called. This look shows it (poorly) in the middle of the gate. You get a much closer look during the movie, but I can't find an image:

I also caught another glimpse of the TIE striker assault shuttle or whatever it might be. Watching the movie again it was heavily implied it was carrying Krennic's team of 6 Death Troopers:

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Eta-class_supply_barge

I found the soundtrack underwhelming, mainly because the version in the "Story Trailer" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frdj1zb9sMY is excellent (especially around the 1.30 mark), and all of that was totally absent in the final film. The scene where the death star is revealed behind the shadow of a Star Destroyer in particular would have been much more dramatic if it had solid music to go with it, as was the case in one of the other trailers.