That's more or less what I meant. If it complements the movie, I don't really notice it much. But like you said would surely notice it if I watched it again and it was absent.

But I simply didn't notice any changes in ANH. They're probably too minor for anyone to notice who hasn't read about them online, and was thus listening for them, or people that have seen the movies a million times and pay a lot of attention to the score.

This is all one big power of suggestion started by the jwfan.net and of course nowadays, if it's online, it must be true. And if it's about Star Wars, it can't be good.

I just watched this for the first time (first time for any version, that is), and for the most part I thought it sounded great. The dialogue audio quality was a bit annoying, though. Sometimes lines sounded very muffled and sometimes they almost sounded too clear. I did notice the reversed score a little bit, but probably wouldn't have if I didn't know about it ahead of time. That said, I would still send in my disc if a replacement program was offered. By the way, didn't anyone else notice this at the end of the credits?:

"If you experienced any conditions that detracted from the theatrical presentation of this film, please call 1-800-PHONE-THX or visit http://www.thx.com"

That's always on the prints of films that are exhibited in THX theaters. It's for a quality control program for the actual theaters. Lucas leaves it on the prints of his DVDs to get free marketing for the program.

Ah, I suppose I should have guessed from "theatrical presentation."

By saying "jwfan.net" you are really saying "Neil S. Bulk" because I'm the one who's done all the writing on this issue there. I'm the one that made Lucasfilm release that dumbass response last Monday. Every finding is one that I made. And it's all true. I have everything cataloged that is changed or altered and I can prove every last bit of it.

And this Star Wars track is royally screwed up, whether you want to admit it or not.

Neil

It's not that bad - and neither was the first pressing of Jurassic Park DTS

BTW Neil - did you see the posts about the missing LFE in ESB? How does it compare to the 5.1 LD?

I haven't compared it. I don't even know the 1997 ESB track that well. I don't like that version of the movie.

Neil

I don't think anyones saying it's not. I just said I didn't notice the problems and thus don't care.

i don't know why on every forum neil posts at there are people giving him crap. he is the only person who truly cares about preserving star wars and he is an important asset to the star wars and dvd community.

also, since he has the movies literally memorized AND is an audiophile (and videophile?) he can bring to the table an expertise not even lucasfilm employees involved in this project could bring.

not only should there be a replacement program, lucasfilm should hire neil to watch completed footage and spot all the errors. we'd have a vastly better product if he did.

and whether the problems are noticeable to someone or not is irrelevant. they shouldn't be there and they shouldn't be accepted. especially on this dvd set of all things!

Possibly because he sounds arrogant? At least in this post, he sounds like he wants a medal or something.

Personally, I don't give a shit about his obsessions.

seems to me he is stating facts and people are getting mad that he keeps being correct.

on the home theater forum he posted audio clips to back it all up and people would say he is wrong still. then once the dvds came out and digital bits mentioned it, then everyone tried to avoid looking like a fool and made up more excuses like now it isn't noticeable... yet a few pages back they were flat out calling him a liar.

the arrogant ones are the ones who won't admit to anything wrong (with the dvds or their judgement) and are lucasfilm apologists.

I haven't read those threads on other websites and don't care to. His posts here seem arrogant, though.

Seems to be on a mission to find the most errors/inconsistencies first, and wants to be recognized for it. If that's what floats his boat, then more power to him. I don't really care, just callin' it as I see it (just my opinion).

They screwed up ANH the worst, and it should have gotten the best treatment. I think that's a shame.

I think it had a mono sound track in the original version. Anytime a mono soundtrack is remixed for 5.1 bad things can happen. This one has also gone through several generations of stereo, surround, and 5.1 remixing over the years. It's no suprise there are so many problems with it. Even including the original mono track is not possible due to all the changes to the film.

People wishing for new 5.1 remixes for old movies like Dr. No had better realize they are at the mercy of sound engineers recreating all the sound effects and remixing the music and dialog. It can come out sounding great or it can sound like total crap. You would think SkyWalker Sound would do an expert job, but you never know.

Has this been confirmed? Everyone seems mostly preoccupied with ANH, but to me this issue would be just as big.

Star Wars' original mix was a Dolby Stereo mix. The second mix done was the 6 track mix for 70mm presentations. The final mix done was a mono mix, for theaters that didn't have Dolby Stereo capabilites. These were all done in 1977. The mono mix has never been on home video. So this was not a mono film turned into 5.1.

As for sounding arrogant, maybe. I didn't want someone atacking an enitre website (JWFan) for running some observations that I made, though. If anyone has a problem with my comments (and plenty of people do) feel free to come after me. My skin has gotten a bit thicker these past couple of weeks.

Neil

Hey Neil - what about the supposed missing LFE in Empire? Like NCYankee asked, how does this compare to the 5.1 LD?

I am getting the impression that there never was much or any bass in the places I noticed it lacking - since I don't have any pevious versions as reference, I can't be sure.

People who have agreed with me say they expected them to add the LFE where it seems to be lacking, but they did not.

All I can say is that Obi-Wan's Krayt Dragon sounds ridiculous now. It's like a sound a friggin' bird would make, and not like something this would make:



Here, which sound goes better with the picture?

New Krayt Dragon: <OBJECT CLASSID="clsid:02BF25D5-8C17-4B23-BC80-D3488ABDDC6B" WIDTH="160"HEIGHT="16" CODEBASE="http://www.apple.com/qtactivex/qtplugin.cab"><PARAM name="SRC" VALUE="http://www.dvdanswers.com/misc/chris/sounds/articles/starwars/anh/bencallnew.mp3"><PARAM name="AUTOPLAY" VALUE="false"><PARAM name="CONTROLLER" VALUE="true"><EMBED SRC="http://www.dvdanswers.com/misc/chris/sounds/articles/starwars/anh/bencallnew.mp3" WIDTH="160" HEIGHT="16" AUTOPLAY="false" CONTROLLER="true" PLUGINSPAGE="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/"></EMBED></OBJECT>

Old Krayt Dragon: <OBJECT CLASSID="clsid:02BF25D5-8C17-4B23-BC80-D3488ABDDC6B" WIDTH="160"HEIGHT="16" CODEBASE="http://www.apple.com/qtactivex/qtplugin.cab"><PARAM name="SRC" VALUE="http://www.dvdanswers.com/misc/chris/sounds/articles/starwars/anh/bencallold.mp3"><PARAM name="AUTOPLAY" VALUE="false"><PARAM name="CONTROLLER" VALUE="true"><EMBED SRC="http://www.dvdanswers.com/misc/chris/sounds/articles/starwars/anh/bencallold.mp3" WIDTH="160" HEIGHT="16" AUTOPLAY="false" CONTROLLER="true" PLUGINSPAGE="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/"></EMBED></OBJECT>

Old Krayt does sound a lot better

I just bought this a few days ago.

I thought that the music in many scenes throughout A New Hope on DVD was a lot quieter than what I was used to. And this is my favorite movie of all time. I saw it in the theater in 1977 when I was six. I've seen it probably 150 or 200 times since.

The music is so important to this film.

Thank for the above posts, which confirm that I wasn't just imagining things.

I grew up thinking that these guys were the best of the best when it came to technical expertise on sound in movies. And they were, for a long time. But not anymore.

Clearly, there were unintentional screw-ups on A New Hope (green lightsaber, reversed surrounds, dialogue shift, key music drowned, etc.). We can only hope these will be corrected one day. I suspect it may be the eventual boxset of all six movies.

Just curious, if this is your favorite movie of all time, why did you now just buy the set?

I prefer the original version.

I was waiting for the original version to be released on DVD.

But I finally came to realizing and accepting the fact that the original version will probably never get released on DVD.

Also, I bought the DVDs because my videotapes of the original version of the original trilogy can only be played so many times.

Consider what happens right after the opening crawl: The Star Destroyer and the Tantive IV are shooting at each other. The Star Destroyer overtakes the Tantive IV. The Star Destroyer uses itrs tractor beam to take in the Tantive IV. The stormtroopers melt the door. The stormtroopers come in shooting. The stormtroopers and the Rebels shoot at each other.

In previous releases, during these events, the music was clearly audible. It was the music that gave the emotional feelings. This was extremely important.

On the DVD, during these events, the sound effects are too loud, and the music is too quiet. The music can barely be heard.

What had been a very powerful and awe inspiring emotional experience has now been turned into a bland and generic action sequence.