Tag: john williams

Posted on

Today in The Force Awakens: By the (box office) numbers, John Williams on the score

Rey and BB-8 (Rolling Stone)The Force Awakens is heading for a $200 million opening weekend, according to the early estimates. That puts it in sight of Jurassic World’s $208.4M record, something many doubted would be possible due to the usual holiday box office trends.

Disney says that it brought in $57M from the Thursday night previews, with Friday showings likely bringing the total to $100M.

→ John Williams talks about the score with the Los Angeles Times, including what seems to have become the score’s standout, ‘Rey’s Theme’. Meanwhile, you can listen to the full score on several streaming services, including Spotify.

→ Daniel Craig made a cameo after all, according to Entertainment Weekly, though I’m also seeing a lot of skeptical fans due to… Accent reasons.

→ Is there a backlash yet? I guess?

→ Badass Digest looks at the Resistance, the First Order and the Republic. Y’all may want to pick up Pablo Hidalgo’s Visual Guide to the movie.

→ Speaking of today’s book releases, io9 has a look at some pieces from The Art of Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

→ And speaking of books in general, author Chuck Wendig on the movie – and which Aftermath character we saw on screen.

→ Also: Easter egg sightings from EW and Comicbook, Adam Driver on Kylo Ren’s mask, and TFA rules Twitter

Posted on

This weekend in The Force Awakens: 60 Minutes extra, why Nyong’o chose to go CGI

tfa-60m-260 Minutes posted extra footage after tonight’s feature on The Force Awakens, including John Williams conducting some of the first music in the film, but we also get a glimpse of the scene with Rey, BB-8, Teedo and the luggabeast.

→ Lupita Nyong’o tells Buzzfeed why she chose to play a CGI character.

→ Rolling Stone shares a few things they learned about The Force Awakens that didn’t make the main article.

→ Spot the new stuff in today’s commercial.

→ Dan Mindel on the The Force Awakens cinematography, and how the film being pushed back turned out to be a positive.

→ Also: Another fun Carrie Fisher interview; Sisters and other films that have gone up against Star Wars.

Posted on

Today in The Force Awakens: The review embargo is in

tfa-kylo-finn-reyWe’ll be seeing the first The Force Awakens reviews on Wednesday, December 16th at 12:01am PST. Plan accordingly. In Hollywood, things are shaping up for the Monday premiere, which will have “Academy Award levels” of security and crowd control.

→ The Force Awakens will be featured on CBS’ 60 Minutes on Sunday, and in the preview video we get to hear some of John Williams’ new score.

→ Today’s best bet: Samuel L. Jackson and Gwendoline Christie chat for Interview magazine.

→ J.J. Abrams has more praise for coffee enthusiast Pablo Hidalgo from in the Toronto Sun. Elsewhere, he talks about The Raid stars with /Film.

→ Costume designer Michael Kaplan on Kylo Ren’s helmet for Time.

→ Vice News did a half-hour piece on Adam Driver’s Arts in the Armed Forces organization. (Guess what made the headlines?)

→ Also: Phasma and Rey action figures flying off the shelves, Lupita Nyong’o was on GMA this morning, and Anthony Breznican on Bobbajo.

Posted on

Today in The Force Awakens: Score and Snoke hints, new character posters

Four new Chinese character posters.
Four new Chinese character posters.
In Variety, John Williams reveals that the motif for a new character in The Force Awakens is based on a Kipling poem translated into Sanskrit (which could give us something reminiscent of The Phantom Menace’s ‘Duel of the Fates’).

→ People sheds just a tiny it of light on Andy Serkis’ Supreme Leader Snoke – or at least, his height.

→ In Mexico City, Kathleen Kennedy revealed that exteriors for Episode VIII and Rogue One will shoot on location in Mexico, according to Excelsior (English) It’s a bit unclear, but she also may have confirmed Benicio del Toro?

→ Rolling Stone has posted their complete Carrie Fisher interview (only some of which made it into their cover story). She discusses her upcoming book, The Princess Diarist, the nature of fame, and not being surprised by Episode VII. Her dog Gary, meanwhile, now has his own Instagram.

→ “I couldn’t be more delighted to see the amazing fan response to Captain Phasma,” Gwendoline Christie tells ComicBook, where she also talks about the physicality of the character.

→ On Late Night with Seth Meyers, Adam Driver talked about his San Diego Comic-Con experience; From IGN, Oscar Isaac on Poe Dameron’s inspirations.

→ And in the most shocking news of the day, Star Wars fans are big spenders.

Posted on

The Force Awakens soundtrack track names revealed

tfa-soundtrackThe track listing for The Force Awakens soundtrack was up on French Amazon last night. It’s no longer there this morning, but I did see it there… It had some weird capitalization choices, so I am a bit wary of it, but there are no real red flags of fakeness in it, and we’re close enough to release that chances are Amazon was actually accurate.

I’ve black-barred the Making Star Wars version (they fixed the capitalization issues – ComicBook has the original) below. There are possible spoilers here, though nothing on the level of ‘Qui-Gon’s Noble End.’

Continue reading “The Force Awakens soundtrack track names revealed”

Posted on

Roundup: The broadsaber is venting, and other things we learned about The Force Awakens this week

tfa-t4-13-broadsaberlights3

Between Wired’s J.J. Abrams interview, Entertainment Weekly and all those TV spots, we seem to have officially entered the “faster, more intense” phrase of The Force Awakens marketing. (No, you haven’t seen too much, calm down.) Here’s some stuff that got sidelined:

dland-broadsaber→ Settle your bets: The crossguard blades on Kylo Ren’s lightsaber “are raw power vented from the primary central blade,” per the description on display at Disneyland’s Star Wars Launch Bay. (IGN has a tour.) We already knew he built it himself, but the design is “ancient.” (via Reddit)

→ Speaking of Kylo, we haven’t seen much of Adam Driver lately, but he did tell Vulture that he found SDCC to be “intense” and “surprisingly moving.”

→ The Force Awakens is skipping some early award shows, says The Wrap, but the only one here you may have heard of is the Screen Actors Guild Awards. It will be out in time for consideration for the Academy Awards.

→ Variety says there was indeed new music from The Force Awakens in the Shondaland spot.

→ The cover for The Force Awakens novelization has been spotted on the Random House catalog (by Roqoo Depot first, I believe) and it’s… The poster. ‘Kay.

And in other movies…

→ Could Episode VIII return to Ireland? We know they’ve already shot on Skellig Michael, RTE thinks they’re looking at another location in County Kerry as well.

→ Jedi News claims to have the codename for Phil Lord and Christopher Miller’s Han Solo spinoff.

Posted on

J.J. Abrams on The Force Awakens and keeping secrets: “We’re walking a tightrope.”

tfa-bts-ridley-jj

In a new interview with Wired, The Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams talks about Star Wars in general, keeping secrets, the Millennium Falcon “changing hands,” and how the previous films succeeded and influenced the new. It’s today’s must-read (so far.)

Some excerpts below the cut, or go straight to Wired.

Continue reading “J.J. Abrams on The Force Awakens and keeping secrets: “We’re walking a tightrope.””

Posted on

J.J. Abrams: Lack of Luke Skywalker in The Force Awakens promotions is “no accident”

The Associated Press was first to ask The Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams about how Luke Skywalker has been missing from all the promotional material. “These are good questions to be asking,” he said. “I can’t wait for you to find out the answer.”

“It’s no accident,” he continued.

Vanity Fair - Kylo RenOne thing we can put to rest: Luke is not Kylo Ren. Adam Driver is playing Kylo Ren, not Mark Hamill, which we’ve known since the Vanity Fair shots were unveiled in May. Bring up the Kahn fib from Star Trek Into Darkness all you like, but no one was going around saying that Benedict Cumberbatch’s role was actually being played by Bruce Greenwood. A ten-year-old video of Mark Hamill saying he’d have liked a more complicated arc in Return of the Jedi is not really the best evidence for that actually happening now.

Abrams also addressed where production stands: “The visual effects process goes on for so long that my guess is we’ll probably be doing visual effects for the next three or four weeks, even though the cut will be done before then. We’re in the editing room working on the cut, going over visual effects and going over reviews. We still have another scoring session with John Williams, who’s a god when it comes to music.”