Mos Eisley in the OOT and the Special Editions

Do you mean the little droid with the saucer head? I like those guys.

 

Richard Marquand's quoted statement was contemporary with the making of the film. He thought it would be changed before the movie was released. The reason it wasn't was for the reasons I stated. When you're on such a tight deadline you can't always do all the things you want to do, and they ran out of time to come up with a completely new track and restructure the sequence around it. That's what happened. It beggars belief to think that, with all this documentation, some sort of alternative explanation which conveniently casts Lucas (and Marquand) as a dissembler continues to beckon to you like a siren of the sea.

 

I actually have the complete opposite opinion, thinking of Lapti Nek what you think of Jedi Rocks.

Oola's pleas to Jabba and Jabba's responses during the end of Lapti Nek match up so well with the song it makes it sound as if they were part of the lyrics, part of the song itself. There are actually breaks/changes in the music for her pleas. There's some repeating music that plays right before her plea, stops while she pleads, and then picks back up again. This repeating part even matches up with what I assume are Jabba's unsympathetic responses to her pleas, and is similarly cold and merciless. There is a tension/anxiety to this heartless repetition in response to pleas for life. And then another piece of the chorus plays up as preparation for Jabba's fist slamming on the button, and then the end of the chorus is cut off by Oola's bloodcurdling scream, rather ironically, like some sort of classic 8-bit video game death music.

I noticed this as a kid, years before the SE came out, and quite liked it. At the time, I wondered, why does the song keep playing while she screams for her life, and why do her pleas sound so in tune with the song? I thought it was quite a cool coincidence. Knowing what I know about Lucas now, I doubt it was coincidental.

Felt the same way about Yub Nub; Luke actually walks into the scene, with exaggerated lunging steps, in rhythm with the song.

 

Yes, clearly that was something the filmmakers were always going for. It was never supposed to be just background music; it's supposed to be a full-on musical sequence which essentially narrates Oola's plight as it plays out on screen. I just don't think it works as well with Lapti Nek. It doesn't meld as well because, like you said, it comes across like some sort of 8-bit video game music (which I can't see as having any place in Star Wars, nor video game death parallels). With Jedi Rocks there's a human chorus and I think that lends itself better to complementing Jabba's moans and Oola's begging, especially because the singers' voices come across as so impassioned and enthusiastic, communicating a sense of pathos and cruel irony. There's the male-female aspect to the chorus which Lapti Nek lacks. Jedi Rocks also builds up to a climax more effectively because of its more complex structure, while Lapti Nek just repeats itself over and over again, then switches to another part that repeats itself over and over again.