Rogue One [Official Info] Rogue One: A Star Wars Story - December 16, 2016

By "edge" they may just mean "The quality that triggered TFA's great WOM".

 

We'll see how it all turns out......but Edwards intial pitch had me intrigued.....I liked the idea of the rebels getting wrecked by Vader/empire and them going through a brutal beating to keep hope alive. I liked that it sounded like they were going to fully jump into the fact that these guys weren't meant to be some big heroes who later ran around during the OT.....but sacrificed everything anyway for this one mission.

 

Urgh!

They bring on Edwards to direct, they have seen his previous work, he would have sold them a vision and now he turns in a cut of it they want to change it?

Unless Edwards went against what he promised (unlikely) then this bothers me greatly.

Isn't the whole point of these stand alone's to make different kind of movies? I can't find it now but I'm sure I read they wanted them to be 'lead by director vision' and not tied to episode restraints.

If that's the case, you got to let Edwards make the movie he wants. You took the gamble, it's a bit late to back track now.

The 'lacking the edge of TFA' also bothers me. So every film has to feel like that one? Why?

Reading between the lines and using pure guess work, as well as what Edwards said before,he may have gone into full 'war movie' mode. It's all subjective, but this is what I want from these movies, different type of stories, styles, genres all mixed in to widen the Star Wars experience. Did anyone watch that trailer and think it didn't feel like Star Wars? The visuals alone did that for me.You cannot keep making the same type of film. It's going to get boring really quick.

If they try to insert humour, then it could easily come across as forced and out of place.

Hopefully it's no big deal and they can tidy it up to where everyone is happy and the film still works.

But I would rather they let Edwards make his film the way he wants rather than ordering him to change things. If I don't like it...so be it.

 

I think you're misreading into things a bit. I think what they are saying is that the ending doesn't line up well with ANH. In the beginning of ANH the rebellion is in a desperate place and all hope is basically lost. Think of that first shot in ANH. I think what they are doing is making the ending hit harder than it does right now and have the good guys take a bigger hit emotionally and causality wise. And as for the levity, if you watched Godzilla you can see what they are saying. It was hard to care about anyone in that movie. The reason why terrible things feel even more terrible in a well toned movie is because these characters feel lived in and it's hard to have them grow on you without some levity - i.e. BvS

 

If this movie was meant to end days or weeks before A New Hope than I could understand if the tone didn't match up with Ep. IV. But if it is meant to go right into A New Hope I would be a little picky about the ending as well.

 

You mak fair points. Certainly on the ending of ANH and how R1 may play into it. I that's the case then fair enough.

I saw Godzilla a little differently, I felt Edwards was trying to say something deeper about man kind's relationship with nature. We had abused the planet too much and it was a ticking time tomb until it came back to haunt us. The human characters role in the movie getting less and less as it goes on, and really insignificant to the final outcome was more a metaphor to display would could happen if we continue this path. It painted a picture of nature's ability to destroy us at any time and our helpess we'll be if that happens. Man kind was forgetting it's place and the movie put nature back into focus.That's why the human characters became nothing, Edwards wanted Godzilla, a product of nature, to be the hero of the film. Which to be fair, is true to the story origins of Godzilla.

But I understand why people didn't like it. The movie went on too long for me, although it looked fantastic throught out, I was bored by the end. The human element may have helped keep engagament longer but I still appauld Edwards trying to insert a deeper meaning, a sub text into a genre that usually decends into nothing more than pop corn cinema that is instantly forgetable. I want him to try something similar with R1. Sacrifice would be an obvious theme to go with or our relationship with war. There's so much reltable content to mix in. That's another conversation however.

Edwards 'Monsters' film is far more concerning to me characters wise. The two leads were horrible in that film and it spoilt a great visual story.

I just have trouble with exces changing a director's vision. I'd rather the film maker put the vision to me and then it's a case of judging it . There's loads of films where there is no levity at all where the characters are just as likeable and engaging. BvS is just awful all around, I find it hard to focus on one thing that really hurts it when everything is wrong.

But I suppose this is a lot of pointless speculation without the exact detail.

 

while i understand most peoples "there's a middle ground, its not doom and gloom", just as likely it could go either way to either of the extremes. and just like everyone was saying it wouldnt be the tone, it looks like that actually is something theyre changing/working on.

to me, this isnt good. reshoots for me are a good thing, it means theyre working on the film even more to fix up/polish thing overall. however, what seems to be the things they're 'fixing' isnt good news to me. "the edge of TFA" - why? this has next to nothing to do with TFA and it should be an entirely different feel considering the timeline this is set. this should be the darkest film (except the last half of ROTS, possibly). characters should be dying. this is the Empire in full strength. this is the Rebellion getting a small, but pivotal win, which also came with huge losses (going by ANH). it shouldnt be like TFA where we, as the audience, enter pastures new. yes, there will be new characters, apparently new vehicles/troopers, but more or less this should feel established and not really be holding our hand along. this should be making an established event interesting and - dare i say it - dark. changing the tone to bring 'levity' is not a good sign. as i alluded to above, and of course this is my personal opinion, but also given the timeline, established events that happened, they line up with my opinion, or thereabouts - seeing new characters just cracking cringe 'quips' in a time of high stakes - war (which the director has emphasized) - just isnt fluid or organic and wont sit well.

in saying all of this, the trailer was good and the general feel/look was something close to what i was wanting. if the changes arent too drastic, what with 4 weeks of reshoots, which isnt a huge amount of time, makes me think that just isn't enough time to drastically change the tone/feel of the film. which to me is good news. I'm really hoping that the dialogue has changed/improved from what we saw in the trailer. that one liner still bugs me to no end, and although some are saying it was for marketing reasons and some things in trailers arent shown in the movies - just the same, it was shown in the trailer and therefor is something to judge. my judgment is that was cringe and if dialogue is being worked on that would personally give me even more confidence in the film - which is still quite high, irregardless of how i've presented this comment.

 

Right on, Rylo Ken.

 

People are worrying needlessly that the edges are being smoothed off. The reality is that they need another across-the-board winner if SW is to have real longevity. This is, after all, only the second movie under the new regime.

The best quote from THR is this:

To me, that's great news. I don't care what tone the film has, or if it's Edwards' "vision"--if it's "extraordinary", it's good enough for me.

 

My first reaction after hearing this story break was that GE, or the writers, had ****ed it up.

My reaction after reading the THR story is that it sounds like GE got pretty close to what he and a lot of us wanted, and now the suits are ****ing it up.

 

I do agree with what others have said. They’ve seen Edwards’ previous films. He has a very specific style, so they couldn’t have been that surprised when he delivered them quite a “serious” film. I’m not too concerned about this, though. I do hope, however, that they keep whatever seriousness Edwards injected into the film, just adding in a bit of “fun” at the same time. Saying that, whilst I do like his Godzilla film, even I think that it could’ve done with a bit of “lighting up”.

I am worried that this cameo rumour is pertaining to Han, though. I thought the Han Solo film was going to be set about ten years before ANH? Something would feel off. I don’t know who else this “very important character” could be. Either Han, Fett or Vader is my guess.

 

My biggest problem with the Godzilla film was that, the characters were dull as dishwater. And the most interesting one, gets offed at the end of the first act. And in a movie where you see so little of the actual titular characters, the humans that you spend most of the movie following, shouldn't be so bland and uninspired imo.

 

But do they?

They've got Ep. VIII in the pipeline. To me, the saga films are the only ones that need to be the real monster 4Q hits, although Disney and its shareholders may beg to disagree.

Star Wars does not need to be everything to everybody, all of the time. The spinoffs are great opportunities to be more experimental, more creative. It would not kill the franchise to make a grittier, darker, more aggressive & brutal war movie in the SW universe that would appeal to adults or more serious-minded kids.

 

Oh I didn't mean to sound like I hated the movie - quite the contrary. It was just lacking in the character department for me personally. I didn't care about anyone but as a film there are other qualities to admire about it

Xinau I think that's what they are doing tho, but by adding levity and making the ending more impactful - you won't feel anything if you don't connect with the characters and when the ish hits the fan it will be all the more painful because of that levity sprinkled in.

 

I didn't hate the movie either. But the human characters were just really boring and since we follow them for most of it, that's an issue.

 

Obi-Wan perhaps! Senator Organa knows where he's been hermiting and might want to tap him for some help. Regardless, I think they are doing the right thing. Even Saving Private Ryan with all their blood and guts had lots of humor in it! I think that's what they want in to achieve with this one.

 

I didn't go into Godzilla with really any expectations and was just looking for some monster action. If I had higher expectations maybe I would have noticed the human interraction.

 

Something that I find interesting is how regardless of whatever tone a film is aiming for, there's always a contingent that says that it's "not right". If it's dark, they say it should be light, and vice versa. Ultimately, what matters is does it fit the story that the director wants to tell.

In this case, I see people afraid that adding levity to what has been described as a dark film will ruin the overall tone. IMO it depends on what kind of humor it is. If it's Guardians of the Galaxy-type humor, then I'd be worried. If it's more along the lines of say, The Lord of the Rings, then s'all good man.

 

I wouldn't have noticed it if we'd gotten more of, well Godzilla. Him barely being in the movie makes the other stuff stand out more.

 

I definitely think the first spinoff needs to hit that 4Q mark. Han Solo will probably do that, too. But I think having Rogue One and Han Solo be more traditional allows VIII to be more daring, funnily enough. And that's where it counts, IMHO.

 

It's true - it's the weakest part of the movie by far and even look at a movie like Saving Private Ryan. We get to relate to those guys in their quiet moments and small talk and levity and that's about as dark a war movie there is

 

You know this might actually be a good thing. I don't think Edwards Godzilla had one ounce of humor for the entire movie. The tone was pretty dour. Zack Snyder-esque

 

And one of the best/most appealing parts of SW from the beginning, are the likeable/interesting characters that you can get behind/relate to. The OT got that, and TFA got it as well. And, for me anyway, that was one of the biggest areas where the PT fell flat on it's face, most of the characters weren't all that interesting or likeable imo.

And as for the "humor" thing, even otherwise really dark/gritty films can still have moments of humor/levity at least. Films like Saving Private Ryan or Black Hawk Down for example, are really violent, bloody, intense, gritty, etc hard R-rated war films. And yet, there are still moments of humor/levity thrown in here and there to relieve at least some of the tension at points.

 

If it is the ending that might tie in with the tone rumor. Perhaps the ending was so depressing so they changed it. or they let a character live who was gonna die so they could be used later. I hope neither are the case especially having someone live since I want all these characters to be as mortal as possible.

 

I don't see how one character potentially living inherently makes them any less "mortal?" Nor is "they all die" automatically a better way to go imo.