Director Steven Soderberg turned "Raiders" into a silent black and white movie!

This is just bananas but kinda awesome. "Retired" director Steven Soderberg took Raiders of the Lost Ark, took all of the colour out of it and changed it to black and white and took out all the sound and added a Trent Reznor soundtrack (From "Social Network" and "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo")! This is just downright wacky and he said he wanted to focus on the staging of the film. Can't wait to watch it!

http://extension765.com/sdr/18-raiders

"I operate under the theory a movie should work with the sound off, and under that theory, staging becomes paramount ....I want you to watch this movie and think only about staging, how the shots are built and laid out, what the rules of movement are, what the cutting patterns are. See if you can reproduce the thought process that resulted in these choices by asking yourself: why was each shot—whether short or long—held for that exact length of time and placed in that order? Sounds like fun, right? It actually is. To me. Oh, and I’ve removed all sound and color from the film, apart from a score designed to aid you in your quest to just study the visual staging aspect. "

 

Would've liked it if it had the original audio or just the isolated score. That dubstep or whatever techno bs ruins it.

 

Raiders is a perfect film to convert to black and white, but that soundtrack was too distracting for me.

 

finally watched it, it looked fantastic, there area bunch of shots that work great in black and white (the FX of the ark ghosts are really trippy) and without any dialogue it actually kind of let you appreciate the performances more by just watching the actors react. I read online that it would have been awesome if Soderberg had added title cards ("Bad dates") that would have been fun too. But the main thing he was trying to accomplish, to appreciate the dynamic frame composition, really stands out.

As for the music choice, I kinda liked it because it was so out of left field, the opening track choice for the first 3 minutes is downright bizarre, but there are a few moments where it adds a different shading to the scene and complements it well - I thought the softer, slower music in the moment when Indy steals the idol is something where it really clicked, also when Indy is in the map room the Trent Reznor soundtrack added an interesting effect.

Overall, it's really weird way to watch the flick, but I do recommend it if you've seen it a bunch of times and want to experience it slightly differently.

 

Started watching it a second time. Isn't that first song from Social Network or something?

 

It's all Social Network / Girl with the Dragon Tattoo music. The bit from Social Network when the Winklevoi are rowing is used when Indy is running from the Hovitos, which is actually pretty funny.