Mos Eisley in the OOT and the Special Editions

Not sure if I ever got that impression, but I do know, that while I generally enjoyed many of the additions when I saw the SE in the theatre two decades ago, and it was sort of cool to see what CGI could add to these classic scenes, this one always felt intrusive, and sort of odd, because literally didn't add anything, but completely obscured the view.

 

That was regarding the actual score.

Electronically enhanced swing music was fine for the cantina in A New Hope. And Lapti Nek is not typical of the comtemporary sounds of 1983.

 

I don't know what to call the Cantina music, but I certainly wouldn't call it electronic or swing. Lapti Nek sounds like any kind of disco inspired music from the late 70s.

 

About the tone of the Mos Eisley/Cantina scenes, I would say that, even with the SE alterations, the entrance to Mos Eisley is pretty tense (the new music, taken from the unused Dianoga cue, helps to create that tension). On the contrary, the Cantina scene (once again thanks to the music!) always had a funny, comedy feeling to me (however, if you watch the original cut, with no extravagant aliens and no music, it does feel tense).

 

It's most definitely swing music. Inspired at least in part by the novelty jazz created in the twenties and thirties by Raymond Scott, in whose band John Williams' father played drums. And it does have a synthesised bass line (which Williams has used throughout the saga for diegetic cues).

I suppose with a little blanding out, Lapti Nek wouldn't have sound out of place in Saturday Night Fever. The thing about the palace and sail barge scenes is that you get a good spread of styles that are stimulatingly juxtaposed with the setting. You get JSB followed by AWB, in a dungeon!

I guess "disco" is forever maligned as the music produced by the decade that taste forgot.

Jedi Rocks on the other hand contrives to be the kind of bland, by the numbers SNL/Letterman show blues. They even changed the whole stage set up to look like you're in one of those House Of Blues franchise places. The novelty of the animated musical number had been used up by Roger Rabbit. And it just seems obvious and what you'd expect.

Kind of like Dex's fifties themed diner with fifties pastiche music accompanying it in AOTC.

 

Putting aside subjective opinions on the quality of the music (though I can't see how anyone can think Lapti Nek is all that much better than Jedi Rocks on a listening level), Jedi Rocks is just more dynamic and, combined with the new editing, serves the scene better. I'm not musically educated, but Lapti Nek is kind of samey and trance-like and lacking in progression, and simply ends by incessantly repeating the same synthesizer line over and over. Jedi Rocks is relentlessly upbeat and energetic, and continually builds up in intensity with battling male and female chorus lines to reach a crescendo, both complementing and ironically contrasting with Oola's desperate struggle against Jabba.

As I mentioned, the editing is really on-point and gives the scene a new snappiness and verve it never had before. Each shot flows into the other and tells a story with the music, just like a good music video. The best shot progression in the whole sequence, and one that has always stood out to me, is this one:



Check out all those match cuts. Yarna d'al' Gargan extends her arm, leading into the next shot where Sy Snootles does the same before twirling her other arm to the right, leading into Oola twirling around in the same direction and snapping her leash to the left, leading to a reaction shot of Jabba recoiling to the left. It's even better with sound, as the shot of Oola snapping the whip is simultaneous with Sy concluding the last line of the verse section, giving it the air of a triumphant statement, immediately followed by the aforementioned chorus section, where Jabba's grotesque masculine groans and Oola's desperate feminine pleas are mixed with the competing male and female chorus lines from the band. As Oola struggles harder and harder against Jabba and the tension rises, the intensity of the chorus also increases, until finally Jabba pounds his fist on the trapdoor trigger and the tension is abruptly released in a blood-curdling scream as the music cuts out. Everything fits together better with Jedi Rocks. It's a more cohesive and interesting sequence as a result.

 

I've always seen this scene as an outlandish, gross, out-of-place, extravagant, almost-too-much musical sequence, similar to the opening of Temple of Doom. It almost feels like it doesn't belong there, but it does, and it's just pure exhilarating fun (and includes the only nudity in the whole Saga!). I understand why many people don't like it, but to me it feels at home in the whole Jabba act (which is outlandish, gross, extravagant and fun).

I have a fondness for the original sequence, as I saw it many times before the SE, but I do like the music-video quality of the SE too. None of them are my favourite scenes in the movie, but I love them all the same.

 

The

 

The thing about Jedi Rocks is that in the intervening years, Lucas decided that he'd conceived the scene as a big musical number. In spite of the BTS showing that it wasn't until production started that Lucas got the notion of having one of the creatures seen to be singing. And that he hadn't told the Director he was shooting a musical number.

It was intended to be the same background craziness as the Cantina but done better.

But it turned into Blues Brothers meets the Ink and Paint club scene from Roger Rabbit when he decided to reconceive the whole scene for the SE.

 

I don't know exactly what BTS material you're talking about (would you mind posting it?) , but I'm not sure how him getting an idea for a creature to be singing during production disproves the notion that he wanted it to be a big dance number. I mean, the original version already is a dance number. It's just poorly done because the song and puppets suck. You're going to have to connect the dots a bit better there. We do know that both George and the director always hated "Lapti Nek":

Also, the "Anything Goes" sequence in Temple of Doom a year later was clearly an attempt by Lucas to do what he failed to do in ROTJ.

 

Yet a full version was shot.

 

Yeah it was during production that he decided to have a singer. Sy Snootles was re-engineered to be that singer. It's in creature features. Footage from the shoot was fashioned into a quasi music video. You can clearly tell it wasn't seriously coreographed or shot as a musical number.

Lapti Nek ain't Disco. Sorry but I'm a purist about these things.

 

The only SE I disliked was Han shooting 2nd but only because the effect looks bad. The rest of the SE material I loved, including the Jabba/hanger scene.

 

Just this once, I'm going to say that TCW did it better than any of the films.

 

What's Creature Features? Link?

They shot all that footage for a reason. The reason you think it wasn't seriously choreographed or shot that way is because the puppet couldn't freaking move, resulting in a mediocre product. What likely happened is they shot all that stuff intending for it to be a longer dance number but then realized it sucked too much, so they cut it down for the movie.

It's disco-funk.

For what it's worth, I'm also sorry you're a disco purist.

 

Quite. I don't know how many times it has to be said. Lucas, Marquand and just about everybody else including the tea lady thought the whole Lapti Nek sequence was brutal. It didn't work the way they wanted. There's a reason why Lucas completely reworked it and brought back Femi Taylor.

If the Jedi Rocks sequence was the original replaced by Lapti Nek then all the people who wanted Lapti Nek now would be calling for Jedi Rocks while the rest of us would be wondering why Lucas made the scene visually inferior. It's usually always the other way around as in the case of Mos Eisley.

 

Did Lucas forget to tell Williams he hates disco? Was he too frightened to ask him to write something else after hearing it? The idea that Lucas couldn’t avoid doing something he didn't want or like is absurd. If it was intended to be a musical number then why didn't he use the music video version? The one supposedly shot for that purpose. It's arguably a better musical presentation than what's in the original movie. Did Lucas decide to sandbag the cue that Williams came up with?

 

He used it because it had been the guide track for so long and the sequence was already built around it, and it eventually got to the point where they just didn't have the time or resources to re-do everything. What are you trying to argue, that Marquand was inexplicably lying and that he and Lucas didn't actually dislike it? That's a bit of an absurd length to go to in this argument, don't you think?

Anyway, when Lucas went back to re-do it, he hired a six-time Grammy Award-winning R&B musician. He didn't just grab a random person off the street.

 

No of course not. I believe them when they say they weren't satisfied. Their retrospective statements about what kind of music they never wanted and the way they really wanted to present the scene, as opposed to what they chose to do at the time, don't make sense.

 

Is there a translation of Lapti Nek? Anybody know what it means?

 

If i remember it right, it's supposed to mean "fancy man" in huttese.

 

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Lapti_Nek/Legends

Feel my body growing
My bones have started glowing, ooh
Wow!
The time has come for showing
That I'll shape you up and work you out
My body feels excitin'
My soul is synthesizin'
My whole frame is jumpin'
I'm workin' out and havin' fun

Work it out, you've got to move your soul
Work it out, you've got to feel the heat
Work it out, you've got to move your soul
Wow!

 

So, Lapti Nek is jazzercize. Now I know.

 

Similarly is there an English translation of Jedi Rocks? I'm assuming so, but I'm having a hard time finding a reliable translation...?

 

I have no issue with the look of the SE version of Mos Eisley, but I have a serious problem with the addition of the slapstick humour!

Totally unnecessary and completely inconsistent with the rest of the film!