Hello and welcome to this week's installment of Cue by Cue.
Today we're going to be listening to 1m3-2m1 Luke's Escape.
This cue is 91 bars long and was orchestrated by Al Woodbury.
Here's what the sketch and orchestrated conductor's scores look like:
A note before listening: This is the first of several cues from this score for which there exist synth elements that were written and recorded with the cue, but which ended up mixed out in some releases. Due to some remnants of the synth even in the no-synth versions, I believe that it was recorded with the orchestra, but on a separate mic; and it was likely kept as a separate stem from the LCR mix so that it could be dialed out without requiring a ground-up remix.
In the case of this particular cue the synth is actually mixed out of the film too, so I've opted to include two versions of the video, one with the synth as intended and one without the synth as in the final film.
Without further ado, let's listen to the cue together:
Synth (intended) version:
No Synth (film) version:
At 0:00 the cue begins with some brass build up over the shots of snow.
Suddenly, the brass gives way to soft woodwinds at 0:08 as we move inside the cave. Some calm music as we see Luke, giving way to an exceptionally high pitched note at 0:27.
The woodwinds start to build up in intensity at 0:32 as Luke sees the shadow against the wall and realizes he's in danger.
Some ominous strings join in at 0:38 as Luke tries to pull himself down by his bootstraps. Everything climaxes with a bang at 0:47 as Luke fails.
Then at 0:53, a new idea - Luke attempts to reach the saber and the music comes back with strings and whistling synth, along with ominous brass. (note: this is one of the best places to compare the synth and no synth versions if you want to hear the difference)
This builds into the Force theme at 1:07 as Luke reaches out again, this time with the Force. More sharp brass at 1:14 as the Wampa approaches, getting faster as it gets closer.
Suddenly, Luke's saber flies up and he's able to cut himself down, accompanied by some heroic fanfare at 1:23.
An ascending brass line for the Wampa's arm being cut off, and then the entire orchestra builds up as Luke runs out of the cave, fizzling out as he falls in the snow.
Some more woodwinds at 1:40, and then we get a heroic fanfare at 1:48 for Han riding in on his Tauntaun.
Then at 2:03, the music changes again to a melancholy yet determined rendition of the Droid Motif as the scene changes to R2-D2 scanning for any sign of Luke. This continues as C-3PO says that his joints are freezing and they need to go inside.
As C-3PO walks away at 2:23 the music increases in intensity and we get one final statement of the Droid motif.
A crash at 2:32 for Luke falling (again), and then a beautiful horn solo at 2:36 as Luke rests a moment before standing up again.
At 2:41 some more woodwinds with glock accompaniment for the wide shot, and we get another Force theme statement at 2:45 as Luke walks.
Luke falls (again!), and then the music builds up to more heroic Tauntaun fanfare at 2:58. This morphs into some ominous brass at 3:10 as the Tauntaun breathes out and Han looks around.
Finally, one last percussion crash at 3:23, intending to segue into the next cue for the scene change. Thus, the cue ends...
The video above is mostly the same as the wide release theatrical cut, although I did need to trim several frames of Luke at 1:48 for the cue to sync properly. While the cue largely syncs with the final cut, about half of it ended up going unused. Only the section from 0:00-1:39 is used in the final film. Personally I find this unfortunate because the second half of the cue is absolutely brilliant, particularly the material for Luke and the droids.
In the Special Edition of the film this cue underwent even more changes in order to accommodate the new Wampa footage. The cue was hacked to pieces, and honestly the edit sounds really awful, but if you wanted to recreate it it would look something like this:
SE 0:00-0:28 = original 0:00-0:28
SE 0:28-0:34 = original 0:32-0:37
SE 0:34-0:56 = original 0:32-0:54
SE 0:56-0:58 = original 0:51-0:53
SE 0:58-1:27 = original 0:53-1:22
SE 1:27-1:33 = original 1:20-1:25
SE 1:33-1:36 = original 1:18-1:21
SE 1:36-1:50 = original 1:26-1:40
It fades out early there just like in the original film.
Since I don't have a recording log I'm unsure what day this cue was recorded, but based on the take numbers written in the sketch it was likely recorded in late January just before the inserts. I'm also unsure how many takes were recorded, but according to the sketch the performance edit uses takes 255 and 256.
This cue has been officially released on four different albums:
1) In 1980 on RSO Records' OST album
2) In 1993 on Arista Records' 4-CD Anthology box set
3) In 1997 on RCA Victor's 2-CD Special Edition set
4) In 2018 on Walt Disney Records' Remastered album (remastered OST rebuilt from scratch from the session masters)
More specifically, 1m3-2m1 Luke's Escape can be heard:
From 0:00-2:47 of track 4 "The Heroics of Luke and Han" on the 1980/2018 albums
From 0:00-end of disc 2 track 3 "Luke's Escape" on the 1993 album
From 0:00-3:35 of disc 1 track 3 "The Wampa's Lair/Vision of Obi-Wan/Snowspeeders Take Flight" on the 1997 album.
All releases have the clean opening, but only the 1993 set has the clean ending. The 1980 and 2018 sets are both ground up remixes, while the 1993 and 1997 sets both contain the Eric Tomlinson film mix. Notably, the 1980 and 1997 sets include the intended synth while the 1993 and 2018 sets dial it out like in the film.
The 1980 version is also microedited, it cuts out the segments from 1:39-1:48, 2:32-2:59, and 3:23-end:
Additionally, all releases of this cue play at the wrong pitch/speed, although this can easily be corrected in an audio editor:
1980 set has to be sped up by 0.400 to match film
1993 set has to be sped up by 0.525 to match film
1997 set has to be slowed down by 0.482 to match film
2018 set has to be slowed down by 0.35 to match film
As a result, I can't really recommend any set as a perfect out-of the box experience, although the 1993 set probably comes the closest.
For the videos above I used the 1993 set for the no-synth version, and I used a combined edit of the 1993 and 1997 sets for the synth version. More specifically, the section from 0:54-1:23 of the synth version is from the 1997 set, the rest is just from the 1993 set and is identical to the no-synth version.
That's all I have for today, thanks for reading! Feel free to leave any comments or questions.
Next week we'll be listening to 2m2 Ben's Instruction. See you then!