Star Wars without 20th Century Fox fanfare? -- Will Disney drop Fox from new films?

prberk

prberk

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Well, with Disney owning Lucasfilm, there are great possibilities for the parks, and even for Lucasfilm... BUT I have to say the Star Wars films would not be the same if they drop Fox as the distributor!!

Can you imagine the Star Wars main title without the Twentieth Century Fox fanfare before it? Or vice versa.

And Fox knows this, too. Because they actually lengthened their official main fainfare theme now used on all Fox films to include the part that was written back in 1977 to bring the two together, since they originally would have clashed (two different keys, I think). The last part of the fanfare was added over the "Lucasfilm presents" part to bring the two together, and now Fox uses it as part of their main theme on all movies.

Anyhow, it would seem strange to see "Walt Disney" or "Touchstone" or "Hollywood Pictures" before a Star Wars film. What do you think?

FYI: This is the original way the Fox intro went (the original Fox theme ending before the "Lucasfilm" card, and the "new" trasnsition music over "Lucasfilm"):



Then came the opening crawl:

 
NemoRocks78

NemoRocks78

Seized
Premium Member
It's going to be extremely bizarre watching a Star Wars flick with the "Disney" logo and castle opening before it. At first, I thought Fox might've still had some sort of distribution rights, so the release could be like the Marvel flicks are with Paramount and the opening fanfare would live on. They said on the conference call that it's all Disney/Lucasfilm, though, so it looks like that won't be happening. :(
 
tahqa

tahqa

Well-Known Member
I honestly don't see that anything would change if Fox still wanted to work with LucasFilm. Look at the Avengers movie. It was produced by Paramount and Marvel and distributed worldwide through Disney. It is not uncommon now to see competing studios cooperate on big budget movies.
 
Thrill Seeker

Thrill Seeker

Well-Known Member
Well in the press conference, they specifically mentioned Star Wars Episode VII would be the first Disney-LucasFilm production, so I'm guessing LucasFilm is being brought into the fold like Disney-Pixar. It sounds like Disney will release all Star Wars films under the Disney banner, so look for the Disney Castle before your crawl...
 
W

wiigirl

Well-Known Member
tahqa said:
I honestly don't see that anything would change if Fox still wanted to work with LucasFilm. Look at the Avengers movie. It was produced by Paramount and Marvel and distributed worldwide through Disney. It is not uncommon now to see competing studios cooperate on big budget movies.
Click to expand...

Same here...
75.gif
 
Master Yoda

Master Yoda

Pro Star Wars geek.
Premium Member
It is going to be odd. SW was the first movie I ever remember seeing as a child (I was 6 at the time) and it had a profound effect on me. To this day, when I hear the 20th century Fox music and logo I expect it to be followed by "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away..."

If I had to guess, they will tweak the Disney logo like they did for Pirates, Tron, etc and have John Williams do a new score.
 
J

JonathanR

New Member
I agree it won't be the same without the Fox fanfare at the start.

However, just to correct a few points in your original post. The longer Fox fanfare was composed by Alfred Newman in 1953 for films made in Cinemascope (to accompany the message "Filmed in Cinemascope" or whatever). In fact, its full title is "Twentieth Century Fox Fanfare with Cinemascope Extension". The longer version largely disappeared when widescreen films became the norm. George Lucas suggested reviving it so as to allow the Lucasfilm logo to be shown. John Williams composed the Star Wars theme in the same key (Bb) but both the long and short Fox fanfare are in this key. Episode IV originally used Newman's 1953 recording, but Williams made a new recording for The Empire Strikes Back, which was used in more recent re-releases of Ep IV too.

The Williams version of the fanfare was used for other Fox films, but when they introduced the rotating logo in the 90s they also introduced a new arrangement. The Williams version and a static Fox logo were still used for the Star Wars prequels for consistency with the original trilogy.
 
tahqa

tahqa

Well-Known Member
This is what /film had to say about this:


Will the new movies have the classic Fox Fanfare?
They will not. LucasFilm and Fox have long had a sort of picture-to-picture relationship, with Fox most recently acting only as distributor for the Star Wars films, while Lucas funded them himself. Any new film may carry a Fox logo (in the same way that The Avengers had Paramount branding) but the days of live-action Star Wars features opening with the Fox fanfare are done. That said, how this deal will affect the 3D re-release of the existing Star Wars films is unknown.

http://www.slashfilm.com/your-questions-answered-disney-purchase-lucasfilm-star-wars-episode-7/
 
NemoRocks78

NemoRocks78

Seized
Premium Member
ms7479a said:
Disney has done a good job of slightly tweaking their logo to fit with different films.

This is from Tron: Legacy
Click to expand...

This is true. I think I'd personally be fine with a quiet open like Tron's.

tahqa said:
That said, how this deal will affect the 3D re-release of the existing Star Wars films is unknown.
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That's something I was wondering as well, and hopefully it will be addressed soon. I imagine Fox still has the rights to the first six flicks, so Disney would have to work out a deal with them, like the one they did with Paramount, to get control of the 3D re-releases.
 
prberk

prberk

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
JonathanR said:
I agree it won't be the same without the Fox fanfare at the start.

However, just to correct a few points in your original post. The longer Fox fanfare was composed by Alfred Newman in 1953 for films made in Cinemascope (to accompany the message "Filmed in Cinemascope" or whatever). In fact, its full title is "Twentieth Century Fox Fanfare with Cinemascope Extension". The longer version largely disappeared when widescreen films became the norm. George Lucas suggested reviving it so as to allow the Lucasfilm logo to be shown. John Williams composed the Star Wars theme in the same key (Bb) but both the long and short Fox fanfare are in this key. Episode IV originally used Newman's 1953 recording, but Williams made a new recording for The Empire Strikes Back, which was used in more recent re-releases of Ep IV too.

The Williams version of the fanfare was used for other Fox films, but when they introduced the rotating logo in the 90s they also introduced a new arrangement. The Williams version and a static Fox logo were still used for the Star Wars prequels for consistency with the original trilogy.
Click to expand...

Thank you for that detail. I had heard the part that Lucas needed or wanted the extension to accommodate his march, but I was told what I said in the original post (to keep them from clashing). I appreciate your clarification.

Wow, my geek is really coming out now! (And that's not so bad!)

Paul
 
flynnibus

flynnibus

Premium Member
Well - they can't for one thing.

Fox owns the distribution rights to star wars in PERPETUITY... until Disney buys them own, fox owns the rights to the first film.

For the other five films, fox owns the distribution rights until 2020

For the new films.. you won't see Fox anywhere. The new films is what Disney is 'buying' for the most part. I imagine they will make up some new march.

The real question is... getting John Williams involved and having him around long enough to do the work!!
 
Master Yoda

Master Yoda

Pro Star Wars geek.
Premium Member
flynnibus said:
Well - they can't for one thing.

Fox owns the distribution rights to star wars in PERPETUITY... until Disney buys them own, fox owns the rights to the first film.

For the other five films, fox owns the distribution rights until 2020

For the new films.. you won't see Fox anywhere. The new films is what Disney is 'buying' for the most part. I imagine they will make up some new march.

The real question is... getting John Williams involved and having him around long enough to do the work!!
Click to expand...
A Star Wars movie without John Williams is down right unthinkable. If the man still breathing, he must do the score.
 
ScoutN

ScoutN

OV 104
Premium Member
flynnibus said:
Well - they can't for one thing.

Fox owns the distribution rights to star wars in PERPETUITY... until Disney buys them own, fox owns the rights to the first film.

For the other five films, fox owns the distribution rights until 2020

For the new films.. you won't see Fox anywhere. The new films is what Disney is 'buying' for the most part. I imagine they will make up some new march.

The real question is... getting John Williams involved and having him around long enough to do the work!!
Click to expand...

I would like to hope JW will be capable of it. He did direct an orchestra live on the 4th of July this year.
 
J

JonathanR

New Member
prberk said:
Thank you for that detail. I had heard the part that Lucas needed or wanted the extension to accommodate his march, but I was told what I said in the original post (to keep them from clashing). I appreciate your clarification.
Click to expand...
If anyone's interested, there are plenty of clips on Youtube showing the opening to '50s Cinemascope films.



However, contrary to what Wikipedia claims, the extended fanfare wasn't used for The Robe (the first Cinemascope feature). In fact, the film's original score plays over the studio logos.



The score was by Alfred Newman, though!
 

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