Ladyhawke Rescored

Having grown up watching Ladyhawke from a very young age, it was one of my mother's favorite movies, I have a lot of nostalgia for this film and the original score. While the original score is very much a product of the time, to me, it is still a great score. That being said, when I came across this edit, I was very interested to see what the viewing experience would be like with Jerry Goldsmith's Lionheart score.

First off, the sound editing for this movie far exceeded my expectations. There are very few instances where the sound effects are lowered or removed completely, but nothing that is distracting in any way. The dialogue is clear and the musical levels are good. I was surprised by how well the music matches up thematically in certain scenes. So kudos to the editor for hitting those marks.

To me watching this reminded me a lot of the Legend debate in terms of score. If you grew up with the contemporary Tangerine Dream score you probably prefer that vs the Jerry Goldsmith score which is more classical in approach. Having grown up with Ladyhawke, it's very hard for me to remove the memory of the original score and it still is probably the preferred version for me.

Overall though, I did enjoy watching this. While the Lionheart score can also feel a little dated at times, it definitely is a more classical approach and provides an interesting alternative to the film. Great job to the editor and thank you for putting this together!

Excellent sound mixing. I found that most fan editors (myself included) fall short on sound mixing. Balancing the dialogue, sound/foley effects and the music score is really an art, which is why it is worthy of its own Oscar category. After watching a few scenes on my cheap bluetooth speaker, I immediately could tell this was done right. I didn't need a fancy set up.

I hadn't seen this movie since college in the 1990s, but remember not being able to fully enter into the narrative because of how dated the soundtrack was. This was too bad as I am a sucker for fantasies from the 1980s. I decided to give this movie another chance with a new soundtrack. What a difference! MusicEdge91 does an excellent job making the soundtrack seem seamless and organic with the mood and tone of the original. I forgot I was watching a fan edit, the soundtrack flowed so seemlessly. Highly recommended.

This is my first fanedit and my first review. I was desperately searching for a re-scored version of Ladyhawke and stumbled across MusicEd921's version. He was very kind and friendly to communicate with. When I watched just the beginning fight scene I was floored with how much better this film is with the new score! It gave the film so much more depth without the cheesy 80's synthesized garbage they had originally added. I'll be replacing my original version with this re-scored one on my Plex server and will watch it with great love over the years. I am not here to critique the movie, the acting, scenery, whatever. You either already like the movie or you don't. My personal problem was with the score, and MusicEd921 did an outstanding job that I wish I had the skills to do (and I do edit videos and am a creative professional myself, lol!). Thank you MusicEd921 for giving this film the dignity it deserved.

In my first semester as an undergraduate student in a New Media program my professor turned a lecture to sound design. At the start of the lecture he put on the encounter at the inn, when The Mouse accidentally reveals himself to Marquet and the chase begins. The first time he played the scene, we watched it muted. Then he played the scene again with orchestral music from another film (unsynced). And finally he played us all the theatrical release. It was disturbing how much that little exercise affected me and how I understand film.

When I saw this edit was available I reached out for a copy immediately. I had to see that experiment expanded upon. It didn't disappoint. MusicEd921 worked some magic here. Not only did the Lionheart score work well, the care for syncing up scenes and actions was beautiful. This feels like what the film should have been, and that's my favorite type of FanEdit.

Reading back over the changes I didn't even notice the other subtle edits that were made, but I'm thankful for those choices as well. The relationship at the heart of the fantasy needs to be as strong as possible for the film to work and be believable, and moments of doubt didn't help that. Well done here as well.

In the end the best thing I can say to summarize my feelings on this FanEdit is that Ladyhawke now feels like a legitimately good movie.