Top Gun Maverick

[Frank Cox]

The initial Thank You is nice, but it's TOO GD LOUD!!!

They spend millions of dollars making the movie and then they spend only a minute on an intro so it's too much work to match the sound level to the rest of the movie....

Sheesh.

[Jon Dent]

Yes it was quite hot volume wise. I actually left the volume at trailer level (i.e. lower) until he quit talking. Even then it was loud.

[Darin Steffl]

Well Week 2 was 77.5% higher in box office revenue than Week 1 and we had a pretty good first week too. This movie is our #1 since reopening March 2020, BY FAR. We had some people come and see it 2-3 times. We loved everything about the movie, the crowd, the excitement, the reviews!! Now let's get the studios to keep sending us good content and we'll be back in business.

[Mike Blakesley]

The initial Thank You is nice, but it's TOO GD LOUD!!!

I noticed this when I tested the movie the night before opening. I thought, well this is not acceptable. So, all you have to do is just set your "feature" sound level cue at exactly 30 seconds into the feature.

Here, I wound up setting the intro a bit lower than the trailers because I wanted there to be a nice noticeable contrast between Tom's intro and the feature sound.

I don't know if our settings would mean anything to anybody else (we have an Ovation2 sound processor) but for this movie they were:

Ads 3.3
Trailers 4.0 (our normal trailer setting is 3.7 but with the bigger crowds I made the trailers a little louder)
Tom intro 3.3
Feature 5.7

[Steve Guttag]

Mike, do you make your own Ads or those made by others? Whenever I see a volume go below 4.0 (which is a hinge point on most volume scales used in cinema), it makes me think that someone thought that -10 to 0 dBFS was nominal rather than -20dBFS. If it is you that is making the ads that loud, then you can fix that in DCP O Matic, pretty easily.

Naturally, when I see volume levels that low, I often think about poor acoustics and low-end equipment that make the audio harsh. I have a 3-plex where they, currently, have three different volume levels despite the same person with the same test equipment, set up all three rooms. The difference? The room acoustics, the speakers and the processing used to tune them (the better the room/speakers, the higher the volume knob went). Since you are a single, that isn't an issue. I also know that you don't have low-rent equipment (QSC screen speakers, Trinnov Ovation processor), leaving room acoustics. Presuming that the Trinnov processor did its own tuning, there shouldn't be too many variables left other than the room acoustics, itself.

As to the intro...it isn't just that it is too loud (which it most definitely is), it is overmodulated and distorted too. So, lowering the volume just gets you a lower volume but distorted intro.

[Mike Blakesley]

Our ads are made by a third party. The 3.3 is just my default setting -- if we're getting a big crowd or a lot of kids I'll turn them up a little louder. I just don't want them to be any more annoying than they have to be. No doubt the ad people would love them to play at 5.0 or so!

I do think the trailers sound a ton better at 4.0 or maybe even a little higher, but I have taken to heart the words of our own Brad Miller, who has always said there should be a huge difference between the trailer volume and the feature. (I know Brad also thinks the surrounds should be off during the trailers, which I get his point but I haven't gone that far.)

[Darin Steffl]

We run trailers between 4.5 and 5.0

Features usually run 5.2 to 7.0 depending on the movie. Most are 5.5 to 6.0

Why would this Brad guy suggest no surround channels during trailers?

[Carsten Kurz]

It is important to quote the type of audio processor with your fader settings, as different devices use different fader curves - they only comply at 7, but not below.

[Darin Steffl]

Dolby cp950 for us

[Mike Blakesley]

Why would this Brad guy suggest no surround channels during trailers?

Because his preference is that there should be a major contrast between the feature film and the trailers. If you play the trailers at the "preferred" setting of 7, they will sound ridiculously loud and the feature will sound wimpy by comparison. So since you have to adjust things anyway, why not save the surrounds (and the louder volume) for the feature film? It gives the audience a thrill to suddenly hear the fullness of the sound.

Personally I like to make the trailer volume quite low, but I do leave the surrounds on. Mainly because I don't have a cue that excludes them. It is still very effective when the feature hits with full volume.

(Be nice to "this Brad guy," he can undoubtedly tell you a few things about projection, considering he's the owner/founder of Film-Tech.)

[Darin Steffl]

Fair enough. I still like to hear the surround sound during trailers. I would feel that there's a malfunction if we only heard stage speakers during trailers. I understand there's more contrast if we cut the surrounds but I think enough volume difference between the feature and trailers will do similar things.

[David Ferguson]

A question for all you that have seen the new Top Gun, I have a question (I’ve not seen it yet).

I hadn’t seen the original until tonight, and… I’m very disappointed. I’d heard good things about it, but it was overly brash, American, and loud, with characters that were brash, American and loud. Maybe that’s the point of this film, but I found everyone unlikable and it a bit cringy. And the flying scenes didn’t do it for me either - I just didn’t feel an investment in them.

With that in mind, do you think I should see the new film? Several people I’ve asked have said it’s better than the original so I’m up for giving it a go, but thought I’d ask what people here thing too!

[Darin Steffl]

I liked the second one better. The first one was very cheesy I thought but I still liked it. I agree as an American that both films are meant to show off Americans and the Macho man ego. I still liked both regardless of that but I'm a biased American.

It might seem overboard to people from other countries but I'd say you will probably like Maverick more than the first.

[Allan Young]

Maverick's slightly more bearable than the original due to the flying sequences. Unfortunately the rest of the film is equally as poor.

[Carsten Kurz]

The original film as of today is indeed hard to watch nowadays. If you liked it as a young fellow back then, you would consider it part of your biography. The new one is, well, slightly better. I didn't connect to it emotionally, but of course, it has been produced with much more attention to all details, and is certainly more fun to watch. The flight scenes and soundtrack is much more advanced. There's a decent amount of successful funny oneliners in it. So, it's a mixed bag, but, as you suffered through the first one already, go ahead and see this one as well. It's certainly not as bold as the original.