How Music Makes E.T. Fly 

Hi everyone - I really hope you enjoy the video! Do let me know what you think, and have a look at the other videos in this Director Project series (bit.ly/2TKkzmk) - there are some amazing essays this month.

“Without John Williams, bikes don't really fly, nor do brooms in Quidditch matches, nor do men in red capes. There is no Force, dinosaurs do not walk the Earth, we do not wonder, we do not weep, we do not believe. - Steven Spielberg - 2016

"Then comes... this". Me, a 44, almost 45 yo guy, broke in tears. I watched E.T. in the movies when I was 6, probably the second movie i watched in theatres and one of the 4 that actually made me cry in my whole life. I still get emotional with it. I think every child should watch it. You can learn so many beautiful leassons. Your narrative and analysis is amazing. Thank you.

This is by far the best analysis of a John Williams theme that I have seen so far.

It's amazing to me that this music, even when I'm studying it intellectually and not participating in the emotion of the movie, makes the hair on the back of neck stand up just the same.

BRAVO! You managed to take a movie that already pulled on our emotions and extract even greater meaning from those intrinsic feelings. I cried watching E.T. and I cried during this analysis. Truly a fantastic job. Kudos! -Jake

The finale part made me cry so hard.

Thank you for making this video. It's a perfect counterpart to the movie itself. I've grown up watching E.T. over and over and over again, as many times as I could. It's still, more than 3 decades after I first fell in love with it, one of my 3 favorite movies ever. And Adventure On Earth, the closing 15-minutes single track, is one of the greatest pieces of music I've ever heard in my life. I listen to a lot of music, from classical to electronic, from opera to hard rock, I couldn't live without it, but I never studied it. But watching this (and more of your videos) brings clarity to the emotions. Astounding, passionate and precise at the same time: music is life and emotions and novelty and experience. This essay sums it up using the best possible example: the perfect union of a genius filmmaker and a genius composer at one of their creative peaks. Since it's been over a year since I put E.T. in my BRD player, I'm gonna watch it again in the next days. And then come back here to watch your video again. Thank you again.

John Williams is such a genius for his masterpiece .I seen this as a kid and I cry like crazy every time . Especially towards the end 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 . This movie would be nothing without the music . The music is so authentic and emotional

Man, I'm crying... thank you so much for your video... the ending and the music is a masterpiece and everything you put into words for it is perfection. Thank you!

Wowwww. I just realised I've never seen E.T. before... and just watching this felt like a deeply emotional experience! You really do have a way of retelling stories, don't you! But anyway, I guess with John Williams' music I can't help but feel things...

ET is such a wonderful film and this marvellous video is so enlightening - your explanation of the score and the visuals of the music and film together are fascinating. Brilliant.

It is truly amazing how everything is connected in some way from beginning to end. It's amazing what emotions can result from it as well. Great job!!

I just stumbled upon your channel in my Recommended section a few hours ago and I haven't stopped watching. You seamless weaving of visual effects and the music you're discussing, along with eloquent interpretations and retelling of beautiful stories are absolutely spectacular -- and, like in this video, often moving. Phenomenal!

Superb analysis of a magical score that for me, as for other commenters, was the music of my childhood. Those opening piccolo notes never fail to tingle the spine...

I'm not crying, you're crying!

You have a gift for bringing out feelings that I forgot I had. Thank you for your work. Keep it up!

The final reel of this score has never been surpassed by anyone. Simply some of the best music ever created, in any context, for any medium. And this is the best analysis I've ever seen of it--thank you.

The outline of that motif in Lydian mode is very similar to the opening bars of Dvorak symphonic variations Op. 78. Whether it is a coincidence or not, which I don't think it is, one can safely say Williams is one of the most brilliant composers of our time. Love this!

12:52 thank you for the sheet music for this fanfare I have been on an endless search for it, that aside, amazing video!

Boy, I know of very few movies that have an ending that can cause one to disolve into tears....the acting, the music, it doesn't get any better than this..

Okay... I'm crying now

This mans out here giving me the feels.

Love the decomposition and explanation of the music score juxtaposed over the running film! Brilliant.

Gosh darn these videos are so darn poetic. So much feels.

Thank you so much for this fantastic video. The incredible music and this great film itself are very beautiful and emotional, but in this video, there is also something about your editing, your analysis, and also your narration that gives a lot of emotions, the way you make the music and the images resonate with what you're telling us is brilliant! Great work, thank you!

I have watched this movie many times and I cry at the end every time. Thank you for this video and analysis of Williams music. A genius for sure.

You made me cry all over again, this music is ingrained and full of wonder ❤

Great analysis. I really enjoyed this video. Thank you!

I always cry at multiple points during this movie and even during this video!! ET will always be such a special movie for me.....& that music, wow!! ❤️❤️

The horns at 7:41is just beautiful. I don't have any words to describe it except beautiful

I completely forgot how great ET's score was. Thanks 😊

You are the best music analyst channel on RU-vid. Please make more!!

The final ten minutes or so of this film is among the most perfectly scored sequences in all of cinema, in my opinion. That climactic fanfair as the spaceship flies off always brings a tear to my eye. Part of why this is undoubtedly one of the greatest kids movies ever made.

I’m really late to the party on this one. Truly beautiful. You get me every time!

This is unbelievable! What a great, great video and explanation, could really feel these emotions. :) Great job!

I loved this movie as a kid, but could never appreciate the complexities of its score until now. This movie had no business having music this good 😭

I once wrote a paper on this movie for English class (one quarter, we wrote about a movie rather than a book). I completely agree with you on the music. My whole thesis on the paper was around two things: cinematography and score. The music especially drives the story forward. It is so captivating that I swear I cry literally everytime I watch the end when E.T. says "I'll be right here" and the music crescendos while he boards... until it begins to diminuendo. Then the ship launches into the sky where the fanfare takes over and leaves us feeling fully satisfied. This is one of the greatest movies ever scored. It was so good, I remember Spielberg saying in an interview about how he loved Williams' score so much, that when Williams had difficulty syncing his score to the edited footage, Spielberg cut the footage off the screen and told Williams to do it his way; the footage would wrap around the score which is quite unusual in filmmaking.

What a wonderful analysis! I've been waiting for someone to do this for years. This had me in tears the entire time. Thank you

Absolutely delightful video and analysis. Your joy examining Jacob’s harmony shines. One of Jacob’s recent collaborator’s is Chris Thile. You could do far worse than take a look at Chris Thile’s solo works or his bands, Nickel Creek or Punch Brothers, have put out in the last decade for some crazy fun harmonic analysis.

What a wonderful journey through an unique masterpiece! Thanks!

Wow. What an amazingly detailed explanation. Thank you for sharing your wonderful musical knowledge. I love this.

what a story teller! amazing work

That was really good! Thank you for that great analysis!

This movie is so precious to me because of that score. Amazing video! 🖤

Jesus Christ, dude. You had me at "Hello". No need to rip out my soul.

What an incredible musical journey! Music has been one of the major reasons why I enjoy movies so much. My parents played classical music including operas most of the time. Movies without an excellent music score is meaningless. I never learned to read music, however, your rendition of the score flawing in front of me, made me understand it. Your voice brings another excellent note into the video. Thank you.

Excellent video! Was surprised, though, that you didn't comment on the music during the ending credits of the film - that wonderful piano solo of rapidly moving triplets then combining with the orchestra - so beautiful.

Please! make a video on the music from the Christopher reeves superman movies my mom and I always feel so emotional in response to that music especially when the theme builds in triumphant moments!

Excellent job. I loved hear you cover Hans Zimmer’s man of steel score due to its great craftsmanship of music .

Beautiful work.

Great video

You should really do a video on Close Encounters of the Third Kind

This film will always pull on my heart strings like no other. John William's score has much to do with that. A beautiful score for a beautiful story.

Beautiful stuff dude

Great video! Your editing is some of the best in the game!

Absolutely amanzing!

Thanks a lot for this wonderful video.. No one gets tired of hearing about the E.T. theme!!

I saw the ending played live at the Hollywood Bowl with JW conducting.

excellent video!!

There's nothing like having "The Flying theme" going in your headphones as you actually fly. It's one of the few pieces that actually captures what it feels like, the only real competitor is the Superman theme.

I love the hornlines by Williams. Could you also do one covering the Robinhood Prince of Thieves Overture? (Yes I know it wasn't by Williams, but it's a great piece.)

Thanks so much beautiful

Best score of John Williams

amazing essay!!

Great analysis, thank you! Just one minor detail: at the epilogue you mentioned Elliot trying to persuade ET to 'stay'. I'd rather see that as just a plain answer to ET's question to Elliot to 'come' (with him): (I have to) 'stay'. Elliot after all knows ET has to leave for he can't live on earth as we've seen.

GREAT ANALISIS !!! And still it don't take the magic of the music, but emphasize it Nice work. What a pity most of my music students (I' m from Brasil) don' t know english to understand.

We need a new RU-vid Channel. John Williams Reacts. Wouldn't it be interesting to hear John Williams react to the analysis of his music. He would be saying stuff like. "Yep--that's exactly what I was going for" and "Huh. DIdn't think about that--but yeah." and "Ummm. No." Of course he's 90 years old, so probably wouldn't happen.

Music makes movies!!🎵 ET ❤️

When ET sees Yoda… “Home!!”

John Williams is the GOAT!

I don't suppose the narrator is a student at Oxford? He sounds like a questioner at Conan O'Brien's interview there.

holy fuck.

You are doing God’s work. Thank you.

B r a v i s s i m o !

The piccolo is very clearly not playing what the notation says.

Why does this have so few views? RU-vid crime.

Good god, I was crying by the end. I've always loved the music to this film but I never knew how brilliantly all of the motives develop and interact throughout the film. And the magic is - you don't have to know - it still hits you at the gut level.

Williams' best score IMO. Pretty much the main reason I ended up playing French Horn.

Holy damn that was good!

Also it is remarkable to know that for the chase scene at the end, instead of editing it and then John Williams stepping into it to score it, Spielberg asked him to compose the whole music for the chase scene AND THEN the whole sequence was edited over it. So yeah the music is EXTREMELY important for this movie.

Man I knew I loved the music from this but you explained the story so well I’m sitting here trying not to cry at work in a chemical plant lol

That chord at 13:08 is the sound of my childhood. It's just a Cmaj7, but there's something about the way he voices it with the minor 2nd dissonance at the very top of the brass that makes a single chord contain a whole universe.

Well I'm crying. Definitely Williams' and Spielbergs' best, in my opinion. Love the fact that Spielberg basically did something that not many directors do, and cut the last 15 minutes of the film to Williams' score. Apparently Williams was having a hard time getting the cues exactly right in the recording room, and Spielberg basically went, "I'll turn the movie off, and you just play the piece of music you wrote, because it's so good, and I'll fit the movie to your music." THAT'S INSANE! I think it's why, like you mentioned, the film has such an operatic sense of completion to it.

Williams once said in an interview, years ago, that the music for E.T. was his favorite of everything he has done.

What a beautiful video essay! Amazingly crafted

The score in this movie is so breathtaking and warm, that it's able to make me cry heartfelt tears in spite of the fact that ET's design has scared the crap out of me since I was a child. Boy howdy, was I not a fan of his way-too-long fingers, the huge head on top of the spindly neck, and especially the noises he made. But when I hear that flying theme, it all doesn't matter anymore.

Bruh how you make me cry

Wow, stunning analysis and John Williams best score in my opinion. His storytelling through music is unrivalled in my opinion and this is the peak.

When my aunt died, thats when i first started listening to Adventures on Earth as a whole. The weeks leading up to her passing actually. I had a whole movie in my head of her adventures on earth, and this music told that story to me. Truly heart breaking music this is, what a gift to humanity.

It’s a miracle that they didn’t turn ET into a franchise with a ton of mediocre sequels.

I love the sinister government theme in E.T. as well

Do you think these were the thoughts of John Williams when he scored E.T? These thoughts are truly amazing, if JW didn't actually think them, then how great is his talent in making us feel the way we do when we hear both the music as well as your thoughts. You have my gratitude as well as my amazement.

Damn it, who’s cutting onions!😭 my childhood was so emotional between this, Star Wars and the Neverending story😭

Just discovered your channel last night and have binged watched every essay. Your ability to articulate the meaning of music, theory, psychology, and emotion is brilliant. Thank you for sharing your gifts with the rest of us.

I am crying right now. Brilliant! Terrific job!

My favorite Williams score, and my favorite Spielberg movie! It's a tough choice on both fronts, but still easier than trying to determine my second-favorites.

Ook! [I cried.]

Wonderful!

THANK YOU so much for this beautiful video. I'm gonna go watch ET right now.