George Lucas: To feel the true force of ‘Star Wars,’ he had to learn to let it go

Lucas is an idiot.

 

Well at first Spielberg did do that but he came around.

 

I dont care who shot first. The reason I dont like the change isnt morally based. It has to do with that it looks clunky as hell. Looks like some sloppy edit. Goofy looking in fact. Do it right, if youre going to edit/add to it.

 

Your post about Luke and Vaders silence brought back memories of the "feel" of the original.

There is a samuri feel to those moments. Like some old japanese movies use to do. Almost a comic book that you turn the page look to it. One frame followed by another in small numbers that tell much more than words. Unspoken pain and release. Much more powerful and also contrasts all the psychological pull of what the dialogue said just before that.

Im afraid, as you pointed out, George Lucas either forgot what that scene felt like; or maybe never got it in the first place and it was just a happenstance that the original turned out that way.

I think the Mose Eisley scene continually bothered George. Instead of it feeling scarey and villainous, it ended up being rather cutesy. So I guess he figured, ok if its not going to be the scarey bit in the movie for the kids, then lets make it even more cutesy and over the top.

The rest of the changes with giant Dinos in the desert and slapshtick circus clown alien humor with farts and popping up alien wiley coyote actions are just out of place and cheapen the feel of the movie. Sometimes less is more.

 

I appreciate Lucas' belief in the power of the cinematic image, but going back and changing the original obviously was not the answer.

 

My ideal version of these films are the original theatrical films in HD with cosmetic alterations. Fix the matte lines, wampa arm and all that good stuff. Fix the shading and coloring issues as well. The DVD/Blu-ray version of A New Hope is very dark. Empire has that blue tint through most of the Hoth scenes. The lightsaber colors are all over the place. I believe these versions are probably on their way.

 

You have just summed up how they should be "fixed". And I know some purists don't even want the matte lines removed, but I doubt they would complain much.

Release the original versions. Fix the matte lines that would show up like a sore thumb on HD, fix the wampa stick, and maybe fix the lightsabers, and they will be perfect.

 

You know there is one change they could make in the first film (Episode 4).


Vader is standing in the middle of a long shot talking to Peter Cushing who is sitting to the right of the frame. Vader’s dialogue is clearly dubbed onto footage were Prowse (as Vader) is saying something different to James Earl Jones. Vader moves his left arm to emphasise a point but the Jones dialogue is calm so the hand movement makes no sense. It might even be a small fist shake.


It’s a static camera angle so it would be easy to copy and paste the wall background over Vader’s hand movement in the following frames. It’s a proper continuity error and more worthy of tinkering with than most of the other stuff.


I noticed this on the 2011 Blu-Ray I watched about six months ago.

 

I'm far from being a "super fan" of Star Wars, but I remember seeing the first film in the theater when I was 13, and Han shooting Greedo pre-emptively was a signal moment. It was kinda shocking at the time, and showed you that Han Solo was a really hard guy who was used to being in deep trouble and blasting his way out of it by any means necessary. I understand that when Dr. No was first released, the scene in which Bond silently kills an enemy agent from behind was also controversial because the hero is always supposed to kill an enemy face to face and in response to a direct threat. The Han Solo scene was the same sort of edgy situation. It shows you that being the swashbuckling hero carries with it a necessary moral ambiguity. Lucas' insistence on effacing that seems ridiculously parochial. Considering that in my lifetime I've seen the whole idea of the epic hero has been altered to include a hefty dose of rough'n'gritty moral ambiguity, it seems pretty silly that Han Solo has to be changed into The Guy Who Would Never Shoot First. He was supposed to be a rogue.

 

I think the bottom line with Lucas and his Original Trilogy is that the man simply doesn't understand his own movies. Or, more directly, he doesn't understand what made his own movies great in the first place.

Case in point, adding the deleted Jabba the Hutt scene to the 97 SE of Star Wars with a CGI Jabba and making him a putz basically. A) It looks awful (CGI over real human Jabba) B) It doesn't work as a scene because it's a rehash of the Greedo scene that has just happened C) It spoils the reveal of Jabba in ROTJ. We've heard about this thug for 2 movies and we get him front and center in ROTJ.

I have read through the years that the original SW77 was practically saved during the editing phase by Marcia Lucas. And then of course TESB was directed by someone else, as was ROTJ. I think it's very possible that the success of Star Wars is due as much to the talents of a number of people not named George Lucas as it is that man's imagination.

 

Oh good lord, he didn't actually do that, did he? Just when you start feeling a little sorry for George, you discover some new act of revisionism he's done, and you have to conclude the harsh but constructive (as opposed to the poisonous invective aimed at him sometimes) criticism of his judgement, or lack thereof, is perfectly justified...

The versions as originally released on their initial theatrical runs, the versions that were on the original edited negatives (before they were re-cut in 1996 to conform to the Special Editions), those versions. And those versions still exist too, I'd wager the recent 4k transfers are the original theatrical versions, taken directly from the digitized negatives done in 1995-96 during the initial restoration work. As long as all they do/have done is clean up the various optical effect artifacts, but leave everything else alone - including all the flaws and mistakes - they'll be what most of us have been waiting a decade for; proper, remastered, anamorphic presentations of the original trilogy's theatrical versions as originally released in 1977, 1980, and 1983. It's very simple.

A memory wipe to forget the prequels would be a nice bonus too...

 

She remembers 4 things changing during the first year:

• Aunt Beru's voice being dubbed.
• The alarm sound during the first attack on Princess Leah's ship was replaced.
• Distortion being added to the voices during the dogfight scenes.
• "Close the blast doors" followed by "Open the blast doors!"

She saw it this way at least 10 times. This was not a premiere, this was during regular release and long before A New Hope.

My point is, George Lucas has been changing Star Wars ever since the very beginning, and what you consider "the original" was not in fact the original.

 

I'm not an apologist for Lucas, but let me again point out these are not the audience's films. They were George Lucas' films. He created the characters, produced all of them, wrote a lot of them, heavily supervised the post-production on all of them, and had financial interests in all of them. More than any studio, more than any other human being on the planet, they are George's films. If an artist wants to change his or her work, they have that ability.

When we were remastering the films in 2004 at ILM, I did ask producer Rick McCallum (whom I worked with every single day) why not just release the original theatrical versions along with the revised films, and he told me there just wasn't enough time and money to do it. George knew going in that he was going to be criticized for all the changes (VFX, editorial, sound, and story), but he told me conversationally that he resigned himself to the belief that no matter what happens, "the fans will always criticize what I do." He seemed to be both dejected and yet determined when he said it. He also said words to the effect that "at this point, all I can do is make the best films I know how to, and make them for myself." So that was the only audience he was trying to please as of 10 years ago.

I think the documentary The People vs. George Lucas and the extensive book The Secret History of Star Wars go into all these changes and the reasons for them in great detail. I think George's fixation on making the films more perfect started from his great frustration and dissatisfaction back in 1977 with the original Star Wars, which was filled with mistakes but still made bucket-loads of money. Once George had the money and power, he had free rein to begin making the changes that fit with the movie he saw in his head, but nobody else could see. And by the late 1990s, the technology finally existed to actually allow him to make the changes.

I asked McCallum one day, "George is still making fixes right now on these movies. Do you think he'll ever finish?" And McCallum kind of sighed and said, "I think the changes will continue forever or when George retires, whichever comes first."

 

Totally agree that George has all the rights to do anything to his work.

But he's ruined it in my opinion. Two of my favorite movies of all time and one that was highly flawed but a sentimental favorite anyway. And I don't own any of them, and wouldn't watch them if they were on right now.

Honestly saddens me, but yeah, it's George's right.

 

Most everyone knows there were minor differences between the 70mm premiere prints and the 35mm versions' soundtracks (Aunt Beru's voice being the big one, if these trivial differences could be called "big"), but last-minute sound editing isnt the same as restarting production years later to make new changes. I'd say either of the two versions from 1977 when production closed down would be welcomed as the "original".

 

When most people say "original," they're referring to the versions that existed on home video until the release of the Special Editions in 1997. The VHS versions were consistent on home video. The THX versions on VHS and Laser Disc would be the definitive versions of the original semi-unaltered trilogy for most people. Nobody complained about "Episode IV: A New Hope" in the opening scroll.

 

All of that said...I'll take any edition that precedes the Special Editions from 1997. Those are the definitive Star Wars trilogy to me.

 

They were George Lucas' films. He doesn't own them anymore. He sold them to Walt Disney.

Also, at some point, shouldn't George have considered the fans in all of this? If for no other reason than to give the fans the option to at least own the version they remember and loved? I do hope Disney remedies this at some point.

I'm sensitive to the intellectual and legal ownership that GL once had of these films. But, I'm also sensitive to this; George Lucas' own statement in 1988 regarding Ted Turners attempts at colorization of classic films:

What happened to that guy? It almost sounds like he was warning us about his future self.

 

Gorts, could we change the thread title to: "Another pointless thread about who shot first?" I'm waiting for the version where Gredo kills Han.

 

Threadcrap much?

 

Whenever I feel like it. The thread title promised an interesting read, the actual content did not.

 

Take it up with Washington Post.

 

I was speaking of the years 1997-2012. It was only in October 2012 that Lucas had enough and sold out. I'm convinced it was the flop of Red Tails that was the final thing that compelled Lucas to leave the "Hollywood" filmmaking business.

Why do you think Lucas owes the fans anything? Look at it from his perspective: he spent more than 30 years making these films and doing the best he could with them.

Again: read the book and watch the documentary I cited. All your questions are answered there, and I think both sides of the argument are stated very well. I'm merely saying this is not a black & white issue, and George was not a bad guy. He was actually very nice... from a certain point of view. But also quietly determined, and clearly a guy who was accustomed to not settling for anything less than what he wanted.

 

I think it was probably more the slick talk of Bob Iger, but either way, I'm glad it happened.

And I do understand that. I don't believe I said he "owes" the fans anything, per se. I do think it should be a consideration though to at least give the fans the option of owning the pre-Special Edition versions though. On some level he does understand that. In 2006 two-disc versions were issued of the OT and included were 1993 THX transfers of the OT-final theatrical versions (pre-Special Edition) but they were non-anamorphic. It was like "fine, here". LOL

Something like what his buddy Spielberg has done with "Close Encounters" would do nicely. I think the most recent Blu-ray release of that has 3 versions, including the theatrical cut.

I'll definitely give it a look. I'll be honest, I'm not much of a reader. I do like Chris Taylor's book "How Star Wars Conquered the Universe" and he has done some interviews where he addresses some of Lucas' inability to let the originals be. I like you 'certain point of view' reference, I just caught that.

Something that does sort of undermine George's changes though is that he kept making them. Sometimes the same scenes would be altered and changed back and then re-altered. No rhythm or rhyme to anything. Maybe I'll check out the book you mentioned. It's going to have to work overtime though to convince me that any of the changes GL made 1997-present to the OT were anything but calculated business decisions at the end of the day.

 

Even though I would still be against it, it would be one thing if Lucas changed the films once to get them to an original vision. But the need to be adding and subtracting over and over again just reveals a guy who has no idea what he really wants.

I mean seriously, what if he one day decided he didn't want Han Solo in the films at all?? Would a single person defend his right to remove that character?