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Star Wars Episode 2 Starts Shooting
Star Wars Episode II has started shooting in Australia. Comments on it being filmed fully digitally. Mentions that Jar Jar will be back (along with McGregor, Jackson and Portman). Millions of fans hold their breath and hope this one is good (it'd be tough to go downhill, that's for sure).
I had two problems with The Phantom Menace. And *gasp* neither of them was Jar-Jar.
I didn't care for the force becoming some weird interaction between midi-chlorians, but what bothered me even more?
HE'S NOT JESUS!
JFC(that's Jesus Fucking Christ, for those of you who aren't in the know) A virgin birth? Conceived by midi-chlorians? Come on! We already liked the guy, anyone who can go on to become one of the baddest badasses in history can start from humble beginnings. Lucas seriously lost a lot of my respect when he gave Anakin an Immaculate Conception.
Steven
-- I have marked myself unwilling to moderate-- I don't have other accounts to artificially inflate the karma of
Australia(AP)- Today, in a freak Lightsabre(tm) accident, the noted Jedi sidekick, Jar Jar Binks was killed. Sources say that Binks, a Gungan from Naboo, was accidentally cut in half by young Jedi apprentice, Anakin Skywalker, during a Lightsabre(tm) training exercise.
Although there are preliminary reports that Skywalker is dispondent over the accident, some people thought they heard a maniacal laugh comming from his quarters.
In an apparantly unrelated event, some people have been reporting a figure in a dark cloak, loitering near the Skywalker compound where the accident took place.
Skywalker's wife, Princess Amadala Skywalker of Naboo, is reportedly in Hyperspace with their two young twins, Luke and Leia, returning to the Skywalker compound to be with her husband during this tragic time.
The funeral for Binks will be a small affair with only friends and family attending.
Republic Investigations Unit TXH-1138 released a statement saying that although this appears to be a training accident, the case will be thoroughly reviewed.
Setting his threshold to 5, Sparky eliminated most of the trolls on /.
(it'd be tough to go downhill, that's for sure)
Come on! All that's ever on Slashdot about any movie is negative. Episode I was beautifully done. It had everything that made the original movies good:
1. A great story line, good vs. evil sort of thing
2. Action
3. Comic Relief (Jar Jar)
4. A bit of romance (Amadala and Anakin)
It has exactly what it needs to be a good movie and to infom us of how we eventually will get to the Empire and the Rebellion. There's much more to Star Wars besides Darth Vader.
What everyone seems to be forgeting is that Episode I is supposed to tell us how it all got started. The only purpose of the movie is to show how we get to Episode II! Everyone seems to hate it because there's no grand revealing things that happen-- there isn't supposed to be! If there was then Episode II and III would absolutely suck because there wouldn't be anything else to tell.
The second thing people need to figure out is that puppets aren't real either. There's all kinds of complaining about how Lucas should have used puppets instead of CGI animation. Why? Are puppets more real than computer generated characters? Lucas couldn't have done what he did without the help of the computers! (Jar Jar aside)
Finally when all the movies are out no one is going to complain about Episode I because it will all make sense and everyone will see that its needed to tell us how the whole thing began. When Episode V (Empire Strikes Back) there was all kinds of complaining about it being too dark and too evil and most of us would now say its needed to have Return of the Jedi. I expect that Episode 2 will be much the same way.
Anyway I loved the movie. There's my rant for the day!
Never knock on Death's door:
The Anti-Blog
Nevermind.
--
First it was the black racists in the NAACP, etc complaining that Jar Jar's accent makes him sound like a Jamaican and they found that offensive because he was a dumb/subordinate character who they thought made blacks look bad.
So now I'm wondering, which group will be pissed off this time? Which bunch of racists will find an "attack" against their race's pride and dignity? This will be interesting though, my bet is that this go around it will be some of the good ole boys (not just from the south mind you) who'll get pissed cuz the storm troopers are all white guy clones and act like NAZI's.
Here's a very large list of both positive and negative review links at Rotten Tomatoes.
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The new Star Wars might seem childish to us, but could it be that we just grew up? Could it be that we just wished the story grew up with us?
I'm still working on a clever footer.
Give me Ewoks any day.
...with a nice garlic sauce.
(it'd be tough to go downhill, that's for sure)
No it wouldn't.
Two words: Battlefield Earth.
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Star Wars is not a kid's series. Did you see Empire? Not a kid's movie. For chrisssakes, they wanted David Lynch to direct ROTJ. Can you imagine that? He would have changed Vader's secret from being Luke's father to being addicted to laughing gas (that's why he makes the huffing noise when he talks) No, the problem with Episode I is that George Lucas made it a kid's movie, even though the subject matter was much too serious to pull it off. Not-so-coincidentally, that's also the same problem with most pieces of garbage that Hollywood craps out nowadays.
I feel for you: your pain is evident. "Here", you cry to an uncaring world, "am I, slone and ignored in my self-righteousness!"
Why can't a movie be for entertainment any longer? Star Wars was ALWAYS a monetary scheme: all movies are; movie directors/producers/actors all expect to get some sort of compensation for their time. If they're good enough, they get more than those involved in bad projects (*cough*Battlefield Earth*cough*). But it isn't THEIR fault if their audience goes into a movie, expecting more than a couple hours of entertainment, something Lucas has almost always delivered (I'm not as sure about THX-1138 as the rest of the films...). So, in summary, if you expect MORE from a movie than a prettily-packaged product, you're in the wrong spot.
Now, as for the "dubious moralising, dumb looking aliens and slushy character relationships", in order: all fiction is political, and contains value judgements based upon the society it was created for. The originals had quite a bit of moralising. Say it with me: "Anger. Fear. Agression. The Dark Side are they." As to dumb looking aliens, I refer you to Star Trek - you must have gotten confused as to which SF saga you were critiquing. And slushy character relationships: society is replete with 'em. EVERY modern (fiction) show cannot help but handle "slushy" relationships. Episode I is tame by comparison.
Finally, your remarks comparing Vader and Manson: you're obviously trolling here, looking for "insightful" or some such. Real quick: Vader==fiction. Manson!=fiction. eof.
That isn't a relevant issue as long as the film is first exhibited in theaters.
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Although, they're also being used by Palpatine - if he's so powerful, the Jedi would have detected him long before.
Instead he probably just shoots up with force germs from time to time. It's still kind of stupid though.
Not to beat a dead monkey repeatedly, but I gotta agree.
The special effects that were physically done were GREAT. You could tell when you were seeing them.
The animations, though.. they looked like cartoons. I woulda loved it if they had gotten some Jim Henson stand ins or spent more time on the animation, but they just left it. Sometimes, you could even flat out tell that the animation was placed in, because it almost seemed raised off the screen.
I vaguely recall seeing somewhere that Lucas had recieved this criticism and was listening, and was going to try to balance the special effects (models,etc. vs. digital imaging) more. It will be interesting to see if he does balance. This film has promise, but if he messes this one up, I know a lot of Star Wars fans who have ciggarette lighters and propane torches prepared for their memorabilia...
We don't need no Net Explorer We don't need no Thought control
Yes and I was hoping that the Special Edition Soundtrack still had the old Ewok song and the old Jabba's lair song as well as the sailbarge songs. The new age jazz crud they added at the end of the movie should have been cut off when panning to the ewoks. The ewok song was far more convincing... and yes as an adult I like both Jar Jar and the ewoks. The key to appreciating episode I is to go in with the expectation that it will be awful... then you are pleasantly surprised because viewed against the other 3 it is worse, but it isn't bad. This same technique can be used to learn to like Star Trek V. I actually have the sheet music to the original Ewok Anthem...(to be played by a school band) The ewoks spoke a tibetan dialect... wonder what the song is about... if it isn't gibberish.
Maybe...... George Lucas is secretly working with the religious right and EII will be the futuristic remake of Moses! I'm sure it will suck either way. I would rather watch re-runs of the Smurfs than that horribly animated and undeveloped Jar-Jar (let alone having to watch E1 a second time).
----Quid
----Quid
Less talk, more caffeine
First, since Star Wars draws heavily from mythology, Lucas put in the "virgin birth" of Anakin. Newsflash for the masses- Christianity isn't the only, and not nearly the first, religon/myth to use a virgin birth. It's a strong story element and it also keeps everyone from asking about Anakin's father (who also should have been a powerful Jedi, if he existed).
At some point (test screenings?) Lucas realized that his primary audience (the US) has, for the most part, a Christian background. Not only that, but they don't realize that there are other myths to use a virgin birth. Everytime I saw the movie I heard someone near me exclaim, "He's Jesus!"
To avoid all nonsense that would result from having millions think he's trying to equate Anakin with Jesus, Lucas decided to throw in the miticlorians. That way, there's a nice scientific explanation for the whole thing.
a whole series about how great the kid who grew up to be Darth Vader, killer of the innocent, is - what the fuck is that about? What's next, Charles Manson - The Childhood Adventures?
You give Lucas too much credit. What essential element was missing from Darth's character in the original trilogy? Why he was the enemy. Also missing was why the empire was bad. The audience has no reason to dislike the "bad guys," and therefore Charles Manson wouldn't fit. He is bad for reasons other than the fact that he dresses in black.
--Jeff
Integral maybe, what other purpose could he possibly serve?
I find it hard to believe that Jar Jar is a character from an earlier movie. I also find the it even more difficult to believe that Jar Jar becomes Boba Fett, that's just plain lunacy. The part about the force is somewhat more believable, but I'm not holding my breath.
Anyway, anyone seen this before. A friend of mine pointed out this site to me before and I went back to see his review on Phantom Menace.
http://www.moviejuice.com/1999/starwars.htm
Here's a clip if the site gets slashdotted.
Every story has a beginning and every universe has its Jerry Lewis. Here it's the virtually unintelligible "Jar Jar Binks." Rasta rabbit, funny bunny, one part Chris Tucker and two parts Scooby Doo. Picture Chewbacca with A.D.D. and a gnawing propensity for pig latin. Silly Binks, Trix are for kids! "Ex-squeeze Me," says Jar Jar Berle, as the Friars Club guffaws uncontrollably. Enter the fifth Teletubby. "Uh-Ohhhhhh!"
Jar Jar Binks? Either some sorry soul at Lucasfilm posed the question: "What would it look like if a migraine headache could walk and talk?" or somebody's serving tainted shitake 'shrooms at the Lucas Ranch commissary. You guys, stop inhaling the hemp mousepads! Don't eat the brown trail mix!
When Jar Jar opened his mouth to speak, my first thought was: "You're kidding. For the whole movie?!" How long can Liam Neeson stand it before he hauls off and slugs this guy? Is this why Bill Gates wanted to limit us all to 640K? "The force is strong with this one," says Liam, "the force of my Jedi fist in his rabbity face, that is. Here's your Scooby Snack!"
The rest of the review is pretty good too. This guy is pretty funny, sometiems.
"The words of the prophets are written on the Slashdot walls."
In the oriignal trilogy, 1 was the 'regular' film, 2 was the 'dark' film, and 3 was the 'happy' film. In the new, iot's supposed to be 'happy' then 'regular' then 3 will be the 'dark' film with all the empire-taking-over and dark-side stuff.
----
Oh my god, Bear is driving! How can this be?
ADVENTURERS! - ANTIHERO FOR HIRE - CARDMASTER CONFLICT
-Put a stop to procrastination... Later....
Well, it looks like the moderation gods were kind to you!
I totally agree with you. It is Lucas we have to blame for fast food/toy promotions and the shameless pushing of merchandise for movies. I wouldn't mind movies without the $100 million price tag in lieu of not having to endure the countless commercials and shelf space awarded to these extensions of the movie industry/entertainment industry/record industry/pick your money-grubbing industry and replace it here.
Believe in things of which no person has ever learned
It could have Ewoks, you know.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
Good point, but your sig's quote of DV is incorrect...the line is:
I find your lack of faith disturbing.
Sorry, but I'm a SW junky.
Karma: Non-existant. Due mostly to the fact that you smell funny and nobody likes you.
I can't help but feel that George has started doing special effects just to do special effects as of late. I thought all the re-releases were crap and made stuff worse with the scenes and effects he added. Episode I wasn't much better.
I wish he'd go back to basics. Concentrate on the story and use the brand spanking new effect technologies a little more conservatively.
And although I'm sure Jar Jar was some technical marvel, as most would agree it was a bad move. Kill the corny characters that make it a movie for the whole family and go back to the big rubber puppet days. It worked better.
-- A computer without COBOL and Fortran is like a piece of chocolate cake without ketchup and mustard
Will there be hot grits? The breakfast of Jedi?
Odd...
Friends don't let friends use multiple inheritance.
Stormtroopers in general and their armour in particular were designed with exactly one goal in mind:
To serve as cannonfodder!
It's a movie guys. Stuff in movies are generally designed for best visual effect, not realism, let alone coherence.
Besides, if I recall my role-playing games correctly, the stormtroopers did have IR imagery built into their helmets.
I strongly believe that trying to be clever is detrimental to your health. -- Linus Torvalds
Anyone read 'A Spell for Chameleon' by Piers Anthony? The main character, Bink, had a magic talent, which was luck... he always managed to get out of predicaments and he could not be killed, essentially. Could it be that Jar Jar is unconsciously wielding the force in this way? Because you see him get in stupid situations but never *quite* gets killed... but that's kind of dumb. --- You know what? I didn't think about the name correlation until I wrote this. Interesting.
'Jar Jar could Boba Fett' ? Christ, man, who came up with that load of BS?
As for Jar Jar being an integral part of the storyline, I hope to hell he's Anakin's first victim as Vader.
So will this speed up the release of the movie?
Death to Jar Jar
Much more explicit. =)
Humorless sig goes here.
Will it have ewoks? That'll be sure to raise popularity!
Also,
Senator Palpatine: He becomes evil emporer and dies on second death star with Anakin.
Did people see the MTV Movie Awards, when Lucas went up on stage to accept "best action sequence" and he pointed out Samuel L. Jackson in the audience? He said something like "We didn't win best fight this year, but I expect to see Sam Jackson up here next year!" Sounds like they're expecting to put some meat in this one.
echo Prpv a\'rfg cnf har cvcr | tr Pacfghnrvp Cnpstuaeic
Messa Bobba Fett...
Hesa wortha alota morsa to mesa alive than dead... Solosa gonna die?
-- A computer without COBOL and Fortran is like a piece of chocolate cake without ketchup and mustard
How can a farm boy crop duster turn into a ace pilot with no training?
Although he was a farm boy crop duster, he was also an excellent pilot. He wasn't a farm boy crop duster by choice, he did, afterall, want to go to the academy presumably to increase his skills as a pilot. Also, when one of the pilots of the death star mission told Admiral Ackbar that hitting the 2 meter wide ventilation shaft was impossible, Luke replied by saying that he used to blast womp rats in his t-16 back home. Therefore, he did have training... and the power of the force.
Don't trust a bull's horn, a doberman's tooth, a runaway horse or me.
In some of the books that are supposed to take place after RotJ, Boba Fett returns. Apparently he found a way out of the Sarlac Pit.
-B
There is a well known expression: "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me." Something to consider when discussing George Lucas and the next episode.
You can actually see this effect in the original Star Trek movies I-IV. I had the greatest warp effect which they got rid of. II had awesome structural damage... burns... scarring of the ship. Shadows...dustiness... a real model. At the time TNG looked so darn fake it was stupid...especially the shield splash on an invisible bubble effect which happened 3 times then the ship blew up or had a core breach imminent... made Star Trek II so much better... now that's a ship...(Reliant one of my faves)... takes such a beating and still dishes it out.
A couple of points, m'lud:
1) The Enterprise was a military ship; a certain amount of spit and polish was to be expected, unlike your basic freighter/smuggling vessel. Plus, the Enterprise never landed on a planet and had shields and deflectors to keep away the stardust; how would it get dirty?
2) Don't kid yourself that the spacecraft and their various dogfights, et al. shown in Star Wars are "realistic"; they have all the realism of the stereotypical space babe in the bikini and bubble helmet. The opening sequence of Episode IV is a great example; two starships capable of superluminal speeds have apparently very carefully matched speeds and headings so that they can exchange shots at point-blank range. As you said, I'm sure that there's some sort of strategic reason... but it's more likely that starships could be painted fluorescent green with big red neon crosshairs over their most vulnerable spots, and at the distances and velocities that space battles would be fought, it would scarcely make a difference.
That having been said, yes, Star Wars did make a huge difference in how these things are portrayed; witness Star Trek III, in which the Enterprise actually does pull into spacedock... horribly shot to crap. No reset button there.
I looked into the abyss, and the abyss looked into me--and we both winked.
How come pt1 had those weird robot warrior things that looked like mice from the mechanical-mouse-organ from Bagpuss-the-saggy-old-cloth-cat kids programme, and yet several years later the battle harware dudes had been upgraded to blokes in cheap very-unnatty outfits?
Technology surely wouldn't turn your drum kit into a log and a couple of sticks!
Lucas should get Steve Irwin to run across the scene holding some futuristic 'goana, screaming "Have a look at this. He is a real ripper!"
Yeah, remember that too. Leia's comment about 'little short for a stormtrooper, aren't you?' is really funny in the context that the ST's were all supposedly clones (probably of the same individual). Seems they were going for quantity and consistency rather than quality when they decided to make an entire army out of clueless dimwits who couldn't hit the broad-side of a barn! Man the guy they picked must have been someone's nephew or something.
Supposedly Palpatine is a clone as well. This is one of the few reasons I probably will stick it out and see the next two movies, to see where this whole Empire/clone wars/Jedi mass extinction thing plays out. Hope I won't bee too dissapointed.
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
You know, I always remember the alians in the Mos Eisly Catana to be much more 'real' looking than the ones in the last film. Even though they were just people wearing corny costumes, they still 'acted' like real people gave a 'real' presence. Computer generated alians may look accurate, but they still don't 'move' convincingly or act alive.
Finkployd
...moderate this down.
There's a difference between not liking a movie/series and undeservedly bashing on someone personally.
Strangely enough, my friends and I (mostly college students, except a younger brother) went to see Episode I and we liked it, overall. Not as good as V, but not as bad as IV either. Sounds like you're the one with penis envy...why don't you go make your own movie that is watchable for yourself?
Light a fire for a man and he'll be warm for a day. Light a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
Actually, I'm having a hard time deciding between Bladerunner and ... Alien (the first one). The design of the Nostromo (and more generally the art) of this movie just blew me away.
I strongly believe that trying to be clever is detrimental to your health. -- Linus Torvalds
Geesh, now we've got virgin birth theories.
...
I mean, face it, Palatine is the father. And not in a nice way, if you get what I mean.
When all else fails, look at the blinking red light and read the words displayed thereon
Will in Seattle
Wasn't the Immaculate Conception the conception of Mary without sin?
At least JJ's people had energy weapons when they took on the Empire... Ewoks fought the 'crack' troopers who were supposed to be guarding the Emperor's life with sticks and rocks...and won!
Not totally preposterous. The battle scenes looked like the Empire's army had been dealing only with energy and particle-beam weapons for so long that their "armor" designers had sacrificed strength for weight and/or other factors, leaving them wide open to a kinetic energy attack.
A silly mistake, of course. But battlefields are littered with the remains of armies whose leaders and weapon designers made silly mistakes.
Of course the armor wasn't very effective against energy and/or particle beam weapons, either. And lots of the civilians they were called on to oppress were unarmed, and could be expected to improvise with clubs and the like. So why WERE they wearing that armor, anyhow?
Perhaps it was to be intimidating, ala the Nazi's crisp uniforms or the Klan's hoods. Perhaps it was as a weapons-system platform or remote-sensing countermeasures.
(Next question: Why didn't they have any thermal imaging, thus letting overgrown teddybears ambush them?)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
That's the same complaint I've heard from a lot of people....no plot, no back-story, just stuff...well, that was the whole point of TPM!! It IS the back story for the entire rest of the series! Lucas had to draw the line somewhere, or else he'd be making pre-quels from now until the end of time... Also, on the midi-chlorians thing...I think the whole reason Lucas stuck that in was because he knew how cheezy it was and how much people would hate it. It was kind of like he was saying "Allright, for damn near 20 years now you people have been whining about 'where did the force come from' or 'how is the force possible' and I'm sick and tired of it!! Can't you people leave anything alone?? Take this and shove it up your hyperdrive!!" (NOTE: This is not an actual quote from George Lucas) Anyways though, as a film, TPM is awesome, and a true fan will enjoy it for what it is: a fun movie to watch
Jar Jar did have a dramatic and an economic purpose.
If you ate a meal that tasted really horrible you would remember the meal as horrible.
If you had to eat a side order of shit with it you would only remember the shit.
Suckers. All of you.
--
Is this guy really dead or what? It must be physically demanding to die....
...you have issues.
I looked into the abyss, and the abyss looked into me--and we both winked.
I don't know about you but personally I found young Annakin (sp?) to be almost as annoying as Jar-Jar, and was hoping against hope that he would crash and die in the stupid pod race scene. On top of that, I always found Vader to be a deep and fairly complex villian, and someone who would be a very shrewd and fierce opponent no matter what side he fought on. Annakin's role was written/acted so poorly in EP1 that I just can't visualize the transformation. Sure the story had some not so subtle foreshadowing about his eventual fall, but nothing about the character himself suggested anything more than an innocent, clever, and happy go lucky kid. I also think that Lucas made a big mistake in the way he explained the Force as being the result of some mystical space parasites that we all have, the notion of the Force as a mystical natural energy that flowed through all living things without explaining itself made for a much better story, the space parasites thing ruins it for me. It also opens up some holes in the story, notice how in the original SW flicks Obi Wan and Yoda always explian the force as well a mysterious force, but practically the first thing Qui Gon (sp?) tells young Vader is the space parasites line? It's obvious that the parasite idea was added just for EP1. Hmm I seem to have gone off on a tangent. Oh well.
"Listen: We are here on Earth to fart around. Don't let anybody tell you any different!" - Kurt Vonnegut
Believe it or not, the Ewoks were speaking Urdu, a language spoken in Pakistan.
Episode I has a decent storyline and handles its foreshadowing excellently (though without great subtlety, due to the younger target audience); it's a setup for the next two episodes. You don't have to have a single clear hero to have a good story; whichever lit teacher put that in your head should be fired.
The fact of the matter is that none of the Star Wars movies to date have been brilliantly written, but they're not bad. I've yet to determine why people think there's this absolute dichotomy between genius and shit. There's a range there... Star Wars isn't the greatest story in the world, but it is well told and therefore belongs near the top of that range.
...check out the original movies. Great movies, sure. But I bust a gut laughing whenever Luke opens his mouth.
The streets shall flow with the blood of the Guberminky.
Will the Special Edition nix Jar Jar?
Mostly it's just these:
Cost
Speed
Crew
Mobility of Equipment
Easier to digitally enhance and add SFX
Plus, it's the fad according to all the directors who were at the Seattle International Film Fest, probably the most highly attended film fest that directors vye to be at.
Will in Seattle
Joseph Campbell
Shoot, forgot.
When the bible recounts jesus' virgin birth, we translated virgin wrong. The hebrew word used meant "unmarried woman" not un-fscked woman".
Tom
Reality does not happen until you analyze the dots. -Don DeLillo (Underworld)
Socially inept, horny geeks dreaming of a piece of Portman Pie. Oh the horror! =)
Humorless sig goes here.
I have to totally agree. I mean, doesn't George know that Christ imagery is supposed to be sorta subtle. He just came out and rewrote the friggin new testament.
In future movies, he'll be betrayed by Obi-Wan thus turning to the dark side and dying as Ben put it in ROJ (kinda a Judas thing). Jesus Christ!!! (no pun, well maybe) I wonder if he'll be a commander of some Jedi regiment in the Clone Wars with 12 folks following him. Hell, perhaps George can work in a last supper or something in E3.
-- A computer without COBOL and Fortran is like a piece of chocolate cake without ketchup and mustard
Well, he still had it when Vader killed him in EpIV, and when he appeared as a ghost in the later ones, so I guess the answer is "never".
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
Well, the original Star Wars movies were definitely made for kids...it's just that you *were* a kid (most likely) when you watched them. Viewed objectively, the first three movies are no "meatier" than PM.
-Graham
Personally, I am hoping Jar Jar's return goes something like this:
;)
*Star Wars Title and Intro text scroll up screen*
Jar Jar pops on screen.
"Meesah Jar Jar B..."
*ZZZzzzzttt*
Head lopped off by a clone Darth Maul
That'd get the crowd's approval, at least
Just remember...every Jedi except Yoda and Obi-Wan die, at least some directly courtesy of Anakin turned Vader. Obviously, Jedi don't go down without a fight -- hopefully Lucas will show some good fights, including some BIG ones. And, since it is _Star_ Wars, a return to some big, complicated space battles...
Xentax
You shouldn't verb words.
2) is supposed to be a joke, right? RIGHT?
As to 1). If that's the case, they should hire Ridley Scott ASAP, coz the opening scene from Gladiator kicked some serious ass imho.
I strongly believe that trying to be clever is detrimental to your health. -- Linus Torvalds
And speaking of bounty hunters, Boba Fett fans will be happy to learn that the ruthless bounty hunter and Han Solo nemesis will be making an appearance in Episode II. How much of an appearance is debatable, though, since Lucas is mum on the storyline as usual.
I bet you any money you like Boba Fett turns out to be a woman. I wouldn't put it past George Lucas to pull the "ruthless bounty hunter in a helmet turns out to be an attractive woman" trick twice.
Not true. After the disappointment with EP1, I rewatched IV-VI many times. The results were clear; episodes IV-VI were MUCH better, even though I had aged 14 years since first seeing episode IV.
That... or JarJar is just what most people want him to be... cannon fodder. =)
Humorless sig goes here.
I love Star Wars. I've watched the entire trilogy so many times that I've gone through about 4 or 5 collections of the films on VHS (thank you DVD). IMO, the first one was OK, but rather lame. Empire was by far the superior film of the series, with Jedi coming in 2nd. What was the difference between the three? Lucas was not in complete control of Empire and Jedi. Someone else directed each of those...Lucas merely produced.
As I understand it, a big reason for this was that the actors couldn't stand working with him. Let's face it, Lucas has some sort of overly black-and-white view of his characters and how they should be. He never figured that Han Solo would be more popular than Luke...Luke's supposed to be the bad-ass hero, but c'mon...we all know that Solo's the man. So what did Lucas do with SWSE? He changed the scene where Solo kills Greedo so that Solo doesn't shoot first. Satisfies Lucas' need to have his good guys be super-good - ruins a great scene of Solo being a badass.
Back then, the actors could demand another director cause Lucas wasn't the bigshot he is today. NOW, good luck trying to get someone to out him as director. As much as I'd love to see another Empire, Jedi, or even A New Hope, I won't be holding my breath. Lucas will remain true to his flat, saccharine characters and storylines from 25 years ago...trying to make up for weak plot with special effects.
Of course, I'll still go see it cause I'm one of the many mindless fans who will go see anything that might be a good SW film.
Karma: Non-existant. Due mostly to the fact that you smell funny and nobody likes you.
That goes for a lot of movies, altho it's more predominantly old movies. Even the old Star Wars movies had a touch of this, now that I look back on things, but not nearly as bad as ep1 (which was ... well, it's star wars, so it can't suck THAT bad, but that's about all I'll say :).
The most annoying thing is, I'm currently reading the coldfire trilogy of C.S Friedman, and well... there isn't a lot wrong with it, just a few niggling things... which brings me back to ep1. The difference between ep1 being what it is, and ep1 being good isn't THAT huge. It's really just a lot of small things, but those small things ruin it, just like the interaction in the coldfire trilogy (it's really just a paragraph here and there that i'm referring to) does.
We might, however, be able to put this down to the actors not being used to working with the blue background tech they used. We might see an improvement the next time around. If only they wouldn't make Jar Jar do "cutesy" things like dropping that blue cannon ball thingie and running away from it. I was just sitting there going "*groan* get it over with, this sucks. it's aimed at 4yo's".
Voting Moo Anyway!
Some of her finds include: Xena: Warrior Princess vet Jay Laga'aia, who's playing a loyal security officer, and Aussie Leeanna Walsman, who'll take on the physically-demanding role of a new highly-killed bounty hunter.
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Have fun: Join D.N.A. (National Dyslexics Association)
Actually, the "regular," "dark," and "happy" order is a well established trilogy sequence.
Part one should be an introduce the characters, general purpose movie. It should be entertaining, and stand on its own in case the movie is not recieved well and you don't get the funding for parts two and three. For examples, see "Star Wars," "The Matrix," and "Back To The Future."
In part two, you continue on with the story, ending in the worst possible situation your protagonists can get into.
Finnally, you wrap it up with part three, where you get out of the part 2 situation and everyone lives happily ever after.
So far, I see no sign that Lucas is doing any different with ep1-3 than with ep4-6. If he doesn't end ep2 on a bad note, many people won't go see it ("Oh, that was a good `happy' movie. I guess all that's left for part 3 is for anakin to turn into darth vader and for luke and leigha to get born").
When I was able to do my own spam-armoring, you got a chance to email me. Now you can only hope I see your reply.
We're all clones
All we wonder is what we are
[Bowie bows]
Gasp! You mean, the Clone Wars ?
Will in Seattle
I, for one, actually found Anakin to be more annoying than Jar Jar. I would have much rather seen the kid from the Sixth Sense as Anakin. At least I wouldn't have wanted to beat him throughout the entire film.
Plus, and this can't be understated, Star Wars didn't have Keanu Reeves. Big edge there :)
It's possible to have a movie that balances special effects against a good story. Forrest Gump, for example -- I didn't like it all that much, but it's the sort of thing I'm talking about. City of Lost Children is a great example though -- one of the "characters" is a flea assassin, shown in closeup several times. You need special effects to get a flea-eyed view of a flea. You don't need them to show Keanu beating up the guy from The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert.
Frankly, I'm sick & tired of movies like that, and I can't fathom why they're so popular. It wouldn't be so incomprehensible if they weren't so universally homogenous and boring, but they are and I just don't get it.
Personally, I have high hopes for the next Star Wars movie, even if the last one did royally suck. A friend of mine and I were... um, that is, some people that I was reading about but have never met before and certainly wouldn't want anything to do with... were suggesting holding Lucas' children hostage for the duration of the next two movies -- if the next one is good, he can have one back; if the next one sucks the kid dies and he better try real hard if he ever wants to see the other again. But of course this would be terribly mean and overreactive and treating a movie way outside of reality and I'm certainly not condoning any harm come down on the dear Lucas children. Not at all. I just think ol' Georgie better do it right this time, that's all ;)
DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
The phrase that was coined (I think in one of the old West End Star Wars RPG's) was that Star Wars described "A univese that's been lived in". It is without a doubt one of the things that set Star Wars apart, and one of the things sorely missing from Episode I. It's like the joke about artificial intelligence not being real until you can make a computer that acts neuroticlly and irrationally; digital special effects for sets and props won't cut it for atmosphere and realism until they can simulate not perfectly rendered fractal geometry plants and leaves, but the half-brown, mildly worm eaten and irregular plants that real people have in their front yards. A New Hope looked like people hanging out in the grimy bars and run-down frontier towns of the future; Episode I looked like a cartoon show.
"Sweet creeping zombie Jesus!"
Hey, they've both got accents. :-)
Make affiliate bucks
The projection is using TI's newer Digital Cinema technology. It features blacker blacks, better handling of over-bright scenes (knee level), gamma that matches film, and colormetry that matches film. It was designed with the cooperation of many film-makers.
The resolution is 1080 x 1920 progressive. While film make have a higher resolution if you shoot a single frame of a Kodak resolution chart, by the time that resolution passes through multiple internegative, interpositive, printing negative and final print stages, and projected via the crappy projector at your local megaplex with it's dreadful weave problems...
Trust me. The end result will look better than using traditional film. Lucas would not have chosen to go digital otherwise.
"How perfectly Goddamn delightful it all is, to be sure" Charles Crumb
I'm already seeing a ton of posts basically saying the same thing. They basically say this, "George Lucas sucks and he's only in the franchise to make money. The story is going to be written for 10 year olds and all the aliens will be stupid and plastic. The origin trilogy will be soo much better than these."
I would like all of these people to sit back and watch the original trilogy again. Now watch it again. Pay attention this time and ignore any nostalgia you had from when you saw this when you were ten.
Back yet? Good now did you notice anything? Right you probably noticed that the original trilogy has most of the flaws your criticizing Episode One for.
The acting in all of them was dubious at best. Ford was wooden. Hamill was just plain bad ("You're not my father! Its not true!"). Carrie Fisher was high through most of the second and third. Lots of dialogue sucked. Quite often the best actors were the Brits playing minor roles.
They weren't written that well. Why is an astromech droid a great security hacker? Thats one helluva back door in the system. How can a farm boy crop duster turn into a ace pilot with no training? And don't give me lots of "the force" crap. Why can't an ace pilot successfully land a ship in a swamp? Especially if it can hover? "Only Imperial Storm Troopers are so precise"? Please. There are lots more, especially that god awful Tarzan yell in Jedi.
Oh and by the way, lots of aliens looked stupid or plastic in the first movies too. Especially Jedi where the band looked like muppets. Can you honestly say Greedo looked convincing in Star Wars?
Oh and Lucas is almost richer than God so he doesn't need the money. He has ILM pulling in money constantly. He has all the other Star Wars stuff. He doesn't need to spend 200 Million of his own money to make another movie.
The basic problem isn't that Lucas is making bad movies. He isn't, episode one isn't significantly worse then Jedi. The problem is he made another Jedi when people wanted another Empire or A New Hope. And he doesn't have anyone to tell him something is stupid and it should be left out like the overly gratuitous trip through the core in Ep 1. And he's not an especially good director, have you seen his other movies?Remember the horn joke from the set of Star Wars?
His real problem isn't that he's making crappier movies, its that he's making the same level of movies when we want them to be so much better. We want more believable aliens and better writing. We want better acting. So its us who really have to deal with it, not him.
So far I've gotten all my Karma from telling people they are wrong... :)
I don't agree. There were many flaws in the effects of TPM. Simply put, if you didn't see a shadow of a craft over terrain, that's a flaw. One notable one, is the shadow of the queen's ship as it landed on Tatooine. I hope they clean that up for the special edition, because it looked like crap. Another bad scene was where they rendered the jedi sneaking into the hangar on the droid ship, when they dropped from the air duct to the floor, there was something sloppy about the physics that just screamed "not real!".
The shininess and newness was a stylistic nuance, reflective of a different historical era, and I thought it was nice, and after two decades of Star Wars - junky looking hardware rip-off, it was quite refreshing. It rejuvinated my love of antique cars (even possibly played a part in my purchase of a vintage Porsche). That was good design. Had nothing to do with the bad effects. Which were bad. It's easy to assume that because they've got a multi million dollar SFX budget, and leadership in the field, and decades of experience, that it's supposed to be flawless and they won't cut corners. That, unfortunately, was not the case.
If it ain't broke, fix it 'til it is!
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
I'd have to disagree. In fact I will. I was in my early 20's when the original was released and was blown away by the story and FX. I still think the first three movies were exceptional in many ways (OK, other than the Ewoks, but I thought those were added to broaden the demographics and open the market for product targeting the kiddie set).
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As a matter of fact, I am a lawyer. But I play an actor on TV.
The first movie set up the rest of the series. Maybe it could have been better. Now if Lucas made this movie first, there might not have been a series. So I am waiting to see what EP 2 brings.
Christ figures are everywhere in western literature, and you don't have to look far to find other examples. Sometimes it is done well (like in Cool Hand Luke), sometimes not so well (In The World According To Garp, he was conceived when his mother raped an unknown dieing soldier.)
If we are to criticize Lucas for the virgin birth in TPM, it should be for being so ham-fisted and obvious about it, when he was so subtle and crafty with the symbolism in the last half of Empire. Perhaps he should consider hiring a more seasoned director to get his vision on the screen without cramming it down our throats.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Los Angeles, CA - Insiders at Warner Brother Studios have reported that The Matrix Parts 2 and 3 will actually be the same movie and just retitled. The technique known in the industry as 'retitling' was pioneered on television sitcoms, and first used on film in the 'Friday the 13th' series of movies.
"What did you think we meant when we said we were filming the two sequels at the same time?" said the Wachowski brothers, directors of the first film. "We don't think most people will notice. The average moviegoer saw the first film 11 times. They can't be that bright. The great thing is the actors don't even know. We only used them for about 15 minutes. The rest is all computers. I don't think Keanu will ever figure it out."
The producers of the movie said, "We toyed with the idea of just releasing the first movie as the sequels, but we figured that would be too obvious to the clever American public." They continued, "Usually the third movie in a sequel sees quite a bit of drop off in quality. This way we can guarantee it will be as good as the second!"
A Warner Brothers official denied the report, "They aren't exactly the same. I mean one is called 'The Matrix: Part II', and the other is called 'The Matrix: Part 3 - Part 2 Revisited', isn't that enough of a difference?"
Reeves against Jet Lee (who's in talks of making Matrix 2) that'll be interesting indeed. ^_^ On the other hand, it'll be dissappointing to see Lee getting beat up by Reeves in the end...'cuz that's just wrong...oh well. (Been a Jet Lee/Jackie Chan fan since um, late '80s :)
No way - it could turn out to be the key to the series. Consider:
What if the Jedi are wrong? What if those germs aren't the Force, but rather inhabit those who have the Force? (Like detecting anti-bodies to something rather than detecting the something itself...)
These little guys could be the key to the eradication of the Jedi. If you're going to try and kill off the Jedi, how would you do it? Hand to hand combat with every single one? Bomb the annual JediCon? What if you could attack the one thing that distinguishes Jedi from the rest of the populace? What if you could turn the symbiotic relationship into something harmful?
Darth and Co. decimate the ranks of the Jedi sometime between now and when Luke comes on the scene. Wanna bet how they do it? I bet those idiot little germs have something to do with it.
And it could be played as one of those 'spiritual enlightenment' scenes for Obi-Wan... "Those germs have died - I no longer have The Force. Wait! I have The Force still! The Force must be inside me, more than something physical..." and so on and so forth until we all barf.
But, then again, I could be wrong and Lucas could play it out straight and drive us even further away...
RinkRat
Yeah speaking to a guy I met in a pub last night who is a model maker working on the set, he said all the actors are there and getting down to it. They're filming for 8 weeks and then heading to Tanzania to film.
Maybe they can have a whole "who is anakin's father?" sequence, ala southpark.
sig's not here
"... Aussie Leeanna Walsman, who'll take on the physically-demanding role of a new highly-killed bounty hunter."
I wonder if they're talking about Dengar? He looks highly-killed.
Sorry, but SW fan that I am, Binks in the reason that I will NOT pay to see the second film. A bloody ewok would have been a better sidekick!
"What's the point in being grown up if you can't act childish once in a while?" - The Doctor
There is only one good excuse for the return of Jar-Jar Binks. After all, we all know he's evil and obnoxious...and the sith are short an apprentice. I can see it now..."Meesa Darth Binks! Yousa gonna die..." (immediately followed by jar-jar cutting off his own tongue with his light-saber.)
I agree.
Never have I so looked forward to a movie for the sole purpose of not going to see it!
For my money, Lucas burned up the last of his karma when he put out E1.
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
That's not entirely true though, you can't say that about the pod-racer scenes. That equipment looked exceptionally lived-in.
The Naboo hardware, of course looked sleek and shiny, and regal, because it served a rich, technically advanced, monarchy. A culture who has function down to the point where it's no longer the primary design criterion, and now dwells largely on form. Consider the iMac. Steve Jobs saw that the need for hardware improvement on a machine that just surfs the net and does word processing was not there - so they designed a pretty case, and put the guts in there. Is it beige? no. Can it give you 60 FPS in Quake? no. Can you CAD a passenger jet with it? no. Those are machines where function becomes a stronger consideration. When you're putting form before function in a peice of hardware like an interceptor/air-space defense fighter, that makes a statement about the technology behind them - they've developed it to a peak, and it no longer needs to be ugly, to be deadly and effective. It can be made beautiful, and still adequately serve it's function.
Obviously, they don't manufacture droids on Naboo.
If it ain't broke, fix it 'til it is!
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Plus a constant.
I prefered the original Star Wars series due to the ceativity involved.
I thought the actual 'sci-fi' portion was better looking due to the actual physical models projecting actual shadows over the bumps and curves of the ship, other than the computer generated models which appear flat. The scenery has no depth to it either...
Sorry Lucas, but computers can do everything.... Yet....
...and I'm not sure we should trust this Kyle Sagan either.
That can't possibly be true, if you believe the article:
And speaking of bounty hunters, Boba Fett fans will be happy to learn that the ruthless bounty hunter and Han Solo nemesis will be making an appearance in Episode II.
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Have fun: Join D.N.A. (National Dyslexics Association)
Made-for-TV and straight-to-video movies are not elligible for Oscars either, unless they are shown in a theater first. All the decision from the AMPAS did was reiterate the role of the Oscars as having to do with theatrical releases. You still can shoot, project, and ship the movie to the theaters in any medium you want. The only requirement is that it be an actual theater, and not some form of in-home exhibition.
I think all that griping on /. last week was over nothing. The decision about the web was actually consistent with past decisions, and does not actually exclude movies made in an electronic format. It just reiterates the requirement of a movie being shown theatrically.
Free Hans!
Hmmm, Australia. That's pretty close to New Zealand, where they film "Xena Warrior Princess". I've heard that Xena will defeat Queen What's-Her-Name and take over the Universe.
it would have messed with alot of peoples minds, especially if both had potential, but only one went to get training. Even if they were not identical twins.
the arguments and potential for speculation would be outrageous.
As it is, the basic plot points are known, and there is no mystery beyond the usual details. [BOOM!]
Unless something unusal comes up in the movie, there really isn't anything to look forward to except for the usual star wars stuff. He told a basic story, and left nothing basically unresolved to make people nervous. In this kind of situation, nervous is good.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
I tell myself not to nitpick, but I can't help it. Here we go.
:)
:)
Basically, a relationship between two living beings is categorised as parasitical (sp? I took Bio in Portuguese, not English) when one of them survives at the detriment of the other. It's a +/- relationship. Therefore, a disgusting nematelmynt (again, sp?) that lives inside your stomach qualifies parasite. So does an unemployed divorcee who lives off the ex-spouse's hard-earned pay.
However, the MOD^H^H^Hmidichlorians (BTW, what a stupid damned name! It tries to be scientific, while ignoring that "a long long time ago in a galaxy far far away" nobody spoke Latin!) don't. I mean, think about it. They get to float around in your cells. You get premonition, supernatural agility and speed, and the right to wear damned cool robes and use those awesome lightsabers (in five fruity colours!). I'd say it's a +/+ relationship, no doubt about it.
Perhaps the word you were looking for is "symbiosis", not "parasitism", eh?
(BTW: It's spelled "Anakin".
To the editors: your English is as bad as your Perl. Please go back to grade school.
Did I miss something, or did Lucas just slip up? :)
Do you even know anything about perl? -- AC Replying to Tom Christiansen post.
What you idiots fail to realize is that George Lucas made this movie for one audience solely. Children
I hear that excuse touted time and time again to explain the disappointment of Episode I. I don't buy it -- there are countless examples of children's movies which are still intelligent, witty, and interesting to adults.
For instance: "The Neverending Story", "The Princess Bride", "Willy Wonka and The Chocolate Factory", "Watership Down", and "Chicken Run" (go see this -- it's elite) are all kid's movies on one level, but none of them are the least bit dumbed down - they all have enough character and plot sophistication to make them three-dimensional stories, and most are peppered with plenty of jokes for the grown-ups. Even films with less sophisticated scripts, like "Tron" or "The Black Hole" don't have the dumbed-down feel that permeates Episode I.
I have no doubt that George Lucas knows how to sell action figures to kids better than I do, but that's not the same as making good movies.
A certain webmaster has gotten into a little trouble over this one...but there are eight pages of the Star Wars Episode 2 screenplay HERE.
I assumed they were fake at first, but the reaction from Fox 2000 makes me think otherwise. Judge for yourself.
Phallic Symbols in LOTR
The best thought about Episode 2 is that Jar Jar Binks may die a gruesome and horrible death. That alone would make it a sellout!
I say, Jar-Jar actually turns out to be Darth Vader. Think about it. Jar-Jar kills Anakin in a fit of rage. To cover it up, he puts himself into a big black suit and changes to the dark side ("Anakin sure has been acting wierd since he starting wearing that black suit" ... "Yeah but he also just went to the dark side of the force, I attribuite his changed aditude to the fact that he is now in with the sith." ) So basically, Vader doesn't die in the end of RotJ. He gets some poor sap to take his place in the death scene. Episodes 7-9 (if ever made) consist of Jar-Jar/Vaders Triumpuant Return.
Jokes aside, I think Jar-Jar could redeem himself in episode 2 in one scene..... Him hunched over a dead body with a crazed look in his eye and with blood and rabial foam comming from his mouth.
Double J. Strictly for the . . .
"However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation."
I guess Lucas has to make his merchandise billions somewhere, but couldn't he find a less obnoxious character than Jar Jar?
Maul does Got milk
What??? The second of the first trilogy (Empire Strikes Back) was the best one so far!
I know that this is not a popular belief, but I don't think that Episode I was that bad. It wasn't anywhere near what it was hyped to be. But if you go into a movie expecting something lifechanging, and you get an OK movie, you're severely disappointed.
Because I now have children, going to movies is a rare treat. The first time I saw it was on rental. I had expected it to completely suck, and it wasn't that bad.
It's all about expectations. If everyone puts the same sort of ridiculous expectations on Episode II, that were on Episode I, then no one's going to like that movie, either.
$.02
Key to financial independence: Spend less than you earn. Save and invest the difference. Do it for a long time.
I'm a big fan of the original trilogy because of the mythological presence. I find it quite ironic how the theme is that technology can't save us but it caters to the masses because of its sci-fi effects. Anyways, I wonder what's going to happen in this film? How is Annakin moved to the Dark Side? is it because his mother dies by the hand of Palpatine? any comments?
Dear god.. say its not so...
The ewoks were bad enough.. a bunch of little pomeranians walking around chanting "yub yub". But jar jar.... *shudder*... save us... I swear, he's someone's vision of Joe Camel while tripping on acid : P
- Rei
The yellowcake is a lie.
If Jar Jar is what counts for comic relief these days, I'd hate to have to experience what comic pain must be like!
You're fooling yourself pal. The original trilogy works for adults but all in all they are movies meant to appeal mainly to children.
What Fools These Mortals Be!
Sorry Anon, you are slightly wrong there.
The proposed release dates are -
Ep 1 - 1999
Ep 2 - 2002
Ep 3 - 2005
You are right, the dates have been documented since 1998. They were always 3 years apart, as above.
HTH.
People should not be afraid of their governments - Governments should be afraid of their people.
I think Star Wars I was only dissapointing to some people because they expected so much.
I didn't find it that bad - I liked a lot of the depictions of things we were not certain of - Corruscant for the example... or the senate.
This first episode was more meant to give information and set things up for the next two.
It could also easily be made better too, just add LOTS of Jedi fighting...
Ninjas, they make anything better
It was pretty easy, but I had run him through the printer first, so he was on an 8x11 piece of paper...
http://us.imdb.com/Name?Christensen,+Hayden
Is the Virgin Suicides major?
just my blog and pix
Take a step back and look at your audience and your peer groups before using "everyone" this and "everyone" that.
Yes, that's right, 99% of Slashdot readers are male, computer literate, and young to early-middle-aged technophiles.
As a personal note, I went with a group of over a dozen friends to go see Episode I, twice. 8 guys, 4 girls, all college-age adults except for a younger brother (9 years old) present.
After the movie, it was pretty clear that different people liked (or disliked) specific things about the movie. The college guys hated or at least though Jar-Jar was annoying. On the other hand, they loved the extensive lightsaber duels, Darth Maul, and, of course, Queen Amidala.
The younger brother loved Jar-Jar. He thought he was funny, in a clownish way. He could have cared less about Queen Amidala, but he thought Darth Maul and all the fighting was cool.
The girls unanimously liked Jar-Jar. They thought he lightened the movie's mood, and was generally humorous in a "Dumb and Dumber" way. They generally didn't like Amidala too much (too uptight). Darth Maul was too icky for some of them, and they could care less about "laser sabers" (a direct quote!).
In other words, YMMV. But, try to keep in mind that you speak for probably 5-15% of the population before claiming to represent me, or any of my friends, in your personal views.
Light a fire for a man and he'll be warm for a day. Light a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
speaking slightly off-topic...
:)
Is anyone else out there just a little too miffed about "extra" stuff on DVD's? I can give examples either way, but my main thing is that most of the extras are just useless... I just want to pay 20$ for a movie, give me a good quality film and leave me alone.
Now, outtakes I find are funny, but 20 or 30 menus to just see how the director lined up one shot is boring.... that's my 2cents.
JUST RELEASE IT.
Karnal
Millions of fans hold their breath and hope this one is good (it'd be tough to go downhill, that's for sure).
... and frankly, George Lucas doesn't deserve any more of your money at this point.
It is probably being shot in digital both to facilitate some Dramatic Digital Special Effects and its release into HDTV/DVD format at some future date.
However, Jar Jar is back.
Need one say any more. It can't be much better, with Jar Jar it will probably be at least as difficult to sit through as the Episode I if not worse, and unless we see mitochondria being written out of the script, I suspect we can write the entire mythos off.
My suggestion: stick to the first two movies (Episodes IV and V) and pretend the others were never made. You'll enjoy it a whole lot more that way
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
The proof is HERE. It's on the internet, so it has to be true, right?
Phallic Symbols in LOTR
What, me worry?
Reeves will reject all offers to appear in Matrix two. He wants to spend more time with his "rock band".
He will be replaced by the guy from Terminator 2.
(did anyone else hear that Arnold is in talks with James Cameron for Terminator 3?)
If it ain't broke, fix it 'til it is!
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
now take episode 1. from that same point of view, it was the story of anakin, a kid. and what do ya know, it has the feeling of a kid movie. this doesn' seem like an accident to me.
i think george lucas knows that he made episode 1 a kiddie movie (hell, he used his own 6-year-old kid as the initial screener!). at a guess, i'd say that episode 2 will be targeted to appeal to teenagers (the way that that Starship Troopers and Varsity Blues were). if he did that, it would be a REAL interesting artistic statement.
just my $0.02 p1ggy
(SPOILER ALERT)
One of Anakins slave friends becomes Boba Fett, not Jar-Jar.
I'm not saying which one, I don't want to spoil it that much.
Clue: what was Boba Fetts ship named??
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Can someone put together a couple of links to some of the more thorough reviews of Episode 1 and some of the other Episode 2 rumor pages so that we don't get baraged with everyone's 2.2 billion cents on whether or not Jar Jar should die, what outfit Natalie should wear next, and exactly how they predict the realization of the inefficiency of using Combat Droids will be fleshed out? Thank you in advance,
-chorder
How much Jar Jar merchandise will still be gathering dust on store shelves before this one hits the theater...
Don't forget that Friday is Hawaiian shirt day.
...because I was about to mod down a whole bunch of Natalie Portman posts.
It's only offtopic if you talk about something that won't be in the movie. Considering that this is supposedly when Amidala and Anakin hook up, I fear we may have to give the trolls some leeway this time!
WARNING: there is a trojan on your
While film [may] have a higher resolution if you shoot a single frame of a Kodak resolution chart...
Film has a higher resolution no matter what it's pointed at, be it a resolution chart or the set of an actual movie, nor does it depend on the number of frames shot, 1 or 1 million. It's still the same medium.
The degradation is actually quite negligible. Even after all those steps, there is still more detail on film than in a 1920x1080 image. I've been to several movies lately where I could see the individual pixels in the digitally processed special effects shots, and that's on the theatrical release print. For example, look for it in "Gone in 60 Seconds" whenever the camera cranes down on a new scene, and there's a subtitle at the bottom of the screen (which was added digitally). You'll notice a shimmering aliasing effect in some of the straight edges in the images (like the edges of buildings or telephone wires in the background). This is due to the limited number of pixels in the digitized version of the film image. The rest of the movie, which was not digitally processed, does not look exhibit that problems.
Besides, these days there are more options for release film printing that produce even better results than the traditional methods. Just look at Technicolor's dye-transfer process, which produces a near-exact copy of what's on the film negative, with brighter and richer colors (and in a form that will never decay). I've noticed that some of these prints have started to show up in theaters, and they look absolutely incredible. Having looked at that, and at TI's digital projection, I'd say that digital has a ways to go before it catches up.
Also note that Sony's DVCAM format is heavily compressed in-camera before being recorded to tape. So, you're not getting a full 1920x1080 pixels of pure picture information, you're just getting some DSP chip's approximation of that. With film, you get the real deal -- no compression artifacts anywhere.
Furthermore, CCDs do not capture light the same way that film does. Film samples light in a logarithmic curve, which is very similar to the way the human eye sees it. CCDs, on the other hand, sample light in a linear fashion, which is what gives video its characteristic "look". Because of this, even with the same lighting techniques and the same lenses, film and CCDs will not produce the same results. That "video look" will be evident in the final film. Ask yourself: Do you really want movies to start looking like the evening news?
Lastly, even though the resolution being filmed is 1920x1080, so far TI has only produced projectors capable of 1280x1024, so unless they increase that resolution, you won't even be seeing the full resolution the movie was made at, and even if you did, it would still be less than film.
So, in summary, SW Episode 2 is going to suffer in terms of picture quality due to Lucas's decision to shoot digitally. I guess it won't be much worse than Episode 1 though, which looked pretty bad already, due to the fact that almost that entire movie was digitally processed at 2K resolution, when it should have been done at 4K.
The standards for the supposed "future of cinema" really should be aimed higher.
Free Hans!
--
"I find your lack of faith disturbing." -- Darth Vader
I'm going to wait for Ep. 2 to show up on satellite. I was really disappointed by Ep. 1.
I've been dying to see what lucas does with the clone wars in this (or possibly the next) film... but why did he have to bring back Jar Jar? I don't know a single person who wasn't irritated by Lucas' "look what I can do with my multi-million dollar special-effects budget" character. Seriously... Jar Jar looked incredible for a completely digital character, but added zero substance. His time on camera could have been better spent developing the other characters, or elongating the Jedi fight scenes.
"Evil beware: I'm armed to the teeth and packing a hampster!"
Lex orandi, lex credendi.
On the downside, turning The Force into super-intelligent germs was a huge mistake. In two brief scenes, he ruined the whole series by turning a beautifully impossible fantasy into a very implausable sci-fi load of crap.
No, it makes sense. After the Empire takes over, it creates the rumor that the Force isn't there, but that doesn't work, so they turn it into a religion of sorts... and like most people today, they disregard it as being stupid and a waste of their time.. so the story of the Force being supernatural came about..
And if Ben told Luke that the Force was some sub-cell being, then Luke would have dissed him as just another crazy old guy... so it makes sense..
I mean, really. Is anyone super-pumped to go see this? After Episode 1, and the incredible media machine behind it, I really have no interest in seeing 2 or 3 now. It was just SO horrible that it turned me off to the sequels of it, partly because the media pumped up my expectations of it, and partly because it just plain sucked.
I will NOT pay $8 to see Jar-Jar again. Lucas can get his $ somewhere else.
BilldaCat
I think that filming entire films digitally is an exciting concept, one that is sure to see many innovations and have it's ups and downs. The obvious ups are the ease of editting and the fact that editting is lossless, and the with which equipment can be developed. Also, the media is probably about half of the cost of film (real cost, not inflated "I've got the first one" cost).
Downs, the colors are a bit off (black specifically, which has to do with the projection, not the capture, and of course is easy enough to fix digitally) at the moment, and film can probably do better resolution with less effort (but who knows, what are the specs on the CCDs used in these cameras)?
Eh...
Assuming the film is better than EP1 (let's hope so), would their use of all-digital technology exclude them from those Oscars mentioned a week back?
and Aussie Leeanna Walsman, who'll take on the physically-demanding role of a new highly-killed bounty hunter.
Can't be a very good one then...
I'm not worried about Jar Jar becoming Boba Fett.
However, I am seriously worried about him becoming a Jedi. Can't you just see him bein' all clumsy with the lightsaber, accidentally deflecting blaster bolts and inflicting non-lethat, yet incapacitating damage on enemies? That's exaclty the kind of crap I expect if Ep. 2 follows the path set by Ep. 1.
Like I said in another post, I will wait until it shows up on my satellite tv.
Before launching into debate on whether this is a good or bad omen (I'll leave that to the repliers), I'll go on to my next morsel.
Orson Scott Card made a review of TPM, and until I read it, I didn't realize how precisely that was how I felt. Read his review, he has some very insightful comments. It's at http://www.hatrack.com/os c/reviews/summer-movies-99.shtml. Enjoy.
Hahaha! I should have seen that one coming :)
Ender
Nothing to see here
My fond wish is that the "space parasites" line will be a red-herring, a tool used by the current decadent Jedi hegemony. Perhaps the midichlorians are an effect of the force rather than the cause. Perhaps this philosophical difference characterizes a schism between factions of the Jedi, contributing to their downfall. ("new-school"/midichlorians jedi vs. "old-school"/force jedi - led downward by the Sith, who probably also are of the "old-school" philosophy.
If it ain't broke, fix it 'til it is!
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
This could also support the Jar Jar Binks = J. R. "Bob" Dobbs theory.
Watch that Luck Plane slant, man!
--------------------
WWW.TETSUJIN.ORG
- - - -
The real Tetsujin 28 is a giant robot.
I can see it now - in an effort to continue to appeal to the younger set ( On an on-topic note, mmm, Natalie Portman...
Discuss trolling and moderation
Hate that stupid windows button. Hate Netscape too so.....
Samuel L. Jackson is supposed to have a huge fight scene in this one. Overall I hope it has more action then Lucas is saying it is...
You forgot a couple. Q: If there is no sound in space, why are there sounds to the explosions? A: The photon torpedos also come with a compressed mixture of oxygen and nitrogen and other gases, so as to make a dramatic sound if the microphone is placed within close proximity. Q: How in the holodeck can you create a world bigger than the room that it is in? A: (off of a Star Trek card) The holodeck floors are actually a very complex moving treadmill. So even though you are really walking in place, the scenery around you moves, creating the illusion that you are walking. Q: Okay, I buy that, but if that is true, what about those episodes where someone else walks into the holodeck when someone else is using it, and will have to walk longer than the length of the holodeck to get to the other person. Stuff around these people do not seem to distort, so how do you explain this? A: ????? Q: How do dilithiam crystals really help make ani-mater? A: Q: The ship is not rotating, so how do they have gravity? A: ???? Q: If it truely is a federation of planets, why do most of the people on the bridge of the ship happen to be from earth, and only a couple are aliens? A: Audience appeal? Q: You ever noticed in the original series how there is no system to the stardates? A: That is not really a question, but a statement. Q: The holodecks work on transporter technology, correct? Okay, than in this case, it should be easy to take an inanimate object of the holodeck. If you take a person off, since it is being controlled by the computer, instead of disappearing, they should become stiff and inanimate. A: Someone thought of this, and to prevent having a bunch of stiff people standing around outside of holodecks, they make it so that if they step outside of the bounds of the holodeck, they disappear. Instead of limiting it just to people, the programmers were lazy, and decided to make it so that anything leaving the holodeck dissappears. Q: Okay, if this is true, then why do people eat on the holodeck, and are not suddenly starving when they walk out of the holodeck? A: Good question.
Are you one of the people that thinks Lucas lost it? Guess what. It was a cute little comic book kind of adventure from the start. He hasn't lost anything. Is it just me, or is it sort of weird that they blew up the Death Star twice?
Luke.... LUKE... next time check for big Death Star chunks!
Linux is only free if your time has no value. Windows is only free if you threaten to use Linux.
If if he didn't have the freedom, then we wouldn't have had the the great first 3 movies we have seen.
And it's not like I'm just a picophobe or anything. I mean, I really liked that kid in the Sixth Sense.
Waiting for the video, again. -- Boycott the MPAA
:wq
Not all children's entertainment has to be as mindless as TPM or (shudder) Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, or as saccherine as (double shudder) Barney and the (hurl) Teletubbies. Kids are smarter than most people think, if you only give them credit. Look at the old Warner Brothers cartoons from the 40's - 60's; they are obstensibly for children, but still have enough meat to be interesting to adults. The Simpsons does a pretty good job of appealing to all ages. Lucas, in his attempt to make the SW saga accessable to children, alienates the adults. He seems to be stuck in the same mindset that gave us the evil purple menace. Good children's programming should be able to hold the attention of adults as well.
"The axiom 'An honest man has nothing to fear from the police'
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
While I feel your pain regarding how much PM sucked, I think it's too early to write the next movie. I think it's possible that even Lucas learned from the first movie. Hard to say; either he will learn from his mistakes and the next movie will have a lot more plot, or he will go the other direction -- the dark side, let's call it -- and make Jar Jar even more annoying:
I'm really, really hoping that he learned from the disaster.
--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
I cannot wait to see the Jar Jar death scene :-)! I'd buy the VHS/DVD just for that! What do you think would be the best way to kill him off?
ByteMyCode.com: A Web 2.0 code sharing community.
Hey, whats up with this brand new technology... digital? Since Star Wars is being shot digital, and the characters are starting to be digitally developed, is the Academy going to let them get an Award?! Seems only fair, right?! I mean since digital flicks that are webcast aren't elegible right.
kick some CAD
I can't stand Jar Jar Binks, but I do see a reason for his existence. Jar Jar is completely innocent. His actions show that he really doesn't have many cares, he acts without thinking. Anakin is still going to turn to the dark side, and what better way is there than killing off the most innocent character in the Star Wars universe?
Think of it as braveheart with Jedi instead of Scotts. Jedi magic, many types of saber weapons and everything. Nobody complained about the CGI in brave heart.
Messr. Lucas has demonstrated repeatedly his ability as a first-class wordsmith of childrens' fables. Why all the disbelief at the unabashed cheesyness of Episode I? We know what depth perception is, let's use chrono-perception here. I'm 31 - Then how old was I when "Star Wars" was first released? Ahh- I suppose you were a child too. And your parents didn't "get it" much in the same way today's audience is flaming Lucas for remaking the Muppet Show w/Blasters. Well, except for the children, your children, who have lost more than a few fast-food Jar Jar toys under the rear seat of your Caravan. Does an all-digital internet distributed film mean less work for movie pirates? Will these persons worry less about smuggling their MiniCam into Cinemark, and more about cracking their FTP server ? It would be in the interest of the distributors to produce an electronic hardware lock for their digital projectors. Should all-digital entertainment still be referred to as "film"? Scot
THIS SPACE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK.
So your saying it's a black thing?
Samual Jackson, is he white and uncool?
I'm glad i'm not you right now.
Excellent article.
I think they might be on to something. When Anakin turns to the darkside, there must be some sign to prove his loyalty. I would expect that this would be killing off a fellow Jedi. Since we know he doesn't kill Obi Wan, that leaves either Amigdala, or a Jedi to be identified (or revealed) in Episode II.
Having Jar-Jar fulfill that role will make everyone happy since Jar-Jar fans will get to see his character progress and become integral to the story line, and Jar-Jar haters (myself included) will get to see him die a horrible, bloody death.
By the way, the article also has a link to the Jar-Jar == Boba Fett theory.
Work for Change & GET PAID!
Anyone heard of him or know what he's done before? I don't recognize the name, not that I'm surprised it would have been so unlike Lucas to pick a "well-known" for such an important character.
"The words of the prophets are written on the Slashdot walls."
... to gouge yet more money out of fans who are so dedicated to the original series that they'll still go and watch anything with the Star Wars moniker on it, even though it's aimed at ten year old kids who think that Jar Jar Binks is actually cool, rather than being the alien equivalent of slashdot-terminal on crack.
I'm sorry, but whilst the orignal Star Wars trilogy had its appeal at the time, this time around the dubious moralising, dumb looking aliens and slushy character relationships just don't really cut the mustard with me. And a whole series about how great the kid who grew up to be Darth Vader, killer of the innocent, is - what the fuck is that about? What's next, Charles Manson - The Childhood Adventures?
Now lets watch as this post get moderated into oblivion by slashbot moderators who still think that George Lucas is something other than a tight-fisted money gouging bastard. These are the same kind of people who will buy each film on video, then each as "Director's Cut", the collected version with a 32-page commerorative booklet and then finally, in about 2020, the DVDs with amazing "enhanced" features - subtitles and an interview with The Man himself.
Nope, I just can't wait for this film.
---
Jon E. Erikson
Jon Erikson, IT guru
Doesn't Anakin have to impregnate Amidala at some point in Ep. 2 for Luke and Leia to be born in Ep. 3? Personally i'm hoping for Lucas to one-up "Titanic" and have a Natalie Portman split beaver shot.
In the anticipation and aftermath for Episode I, I noted a good deal of discussion on whether the week-long lines and general fanboy anticipation would be greater or lesser the second time around. Now that it's closer, I'd like to get a better idea... how many people here are planning to do the vigil this time?
- Michael Cohn
-----
Go ahead, blame me... I voted for Nader!
In an effort to continue to appeal to the younger set (<12 yrs old), Star Wars will continue to get dumber and dumber. Trying to appeal to the kids will always ruin a movie series that at one time appealed to adults - just look at what happened to Back to the Future between episodes II and III.
On an on-topic note, mmm, Natalie Portman...
Discuss trolling and moderation
Man, the star wars movies have always been some of my favorite movies (especially ep. 5). Sadly, though, I think that Episode 2 won't be up to par:
Washington, DC: It's like Hollywood for ugly people.
I read an interview with Lucas one time, and he said that he realized older people would hate Jar Jar, but everyone would like Jar Jar in the end. In that same interview he mentioned how bad guys like Maul, Fett, and Vader were alwasy people's favorite. I don't personally think he will be Fett,
But,
Think about a what a badd-assed dark jedi he could be. He's 9 fricken feet tall! With that slithering tounge, huge feet. His voice could easily turn menacing. I put Darth Vader's cape on my Jar Jar action figure to try it out. I gave it a red light saber and wiggled it at my Obi-Wan action figure.
"Yousa die now!"
It works!
I've been to many movies lately where I can see the individual pixels in digital effects shots, and that's when looking at a film print. What we need is 4K resolution, not 2K. People just don't get it. Film is an amazing technology. It is still the most efficient, compact, and asthetically pleasing way of storing and reproducing images.
Lucas is using digital because film offends his sensibilities. He considers film an "old" technology, and has referred to it as "a 19th century idea", as though that were justification enough for getting rid of it. Hey George, you know what? The wheel is a pre-historic idea, and people still use it!
I think that some of these people who are drooling over digital "cinema" are so blinded by technolust that they would willingly buy a bottle of snake oil as long as it had the word "digital" somewhere on the label. It's good to know that I'm not the only one who still thinks CCDs and other digital methods are up to the job yet.
Free Hans!
Now Bobba Fett's death makes since. He started clumsy, he will end clumsy. Remember, Bobba Fett falls into the pit after Han "clumsily" hits his jet pack.
Yeah, I want to know when we get to see Yoda kick some 'bad guy ass'!! Mainly because I can't really see him using a light-saber. He's a bit...well...short, no?
Ender
Nothing to see here
I'm sorry but if Jar Jar is integral to the story and if the supposed rumors that he becomes Boba Fett are true, I'm affraid that George will succeed completely in turning a big-time fan off to the entire Star Wars universe... Say its not so, and that your kidding... Please...
-- A computer without COBOL and Fortran is like a piece of chocolate cake without ketchup and mustard
Has anyone here been to ihatestarwars.com? It's a good read - but I think the guy takes things a bit far - and I laughed my butt off the first time I visited it.
Be nice to your friends. If it weren't for them, you'd be a complete stranger.
Lucas has reiterated numerous times after being given heat about Jar-Jar that Jar-Jar is integral to the story. There are a number of rumours circulating around the Internet concerning this.
One is that Jar-Jar is unconciously weilding the force, and is on his own path to becoming a Jedi. This rumor speaks about how Jar-Jar, although clumsy, still seems to win battles despite his clumsiness. This kind of story line could speak to the nature of the force, how it is far reaching, even to the meek.
Another rumour is that Jar-Jar is a character from the later movies, and is currently "disguised." This rumour speaks about how Jar-Jar is pretty similiar to Human in size and weight (some other stuff too I'm not sure of.) I even saw one website suggesting Jar-Jar was Bobafett(!).
Lucas is a master of weaving storylines. I can't wait to see how Jar-Jar fits in based on Phantom Menace.
Just my $.02
Execute? [Y/N] _
Episode One was one of the corniest things I ever paid $8.50 twice for (the second showing was improved by the syphilitic in front of me whose rigid posture and eight inch afro obscured the occasional subtitles and most of the graphics). Episode Two doesn't even deserve to be seen; I'll watch it, maybe, if Lucas manages to get the word out that it is an apology for the first one. What was there to make Episode One tolerable? A few interesting aliens in the race scene and a well-choreographed swordfight towards the end (although the death of Darth Maul is not believable either). What made it insulting? Every thing else.
Well, perhaps it is unfair to use the term insulting? After all, it's not as if Lucas promised us anything... or did he? Probably not; it's simply aimed at a new generation of viewers (aka purchasers (mom, buy me Jar Jar!)). So those who enjoyed 4-6 should probably ignore 1-3 entirely. After twenty years of being a Star Wars fan (and not too much of an obsessive), I can finally terminate my relationship with Lucas. Just as so many Napster-and-Metallica fans have terminated their relationship with those shmucks. Episode One crossed a line and destroyed the nostalgic magic. So what else can I say about Episode Two? To paraphrase Jay Sherman, the Critic (on "English for Taxi Drivers"): "If the movie looks terrible, DON'T SEE IT!"
For the record I have not terminated my relationship with Chewbacca.
(Movies to pay good money for: Casablanca, Godfather II, the Blues Brothers, A Clockwork Orange, Animal House, Dr. Strangelove. "Empire" holds the distinction of being one of maybe 5 good sci-fi movies ever made, the others are Bladerunner, 2001, uhh... Heavy Metal??.)
Ben Chadwick - Editor, Zero Future/Post-Collegiate Malaise
Hell, I posted it on the Pentium story, might as well put one here. I think it's time for some Weird Al.
All Al all the time!
--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
I think you are getting her mixed up with your wife. Natalie is a stunningly beautiful and highly educated young woman. I would love for her to bear my children.
-- Defenestrate Microsoft!
Sorry, but maybe I can't quite understand what you're saying:
I'm not talking about classifying movies into age groups, I'm talking about being an adult and realizing that you don't see things the same as an adult as you did when you were a kid. I saw the original Star Wars at LEAST 60-80 times between the movie theater and HBO when I was a kid, but I sure couldn't do that now and watching it is just not the same now.
Put away childish things...
So we should classify movies into age groups because the will make a difference if a movie is good for the audience?
P-P-Please .... NO JAR JAR!
one word - goddamnit!
Mike Roberto (roberto@soul.apk.net) -GAIM: MicroBerto
Berto
The scenery has no depth to it either...
Don't forget the writing.
And the acting...
Now that's a headline.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
the Fett isn't the correct shape to be jarjar... Think... ;-)
"... That probably would have sounded more commanding if I wasn't wearing my yummy sushi pajamas..."
-Buffy Summers
Goodbye Iowa
Should be a good movie. Maybe not great, but still worth seeing.
________
1995: Microsoft - "Resistance is futile"
Surely it can't be any worse than the last one.
You're missing the point. If you're any distance
from an explosion, you are slammed around not by
the explosion itself but by the shock wave in the
surrounding air that carries the force of the
explosion to you. Since there's
no air in space, *how in the name of Roddenbury
can you be bounced around by a distant explosion,
no matter how big?*
Chris Mattern
"It feels pretty weird
To type "Natalie Portman"
And not lose Karma. "
Heh, now all we need is for Natalie Portman to sue Microsoft after finding doctored pics of her having hot grits poured down her pants while stroking a Penis Bird, pics that were rendered on a Linux Cluster of AMD chips using Microsoft Photo Editor running via Wine.
Gawd, the Trolls would have a field day. Suddenly we'd have Trolls with more Karma than Signal 11
Steven
-- I have marked myself unwilling to moderate-- I don't have other accounts to artificially inflate the karma of
For a cheep laugh try reading through Golias comment a second time with the voice in your head.
:)
"Quotes are for people who can't express themselves in their own words" - Jayne Crouch
Would all the jedi fight, or do we get to see a few step back and do groovy 'battle-magic' sort of stuff with the force?
Now *that* would be neat.
Believe with me, my saplings.
I hope George Lucas takes his time to do this one, and do it with more depth.
...". Everyone then leans forward in rapt attention...
:)
:) ). I did see some efforts by the actors to do it (rapport, feel, etc), but it seemed like they just had enough time to think of what to do, but not _feel_ what they wanted to do.
:). I mean if he had said "I love you too" ;).
Episode 1 reminded me of someone doing a good presentation for the first or second time. There's stuff in there, but the depth is not there, you just go "yeah, interesting". Compare this with the 10th time they're doing a presentation- they'll go - "ok that's the slide and now let me tell you what happened when
Episode 1 seemed like:
Let's do scene 1, Liam and Ewan. OK that's nice. Do it again once more with a bit more expression..
OK! That's good enough! Let's get back to designing Amidala's dresses and the other computer graphics stuff!
It just looked as if the actors didn't have enough time to add more touches to the characters or produce more rapport with each other. It's probably more difficult when you have a CGI character like Jar Jar around (or more accurately not around
Compare this with the interaction between Han Solo, Chewbacca, Leia, Luke Obi-wan, in episodes 4 and 5.
I remember Han Solo (Harrison Ford) was supposed to say something else when Leia said "I love you" to him. But during the take, his ad-libbed reply was "I know". And that was brilliantly "Han Solo"ish
It's stuff like that. Got to have the actors mixing around with each other, bouncing things off, see what works etc. You can't do it all with CGI, unless the CGI team do that very same thing. Most actors have some talent in them, just need some time and let them do their stuff. Without time, you just get a monologue from the director, which can be rather clinical and shallow (unless the director and script are just so "complete").
Maybe George Lucas didn't have enough budget/time to do a longer shoot. I sure hope he has enough this time. Also maybe he could hand the task to another director, just so he can get more perspectives.
Cheerio,
Link.
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more, Or close the wall up with our American dead!
It feels pretty weird
To type "Natalie Portman"
And not lose Karma.
"Beware he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he deems himself your master."
Lucas shouldn't be directing, he's a great technical director but he can't cut it at the artistic.
The reason The Empire Strikes Back was so good was because he wasn't directing it. The movie was not the glossy, fairy tale movie that A New Hope was. Same with Return of the Jedi. These movies were ruined with the Special Editions, mainly because Lucas was NOT the director and then he came in and put his spin on it.
The pod racing scene was amazing, as were all the fight scenes. But any scene that involved people talking were lousy. Lucas should leave the directing of Star Wars to someone else and go back to directing projects that he can do a good job on like THX-1138.
While 'digital' might now mean quite the same thing, anyone interested in this kind of thing should go see "Time Code." The entire movie was filmed with four digital cameras, all of them running all the time, without a single cut for two hours; each camera shot occupied 1/4 of the screen. The actors were given a general setup to the plot and ad-libbed the details.
I don't know much about movie making, but I can guess that this would have been hard to do with traditional film. Not only getting two hours of movie-quality film into a camera but also carrying the damn thing around for two hours straight.
I'm sure it would have made editting easier, if they had wanted to do any.
LL
"If you are falling, dive." -Joseph Campbell
1) Clone Darth Maul - the clone wars have to happen sometime before "A New Hope," so maybe someone will clone Darth Maul, and let him kick some butt before another child-jedi gets lucky
2) Have real enemies instead of an incredibly boring, no blood, dumb droid army. Look at how many living things were killed in E4 compared with E1 - no bloody arms cut off, no shooting green bounty hunters under the table, etc.
3) Kill Jar-Jar maliciously - just pretending Jar-Jar never happened would malign the story line, but the second movie is a great chance to have him brutally eliminated
wish
---
We pretty much know what happens to most of the characters from Episode I, unless they throw us any major curves.
Anakin: Becomes Darth Vader, is talked about in second trilogy, dies on second Death Star.
Obi-Wan: Lives through slaughter of Jedis, becomes crazy old coot, lives on Tattooine, dies on first Death Star.
C-3PO: Eventually gets built.
R2-D2: Remains an ash can.
Queen Amidala: The assumption is that she becomes Luke/Leia's mother and gets killed.
Really, the only character with room for development, who can have the kind of character arc that Luke had in the first movies, is Jar Jar. He's the one we know least amount, and he's the one who apparently has the farthest distance to travel, in the George Lucas/Joseph Campbell sense. Don't you get it yet? Star Wars, Episodes I-III, is the story of Jar Jar Binks!
He starts out as a bumbling, outsider nobody who can't get anything right. By the end of Episode I, he's proven himself to be an okay guy. In the next couple movies he'll continue to mature and advance, will become a major general or other figure, until finally by the end of the third movie...
(SPOILER ALERT)
Breakfast served all day!
Could very well be - Qui-jon does use a mind trick to free him from the bosses... at least so it seemed to me He's not my fav character though - obviously The more things change The more the remain insane
The Matrix.
Mission Impossible 2.
Star Wars 2.
...and a host of other lesser known titles...
Anyone see a pattern here? Why does Australia have 2 large studios (Universal in the Gold Coast, Fox in Sydney) making the cutting-edge hi-tech movies?
IMHO We here in Oz are the cheap Asian labour we've always been afraid of. Also Low Crime rate, Low Labour cost, Highly skilled, Politically stable. We even have more Americans emigrating here than Aussies leaving for the US, despite the pitiful salaries for IT engineers here. (How does 15 years of C, C++, Java, HTML costing $40,000 grab you?)
Market forces may increase the salaries - but may not. There are just too many non-monetary advantages to living here. And there are literally thousands of talented CGI programmers who will almost pay to be allowed to make movies here. Actually, given what I've seen at the multi-media training centre 200m away from my house in Canberra, delete the "almost".
Wonder what the Unions in Hollywood have to say about this consequence of Globalisation.
Zoe Brain - Rocket Scientist
"size matters not!"
-------------------------------------------
natalie protoman! natalie protoman! ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh
I got that hot grits feeling!
My head is all a reeling!
Monkeys will suffer by being forced to work in cubicles for worthless stock options if i do not get natalie protoman!
Take this personaility test.
Generally you expect at least a decent plot, especially after having many years and numerous books to draw inspiration from. And I hate to say it, but Liam Neeson didn't seem too enthusiastic about doing the flick. Pretty bad when the lead character can't stay awake enough to act.
From the Yahoo article:
A casting team is also searching for pint-sized preschoolers needed to fill some extra shoes in Episode II--Ewoks or Jawas, anyone?
I wouldn't be placing any bets on Ewoks or Jawas, actually. According to this article on StarWars.com, they're looking for kids that look alike, twins, triplets, etc...
Now, they say it's to overcome the limited hours that children can work. I, however, have a different reading on it. Say it with me now, people... clones.
________________________
Corporate Jenga: You take a blockhead from the bottom and you put him on top...
Quote from the linked article:
"Some of her finds include: Xena: Warrior Princess vet Jay Laga'aia, who's playing a loyal security officer, and Aussie Leeanna Walsman, who'll take on the physically-demanding role of a new highly-killed bounty hunter."
Gosh, that does sound physically demanding.
OpenSourceMan, that has gotta be the longest OSM vs. /. crew post i've seen.
and not bad either
XZ
The funniest Star Wars parody/homage I have seen is Star Dudes, an 800K/5 minute shockwave film. It summarizes the whole of Episode 4. You can find it at http://theforce.net/theater/animation/stardudes
I'm not karma-whoring, it's just funny. Please don't moderate me up.
wish
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But it's FUN to reverse-engineer a plausable explanation for things in SciFi (as opposed to SF) movies which are REALLY there solely for dramatic effect.
For example:
Q: Why does a "photon torpedo" going off nearby throw people around on the Enterprise's bridge?
My candidate A: EMP from the detonation interfering with the artificial gravity's mechanism for compensating for impulse engine acdelleration.)
My favorite from someone else:
Q: Why does the Enterprise go "whoosh" as it flies by (in a vacuum) in the opening credits?
A: Because someone left the vacuum cleaner running.
(Real A: Because they tried it silently and it just didn't work ffor the audience.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
They had a similar story to this on geekpress last week or so.
Although, many of these pre-movie stories are just that, stories, according to this review I read, there will be some fight scenes of epic proportions.
1) There will be a fight between 10,000 Jedis and 20,000 bad guys which results in several Jedi's being killed.
2) Yoda and Mace will be in the fight. Yoda apparently carries not one but two short lightsabers and uses them like nunchucks. Several members of the Jedi leadership will die in this battle.
3) Episode 2 deals primarily with the Clone Wars and the birth of the Empire. Introduced are Boba Fett and his gang, Grand Moff Tarkin, a new Dark Lord of Sith menace who starts leading Anakin down the dark path and ends with the Star Destroyers being built to "bring peace" to the galaxy.
I don't think it had to be a kids movie. My parents didn't think Star Wars was dumb when it came out. I liked it just about as much as the adults I knew at the time, remembering back to Return of the Jedi, when I was about 10-12.
I think you have a good point, though, the E1 was definitely aimed at kids, but more so than the old movies were. Catering to all ages groups is tough, but it was what I expected from Lucas. We may see what Jar-Jar is like this time, but I think it's a sign he's going for the kids again. I didn't like Jar-Jar, but I didn't hate everything about him. Ok, I hated a lot of things about him, mostly that I couldn't understand him. And his dialog was stupid, not even cute. If they cleaned that up it wouldn't have been half as bad. Hey, I liked the rest of the Gungans (sp?), I could mostly understand them.
The more I think about it, the more I feel the acting wasn't as good. I think a lot of the lines just came out sounding unatural and phoney. I'm not talking about some complex acting errors (I'm no experienced critic). I've seen other movies by the cast, and I know they can do a much better job. Maybe it was the directing. Come to think of it, the only characters that did come off sounding good were the puppets and computer graphics. As much as I didn't understand or like what Jar-Jar was saying, it didn't sound fake. Maybe Ewan McGregor did a good job, but he didn't really have that many lines. The rest sucked.
Think about it:
Jar-Jar Binks is NOT in E4, E5, or E6. So this means that Jar-Jar has to die somewhere inbetween E2 or E3... He did not die in E1, E2 Lucas states him as a main character so there is doubt he will die in E2. Unless Lucas is using this as a "decoy", the sly bastard. But get ready folks Jar-Jar HAS to die in either this one or the next.. I am betting on E3 personally.
:)
Atleast there is a bright side
"`Ford, you're turning into a penguin. Stop it.'" -THHGTTG
Another rumor is that Jar Jar is a big fucking mistake, and should be excised immediately from all past and future scripts.
There are only a couple of characters in the later movies that could be Jar Jar: both worked for Jabba - one would be that annoying little rat that laughed at everything, and the other would be the fat, blue, synthesizer player in the band. Neither added much to the movie, overall. Deja vu.
Guess I won't be seeing all of the second one either. (Never thought I'd ever get up and walk out of a Star Wars movie, but it happened.)
Lucas is directing episode 2 though, right? Potentially not a good sign, as he handed over the reins to ESB (the best one?) to Irvin Kershner. ...and on the other hand, Lucas didn't direct ROTJ either...
On a related note, Gaming Age have MPEG movies of the Nintendo Dolphin version of Star Wars Episode 2 Racer, here!
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It can't be as bad as Battlefield: Earth
One thing that also clearly shows that it's not those midiwhatever thingies that "cause" the Force is Darth Vader. He's about as strong with the Force as you can get, but all that is left of his body is his head, really - the rest is all artificial, created by the Emperor. I guess those midithingies would have a really hard time living in an almost fully mechanical body...
)O(
the Gods have a sense of humour,
Never underestimate the power of stupidity
To err is human, to moo bovine
I mean did that stop us from seeing all the highlanders?
Uh Yeah, Actually it did.
- Rob
I thought episode one was pretty horrible, half of them couldn't act at all. I mean I wanted to smack the kid who played annakin half of the time because he sounded like he was reading the lines off of a cue card. they better make episode two pretty damn good.
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the pr0n-o-matic http://www.phatmax.net/
That post was moderated informative??? Funny, maybe, or even interesting if you're so inclined, but informative??? Could the moderators please put down the crack pipe? :)
)O(
the Gods have a sense of humour,
Never underestimate the power of stupidity
To err is human, to moo bovine
I actually enjoyed Phantom Menace. I understand I was in the minority, but I predicted the presence of an annoying character and routed around it in real-time.
Trying to appeal to the kids will always ruin a movie series
Call me crazy, but isn't that was a children's movie should be doing?
and Aussie Leeanna Walsman, who'll take on the physically-demanding role of a new highly-killed bounty hunter.
So, how many times will she get killed?? And does she shoot Jar Jar before she dies (any of the times)??
We don't need no Net Explorer We don't need no Thought control
1. Jar Jar is a major comic relief in Episode I, comic reliefs are usually needed to help compliment the heroes
2. Putting Jar Jar in EII tells me that Lucas is going to continue to direct HIS vision, despite all the public scrutiny that he got in EI with Jar Jar's alleged references (leave it to people these days to find something to get angry over in something so harmless)
3. I thought (after watching the character for the 3rd time) that Jar Jar's character is a bit more deep than one might first appear, and his character has quite a bit of growth potential (despite the speech impediment of his entire race)
Cheers
Tenement.
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I heard rumors on some fan site that the Empire is going to use bounty hunters to freeze Queen Amadalia the same way that Vader froze Hans Solo in Empire. Is the script released?
Is this true?
because if so PETRIFIED NATALIE PORTMAN! OH YAAAAAAAAAAAA!
-hee. sorry. begin karma burn.
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What happens when you outlaw guns
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"[New find] Aussie Leeanna Walsman [will] take on the physically-demanding role of a new highly-killed bounty hunter."
Poor Aussie. I wonder how often one needs to be killed in a movie before one gains the fame of being 'highly-killed'?
-Adam
Morale will continue until the beatings improve!
What does one call a sequel to a prequel??
---K2K was here---
Hey, let the guy do what he's gotta do -- he's under a lot of pressure! After all, he sold off Pixar because he didn't foresee digital animation's impact on the movie industry and now he's trying to emulate the best he can! ;-)
... 16-18 year-olds. They act like they are still children except they run around screwing things up for the kids.
Seriously though, after seeing recent interviews (especially during and after Episode I), all I can think is that this guy is REALLY damn arrogant. I can't get Episode I on DVD until WHEN? 2010??? What the HELL is wrong with you? Some of us out here don't want to keep dumping cash into decades-old technology like VHS just because you don't FEEL it's the right time or some B.S. like that. Sure, Star Wars was/is a cultural phenomenon, but your head is just a little too big for your own good.
Also, he constantly says how much better technology is now, but at the same time downplays the role of digital animation "at this point" in movies. Got a little penis envy when you look at Pixar or what? Personally, I'll go on the record as saying that our family as a whole (all 5 of us) *loved* Episode I and can't wait for Episode II. Jar-Jar was anti-hyped by people like those in this forum JUST as much as Episode I was hyped in the first place -- he was a necessary character and not just an add-in to attract kids. You couldn't simply delete him and have a complete movie!
BUT, the animation of Jar-Jar and other CGI characters was GOOD? Give me a break -- it was not so good and I've seen a better job done in movies 5 years ago, let alone now in 1999 and 2000!! The fact is that Episode I could've been a better movie for me (since I saw Episode IV when I was a little kid), but I think expectations and GROWING UP have an effect on that opinion. I think people who constantly piss & moan about Jar-Jar and other crap they hated in Episode I need to take a moment to figure out what their problem is because they're just screwing up the atmosphere for MY kids! It's like when it's Halloween and the big kids come for candy
Face it, how many adults (over 18) went with you and enjoyed Star Wars when you saw it? None in my case. I know some adults liked Episode IV, but unless you were over 18 when you saw Episode IV and now you're the same adult watching Episode I, you have to admit that your mindset is different and that probably explains how this one "sucks" so much more than the first one. A good chunk of the fun in watching Episode IV again is the nostalgia!
Grow up and move on...
What everyone seems to be forgeting is that Episode I is supposed to tell us how it all got started. The only purpose of the movie is to show how we get to Episode II!
I want a movie that stands on its own; that's the whole point of shelling out the money and sitting in the seat.
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this is not my beautiful wife. TH
I saw on the starwars site that Boba Fett will be in the flick. Hmmm... that could possibly make it decent. As long as the jar jar time is kept to a minimum. I wont be holding my breath or waiting in line this time though.
Check it out http://home.clear.net.nz/pages/asciimat ion/
$_='while(read+STDIN,$_,2048){$a=29;$b=73;$c=142;
Okay, at the risk of being the biggest childish dork in here...do you think that they'll have the Y-Wing fighters in this one? Supposedly the Y-Wings were "an old design, still the mainstay of the Alliance forces". And from watching the Naboo fighters, which do you think would win in a dogfight or general battle? The Y-Wings may be old in the "later" SW films, but they should be new in Ep 2/3 I would think. And while they're at it, what about other tech like the Star Destroyers and stuff? Just wondering.
And I know that if I stay with her I'll lose all track of time/'til I light a candle to the shrine/call it rock and roll
I find this really vile. I'll be the first to admit Jar Jar was a bit weird, he wasn't the poster child for racial intolerance either. And Episode 1 was not as good as 4,5 or 6. Doesn't make the movie bad just because it didn't live up to everyones expectations?
It was peoples expectations and bad talk that made the whole thing worse. No one expected anything from lucus or skywalker ranch some 30 years ago, heck people said 'don't quit your day jobs' to the few brave souls who started out. They made not only a movie but a phenomenon. Now they want to come back and finish the story. They wrote its climax already, how can it get any more exciting then that. Now it is time to tell the whole tale. Learn and be entertained, not critical. And on a side, maybe lucas over merchandised just a bit.
so THERE YOU HAVE IT, THE TRUTH COMES OUT I LIKED EPISODE ONE. I would even pay to watch it not download it off some pirate site
Geoffrey Cameron Peart
McMaster Software Engineering
Geoffrey Cameron Peart
McMaster Software Engineering
Monkies? I like Monkies
I can hear it now...
"..(BANG!!)... Awww, Man... you shot Jar jar in the Face!"
my ticket money is on the bedside table...
"If voting could really change things, it would be illegal. " - Revolution Books, NY
I'm surprised lucas went with video - it still hasn't achieved nearly the resolution of good, old-fashioned film.
Paul Anderson
"I drank WHAT?!" -- Socrates
Highly killed, huh? Tough job, but someone's gotta do it...
Friends don't let friends use multiple inheritance.
... is when ben kenobi is going to lose the british accent.
"I don't need a compass to tell me which way the wind shines." - Mr. Furious, Mystery Men
Can anyone explain WHY they are shooting digitally? Are they shooting digital in addition to film??
There are some basic problems with digitial image capture. CCDs see light on a arithmatic scale. Twice as much light registers as twice the brightness. Film sees light on an exponential scale. Four times as much light registers as twice the brightness. This gives film a much higher dynamic range. Film also corresponds to the way our eyes see light. Film also looks better.
However, we have been socialized to beleive that CCD images look more "real" because news shows shoot video rather than film. In actually, its just a flatter image.
I'm all for getting rid of the hassles with film, but CCD's don't seem ready yet.
Know what I like about atheists? I've yet to meet one that believes God is on their side.
I often hear this apologia for The Phantom Menace, but there are many excellent kid's fantasy films that adults enjoy too: The Iron Giant, Indian in the Cupboard, My Neighbour Totoro, Labyrinth, The Last Unicorn -- these are just ones I own.
The truth is, The Phantom Menace was badly structured (who was the hero?), badly written, and -- unlike Star Wars -- relied on flash rather than a compelling story. It deserves every scrap of criticism it got.
Not all kid's movies need to have adult appeal, but unlike a Barney the Dinosaur movie, Phantom Menance *could* have been something adults would enjoy. Maybe the next one will be.
Yogurt
-rpl
There will be a fight between 10,000 Jedis and 20,000 bad guys which results in several Jedi's being killed.
What this means is that we'll have more huge CGI generated scenes. Moores law having duly cranked a few more times, you can model the more fluid movements of people instead of the robots of Episode 1. Frankly, I'm not terribly excited about this. I like cool effects, but when the whole scene comes out of a giant render farm it loses something, at least for me.
What was the best part of Episode 1? I liked Ray Park, the British kung fu athlete who played Darth Maul. I enjoyed it for the same reason I like Jackie Chan movies. There's something exciting about watching an actual flesh and blood human being do something that he really shouldn't be able to, even if he's had a little help from carefully chosen camera angles and multiple takes.
Maybe the reason massive computer generated scenes leave me cold is that I'm too aware of the technology that goes into it and it spoils the trick for me. Or perhaps the ones I've seen have artistic flaws that will be fixed with better technique and more computer power. Maybe we won't even need actors. I'm not sure though. Would slashdot trolls be fixated on petrified Natalie Portman if she were digitally generated? The company that puts out Tomb Raider still hires a series of increidbly nubile girls to make personal appearances as "Lara Croft".
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
They're cute, they're annoying, they're tribal. But best of all, polls show they appeal to the prime demographic that will heighten the ST:E2's profitab...er...appeal!
This news release has been brought to you by Anonymous Kev.