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A Closer Look at Star Wars on Film and Off
mclove writes "Revenge of the Sith comes out on DVD today, and there's an interesting article on Slate dissecting the now-complete trilogy as the avant-garde, intellectual sort of film that Lucas keeps saying it is."` Relatedly inkslinger77 writes "ILM model maker, Brian Gernand, speaks about what it is like to work with George Lucas and why he thinks Star Wars attracts such a huge following, particularly among the IT community. He also gives some information about the technology that is used behind the scenes. "
Don't count on it...
The toad can't burp - and for some reason can't fart either, so it swells up and eventually explodes. --Anonymous Coward
...It's a cash machine.
As always, any sufficiently insightful deconstruction is indistinguishable from satire.
...when the author commented that R2 and 3P0 landing on tatooine was a coincidence.
I'm not that big of a SW geek, but even I know that there is a reason they ended up back in the same place.
The slate article seems more interested in the academic thought than the actual subject matter. They should at least be related.
So what this guy is saying, is that "The Force" is actually George Lucas, and when they say "The Force be with you", they are basically saying "Pray that Lucas doesn't get you killed in the next scene"
Now it all makes sense!
READY.
PRINT ""+-0
Cubicle light saber duel, anyone?
I love Slate and I read it every day, but this article is not convincing for me. His main point is that George Lucas got all meta about plot; the Force represents Plot; the Emperor represents the author's attempt to control the plot, and Jar Jar represents the inventive whimsy of the characters. Sounds to me like "Moby Dick is actually the Republic of Ireland". Sorry.
Never attribute to post-modernism that which can adequately be explained by stupidity!
Revenge of the Sith comes out on DVD today, and there's an interesting article on Slate dissecting the now-complete trilogy
All I can say is that I'm very grateful to have episodes IV, V, and VI in their original untouched format. IMO they are the only films deserving to be called the 'Star Wars Trilogy'.
The others films are an embarrassment at best.
The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky
The Force is the ultimate plot device, and it's such an obvious plot device that even the characters themselves realize that their actions are being controlled by this plot device, so it becomes a post-modern plot device.
Cue fanfare and applause.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Star Wars is probably the best example of IT nerds meeting film geeks, and that pairing continues with all the fan films. Projects like http://www.impstherelentless.com/ bring the best of garage coders, animators, and home movie people together. And everyone wants to document their Star Wars fandom, from http://www.starwoids.com/ to http://www.starwait.com/ to the most recent project, http://www.lininguptv.com/.
Jar-Jar and the prequels "needed" to happen so that Toys'R'Us could squeeze that bit more Star Wars junk on the shelves.
This article is a load of rubbish, unless of course if it is satire, in which case it is great.
That's a big "if" ladies and gentlemen.
Okay, its only the first two movies of the new trilogy, as I got burned out by the time I hit 11 pages and just needed to sleep.
Basically if Lucas had wanted them to be artistic and not just popcorn it wouldn't have been difficult, he had a good story, just a poor execution, except for the end of the second movie and the end of the third movie, that bloody rocked.
Anyway here it is its as if Frank Herbert wrote them and George Lucas didn't suck enough to ruin them.
Read Errant Story.
I was talking to a friend about Episode III. He pointed out, his words, "It was the best of Star Wars, it was the worst of Star Wars." You'd have an incredibly great moment followed immediately by something soul-crushingly stupid. The POV shot of Vader's mask coming down over his face; Vader's first breaths. Chilling.
Followed by Vader whining about where Padme is, and then, of course... "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
Lucas is great at molding basic story material, but he can't write dialogue or characters to save his life. He should have stuck to producing, which is what he's really good at.
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
He's not impressing people with no interest in the arts. He's sure not fooling anyone who even casually takes this seriously. I guess is supposed to be a joke on both Star Wars fans and students of literature, but where is the Monty python foot next to the submission?
The real questions are ...
... when his family is also related to Darth Vader?
... with the son of the guy who built them ... and Ben not recognize them or say anything to the kid.
... ever. I mean, just one twinge of middle age and the entire scheme is ruined.
... look at it as Lucas trying to tie the new 3 with the original 3 to give the old fans something to "Hey! I recognize that from when I was a kid!" about and it all makes sense.
Why was Ben there?
If the answer is to look after Luke, then why was Luke there?
If the answer is because that's where his family is, then why put him with his family
That just sounds stupid.
But not as stupid as having those 'droids drop in on Ben
Okay, so maybe putting the kid with Vader's kin wasn't a bad idea. I mean, Kid Vader didn't even bother to save his mommy from a life of slavery. So why expect Adult Vader to drop in and visit the family
Rather
Shame Lucas couldn't put together a better plot to tie his marketing gimickry together.
It looks like the slashdot audience is getting really hung up on the whole, "Is the Slate piece a satire or not?" thing. The thing is, as I commented before, "'satire' and 'non-satire' is a binary distinction that post-modernism transgresses proactively."
What I mean, is that the author both is and isn't kidding. Also, I'm both kidding and not kidding when I say "transgresses binary distinctions." Here's a helpful analogy: Let's imagine you're writing a horror story. You write, "Start breathing harder. OK. Let your pupils dilate. Shake a little. Cower. Think about other scary stuff. Be worried that something might kill you soon!" How effective would this be as a horror story? The answer is not at damn all. The best way to make someone frightened isn't to say, "be frightened," it's to say a bunch of other stuff that inspires fear in them.
Similarly, the content of the Slate piece isn't the point. The author almost certainly doesn't care whether Star War is "post-modern" or "avant garde." Instead, the author likes challenging his brain, and wants you to enjoy challenging your brain. So, he's given himself a task: come up with a post-modern meta-framing of Star Wars. Now, we the audience are supposed to allow our brains to quiver with joy as we connect the dots and think about whether and how the Force as a meta-explanation for plot coincidences in Star Wars can be called post-modern. The author is almost certainly serious in that this explanation is a valid one for Star Wars. The author is almost certainly joking in suggesting that Star Wars is High Art. The author is both serious and not, and that's the point.
If the author had written, "let your brain light up with activity. Think about connections. Enjoy the tingling of neurons firing," it wouldn't be effective. Instead, we're supposed to accept what the piece gives us without trying to shoe horn it into the category of "joke" or "not a joke." We're supposed to be enjoying how the piece is and isn't a joke, not trying to make it fit what we think about the quality of the Star Wars movies.
Now that we have all six films, we know that the main thrust of the story is Anakin Skywalker's fall and eventual redemption. The main story is good. The execution is patchy, to say the least. You can imagine Lucas sitting on a big pile of money at his ranch thinking "Now what this dark, tragic story really needs is an annoying rasta guppy fishman..'
So, this might be heresy, but I'd like to see a bunch of remakes in twenty years time, where the story isn't made up on the hoof and the budget for hiring writers is slightly higher than cake budget. Imagine Joss Whedon writing the dialogue...
Just as long as Han shoots first, natch.
Anyone care to enlighten me?
You are too enraptured by the Star Wars mythos. To the Dark Side of the Fandom headed you are!
May the Maths Be with you!
Lucas wanted to make a set of films which reminded him of the old-time matinee serials. Lots of adventure, light on plot, big on fun. Within that framework I think he succeeded pretty well 100%.
Now, it may well be the case that some of us don't want that, and it pretty well explains such nonsense as Jar-Jar and "going through the core" etc, but it seems obvious to me that it was what George wanted and I suspect he's a happy man when he looks at what he did. And, on the way, he did manage to produce six films about the bad guy, which I think is a great idea.
Chill out and repeat: "It's just Flash Gordon". You'll enjoy the films much more that way.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
its so good because its a fancy sword made of light!
:-p
but, going a step further and a tad geekier, consider that the blade itself, which can cut through anything except the beam of another saber, is incredibly light-weight. since light itself has no mass, the only weight of the thing is in the handle, so its incredibly easy to do quick shifts of position. add that to the jedi's ability to sense the world in a unique way, and not only is it a sword, its also a shield against incoming projectile attacks.
compare that to the longsword of comparable size (when the saber is extended, anyway) that I bought at the renaissance festival, which weighs (probably) 20 pounds, which i can (awkwardly) lift with one hand but couldn't likely swing with any accuracy or force, and you'll understand why people like the concept of lightsabers so much.
>> Can anyone give me a precise reason why they think Star Wars I, II or III were horrible movies?
Because they sucked. How much more precise can I be? You want me to list scene/chapter/verse? Why isn't the perception of overall suckiness enough for me to say that it was a horrible experience to watch the new "trilogy"?
When The Matrix sequels came out, I had a hard time arguing with at least one fan-boy at the office who kept telling me that if I didn't like them it was most likely because I just "didn't get them". As if there was some secret deeper meaning behind them of which only an enlighted selected few were aware. As if I am not smart enough or rational enough to be able to form a valid opinion on something by sheer perception and experience.
I liked the LotR movies a lot, but I accept the fact that there are people who found them slow, boring, and too distant from the original work to qualify as Tolkienesque. I can certainly see why, but more importantly, I respect their opinion.
Now respect mine (and all those others who have a negative view of SW movies): I believe that Episodes I, II, and III were horrible. I believe that Episode II was (slightly) better than the first, and that Episode III was still even better than the previous two, but in my eyes that still means that Lucas finally reached mere mediocrity from the depth of incompetency and horridness. On the other side of the token, I believe that the original Star Wars (what you would call Episode IV) was the best of the series, with a very good follow up in The Empire Strikes Back (that's Episode V for you kiddies). I don't really care much for Return Of The Jedi (Episode VI if you're not following).
-dZ.
Carol vs. Ghost
He did not lie when he said "I don't recall ever owning a droid" as far as we know. Also, he may not have much reason to recognize R2D2 as he never really did anything with R2...That was all Anakin, if you recall. Obi-Wan was using other droids in his ships. As for C3P0, well, as we saw in Cloud City (among other places), there are other droids with identical designs, so there is no reason to recognize 3P0 either...
However, it seems (to me) quite clear that the droids were sent to Tattooine with Leia by her "father" (Senator Organa, right?). It was only after Leia's ship was attacked that their mission (well, R2's anyway) became to find Obi-Wan.
To me, it seems to fit the plot rather well, with the only thing that seemed to happen by chance (or the will of the Force if you buy the article author's premise) was the droids coming to Luke first.
IMHO. :-)
"Empathise with stupidity, and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot." - Iain M. Banks
as the avant-garde, intellectual sort of film that Lucas keeps saying it is.
jar-jar binks is most definatly not intellectual, and he wasted half the time in the first two prequel star wars movies. so i guess maybe you could argue that episode III was intellectual, but I and II vaporized my brain.
This raises a really interesting question about why Leia's ship was near Tatooine in the first place. According to the narrative in Episode IV, she had recieved the stolen plans from the Rebel spies, and was en route to Alderaan to deliver them to her father, Bail Organa, presumably the leader of the rebellion. I have always assumed, since we don't know where they started out from, and since it seems like a relatively short journey from Tatooine to Alderaan, that the ship was damaged and forced to seek shelter at the nearest available system (such as what happens to the Falcon in Episode V).
But then this raises the question of how Princess Leia knows who Obi-Wan Kenobi is, or how she knows that he is located on Tatooine. The end of Episode III tells us that Bail Organa knows this information, and so we need to conclude that he told his daughter. But this raises a startling additional point: Organa also knew that Luke Skywalker was in residence on Tatooine. It coule be that Organa has decided, now that Luke will also be of age, to call in Obi-Wan and Luke to assist the Rebellion. Since none of this is given in the narrative, it isn't very likely that this is Lucas's intent. It is perhaps more likely that Leia has a letter from her dad on the ship that says "Open in case of being marooned on Tatooine - it happens more often than you might think." Or maybe she had an emergency call back home and said "I've blown a tire near Tatooine, who can help me nearby?" Nevertheless, it is interesting to speculate about the possible motives for sending Leia to Obi-Wan at this point in the history of the Rebellion.
The problem with these kinds of analyses is not that they are debasement of criticism, as some have suggested. It's that they create complex and appealing explanations where simpler ones fit better.
While you can frame Lucas' triumphs and missteps in a kind of Dionysian/Apollonian dichotomy as the author does, I think the more economical explanation is this: Lucas is hampered by having too much money.
For this analysis, it is more useful to consider the films in release order, not narrative order.
Episode IV barely got made; Lucas had no idea whether his whole vision would ever come to fruition -- probably he doubted it. He also had limited budget; within that budget, his effects had to be as convincing as he could manage, and it probably wouldn't be wise to let people dwell on them (or the novice actors' performance) too much. Struggling against these limitations, he ended up trying to squeeze a barrel full of plot squashed into a thimble of time. The result is that the Episode IV unrolls at a pace that may never have been matched before or since, at least in a movie that had any narrative cohesiveness. The only reason it can be followed at all is that it's cobbled together out of familiar old stuff out of the common cultural attic. The result was a freshness and exhiliration that none of the subsequent movies could match.
Episode V is widely regarded as the most satisfying of the series. The actors have hit their stride (helped along by a new director), the most onerous of the limitations have been lifted, but Lucas is not yet an all powerful, infinitely financed auter yet. The movie runs along at a slower but still brisk pace as Lucas the writer fills out the story from his Joseph Campbell crib sheet. Overall the best balanced of the entire series.
Episode VI is remarkable for being the first unremarkable film in the series. The cast has hit it stride, but Lucas the movie maker and story teller is starting to fall apart. Like the once athlete who starts to succumb to middle age, he's succumbing to middle aged spread and is plodding perceptibly. He now has power; limitless resoruces and self-indulgence are starting to take their toll. But he still has a compelling story to finish, and he manages to make it over the finish line. In retrospect our disillusionment with this film is perhaps tinged by our over optimistic expectations.
Episode I-II should be one film. That they are split into two is a sign of Lucas' complete independence, not only from financial constraint, but its accompanying artistic constraint. He made two movies out of one movie's worth of plot, for no other reason than he had a notion to. Add this to the limitless distraction iof digital effects on an unlimited budget, and these films do the unthinkable for fans of Episode IV: they drag on, and on. We're given plenty of time to ponder the imponderables as "WTF is the Trade Federation" or "How could Annakin go from ten years old to twenty without Padme going from twenty to thirty?"
Episode III: Lucas return to mediocrity. There is story to tell; Episode I-II has to be bridged to Episode IV, and he only has one movie to do it in. So his tendency to ramble is reined in, which is a very good thing. He also has an interesting philosophical point to make, one that's familiar to thoughtful readers of Tolkien and CS Lewis, about the costs of trying to impose your personal narrative on the people around you and the inability to accept the impermanence of life. But the movie, while entertaining, is unsatisfying because it wants to be profound but fails. Lucas can't shoehorn a archetypal myth like the quest or rebirth into a script that will do what he needs to do in this movie. What he has to work with is collection of loose ends that he must tie up in a way that makes his point. What he needs to achieve his ambitions in this episode are the powers of a dramatist, which he lacks.
In politics, power is the instrument. But power also corrupts. In art the struggle for freedo
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Anakin was a loving, good-intentioned person with a conscience. The film's attempts to drive him to the Dark Side were staged and pushy and contrived and ultimately ridiculous. --You can frustrate a person and make him/her angry, but to become Vader, you have to scramble a person as a child. Anakin was already well past the point of such vulnerability; he had seen and learned love and friendship during his formative years. --His love and selfless good deeds were rewarded with the gratitude and returned love from solid, respectful friends, and thus his belief system and internal compass about how the world can and should be would have been set and anchored deeply. It would have taken a LOT more than a sly Palpatine whispering shit at him to screw up a 20-something year-old Anakin. Heck, even the flying junk-dealer from his childhood spoke of little Anakin with pride. --There are fatherless kids out there in the real world who would do anything for the kind of affection Anakin was shown in Phantom Menace. If you want to create a Vader, you have to start kicking him as a baby and never let up. Anakin should have been the second coming. Vader? No chance.
2. I DID however like the illustration of how a republic can easily turn into a fascist state. We all can take a lesson from that and pack our bags and move to Canada, France or New Zealand. . .
So Lucas gets half marks for insight. Politically, he's got a clue, but otherwise he's still learning. Evil is a tough problem.
-FL