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Time on Star Wars
BOredAtWork writes
"Hey, it turns out that George Lucas guy is still alive,
and making movies. He's got a new one coming out this summer,
and it's even on the cover of the April 26th issue of Time! "
You can read the article online.
What we need is someone with more graphical ability than me to make Phantom Menace Themes! Gtk Themes, E themes, WM Themes, etc, etc :)
See my Home Theater
...are "exclusive pictures". Some of the closeups of the CG characters are amazing... I could really only tell that they were CGI because I *knew* they were CGI.
The Galactic Guide's much neater in there, too... all on one foldout, that's going to get tacked to my wall.
4 more weeks!
-Virgil
--
The Future: Some assembly required; batteries not included.
i have to say that is one of the better star wars articles I've read. It covered a large aspect of what the movie is going to contain. Of course, if these articles keep coming, I'll already know what's going on in the movie. I got to thinking "geez, that'll suck." Then I thought, no it wouldn't.
I think a comment I saw posted already about the CG characters not looking CG explain it. What of my biggest irritations is movies with CG special effects that you can TELL are done by a computer. (In my opinion that means the special effects are not special effects).
There are 250 shots of the 2200 that haven't been digitally produced or enhanced. I have a feeling this is going to be something worth getting on DVD.... without doubt. (of course, I wonder how many years until it is available on DVD)
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I enjoyed the interview with Lucas, tentatively perused the main article (don't want to many details), and simply adored the $!@^#% picture of Gates that kept popping up. For more on Star Wars, check out theonion web site. It seems that another Bill (Clinton) is already standing in line to see the movie.
I'm suprised that you did not mention that There's an interview with Lucas by Bill Moyers. Bill Moyers, along with Joseph Campbell, is responsible for the rebirth of mythology theory and the Hero's journey stuff that y'all learned in High school. He's really quite a genius.
My understanding is that Lucas wants to make people think about the big questions regarding spiritual reality, such as, "Is there a God," or even, "Is there anything beyond the physical universe?"
That's very different from saying that the movie will have a Christian emphasis.
And I remember when Christains were complaining that the Force was analogous to witchcraft. If it's not one side, it's the other...
Along with begin in Time Star Wars will also be in a great number of other maganizes this month. Among them include the May issue of Metropolis with focas on some of the props used in Episode 1.
Also Star Wars will be fetured in Premiere. The First time ever that Premiere has dedacated a whole issue to one moive. Star Wars is coming.
Seeing this cover brought back memories of the first cover story run by Time on Star Wars. Published in the spring of 1977, it gave in-depth coverage of Star Wars: Episode IV: A New Hope, known at the time simply as "Star Wars." The Time scoop was nearly the only advanced publicity the movie received, and not surprisingly, the theater was less than full capacity when I saw the first showing of Star Wars in '77, on opening day.
Of course, the film blew me away. Unquestionably.
Some things that took my breath away:
- Size and scale. The angles used in filming the model made the spacecraft seem, well, immense. A far cry from "2001" (*different* from SW, of course, not inferior) and its ilk.
- Uniqueness of the aliens. Up till Star Wars, humanoid aliens ruled the roost, and the inventiveness of Lucas enthralled.
- Details, details. Flash-by scenes, such as the holographic chess game, only adhered to the memory on the second or third viewing. Perhaps that's why stories of viewers who, in '77, revisited the show > 500 times were legendary that year.
- The expansiveness of the SW world, which encompassed desert planets as well as space melees, bar brawls as well as romance.
- Finally, the heady pace. Fast cuts. Brief scenes. Action from start to finish.
Star Wars, in this respect, was Hollywood's first "action" movie -- the first movie to launch this genre into cinematic hyperspace. The torch lit by the film was taken up by "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (1981), the (bad) Simpson/Brukheimer films of the 80s ("Top Gun"), John Woo, and, in its most recent incarnation, "The Matrix" -- a superb distant descendant of the genre.
"Star Wars" lit the original action flame, and we have Lucas to thank for his inspirational wizardry in the cutting room.
Geez! I stopped reading before the end of the first page, because they were giving all of the plot away! I hate that!
Jon
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.