How History will remeber Lucas

How exactly will history remeber George Lucas, 100 years from now or 200 years from now.

Now in my opinion William Shakespeare was a terrible playwright (and that is not because of the language because I understand it, what I don't like is his stories.) And yet Shakespeare is remembered. Infact most of the classic authors such as Herman Melvile, Charles Dickens, William Golding, Nathaniel Hawthore, and Edgar Allen Poe, in my opinion are not good writers.

So will Lucas not be remebered because he was actually good? Will he be remebered as a Movie making genius? What do you think.

Darth-Seldon

 

He is the Tolkien of films and will be remembered as that kind of storyteller. That´s what I believe.

 

A lot of geniuses got laughed at and critized. GL will be the same. He is the Tolkien of filmaking(very well put). Anybody can like his films, there seems to be something there for everyone(except damn critics). Fantasy, scifi, reality, you name it, he can mold it into a story that will touch a part of us somewhere, somehow(and we may not even appreciate it).

 

IMHO, he will be remembered for making innovations in the way movies are made.
He helped usher in the age of the blockbuster.
He pushed for high-quality THX motion picture sound.
He helped pioneer and popularize nonlinear editing.
He helped special / visual / digital effects technology get where it is today.
And now of course he is forefront in the crusade to upgrade the world to high-definition digital video and digital projection in your theater.



And of course he made some movies too. But in my opinion his actual films, as pieces of entertainment, are far less important. (Yes, even Star Wars.)



Rick McCallum loves you!

 

Some, in the future, will rumor that he was actually the promise of salvation foretold by the prophets.

 

I think he'll be remembered for the revolutions in filmmaking he has ushered in and for being the Tolkien(I can't put it better) of filmmaking.

-Jedi Master Zax Starwalker

 

a Master Storyteller(the Tolkien of films as you put it)
a Rebel Filmmaker who succeeded

 

He will be remembered as one of the prime creators of the summer blockbuster movie trends.

 

revolutionized special effects with ANH
revolutionized marketing and memorabilia tie-ins with ANH
Revolutionized the industry by practically giving birth to the summer blockbuster season with ANH
created ILM which made special effects for a hundred or more very history-making movies in the last 25 years.
Created THX and pushed theaters to adopt Digital THX sound systems and now pushing them for digital projectors.
The first to use digital cameras for a feature film of EP II's magnitude.

GL's place in history is secure just in technical and business-related innovation alone.

 

+ Creator of 'Star Wars' one of the most successful, popular, profitable, influential, innovative film series ever produced.

+ Producer of the 'Indiana Jones' movies, among the most popular, successful and profitable film series ever created.

+ Technical innovator in all fields of visual broadcast media.

+ Philanthropist with an interest in education.

+ Experimental filmmaker whose interest in technical challenges, arcane themes and complete immersion in fantasy worlds often left viewers unsatisfied with the human aspects of his stories.

+ Friend and contemporary of Steven Spielberg, Francis Foed Coppola and Martin Scorsese, among others, comprising the single greatest generation of American filmmakers since the 1930's.

 

He is the Tolkien of films and will be remembered as that kind of storyteller
Excellent post Lars_Muul

I think GL will be remembered for his contributions to the technical aspects of filmmaking...rather then his own films. Not to say he hasn't created an epic story with SW, but people seem to give folks like Speilberg (he's great as well) more credit as a filmmaker, then GL recieves.

James Cameron credits Lucas with creating the tools, that allowed him to make films like "The Abyss" and "Titanic"...and I think GL will be remembered more as the man who created the tools of the trade, as opposed to the one who used them the best.

 

Fans will remember him fondly for his movies - particularly Stars Wars and Indiana Jones.

Studios will remember him fondly for introducing the summer blockbuster.

Some filmmakers will remember him fondly for upgrading effects and popularizing the use of computers in editing and other movie making functions. They will also appreciate his love for making film a total sensory experience including sound.

Some filmmakers will not remember him fondly for trying to replace film with gigabytes. His thirst to turn the entire movie experience from making to viewing into a totally digital experience will likely eventually happen. But I feel many filmmakers will not look at this as progress. I think there will always be a strong sect of filmmakers who prefer film to digital video.

Then again, 200 years from now, we'll probably be plugging movie discs into slots in our heads and enjoying a totally 3D movie experience, meaning both film and digital video will seem antiquated, so who knows?

 

Then again, 200 years from now, we'll probably be plugging movie discs into slots in our heads and enjoying a totally 3D movie experience, meaning both film and digital video will seem antiquated, so who knows?-------sounds a bit painful!

 

only if the movie they're plugging in is "Kung Pow" (Shivers at remembrence).

I can just see them at the Emergency room now.
Doctor: "Another case of clawing out a movie disk? You could've just pushed eject."
Victim: "It wasn't fast enough."

 

As just a sweet, down to Earth guy who made a bunch of great movies.

 

He is the Tolkien of films and will be remembered as that kind of storyteller.

Well put. I think when everything comes down to it, he will be a Master-storyteller. Even with some of his angles and plot lines and dialouge, he has a way of shooting the movie so that it seems fresh and real in a way no one else has. He has a beautiful way of letting a person slip into a different reality and back again flawlessly.

But then again, he's a technical wizard as well.

-Krystal

 

I hope Lucas will not be remembered as the Tolkien of films. For I hate Tolkien who in my opinion has no writing ablity. And plus I don't belived Tolkien will be remebered that long while Lucas will.

 

I don't know Lord of the Rings was written during World War 1...

-Jedi Master Zax Starwalker

 

Written during World War I? what reference are you making???

Anyway, Tolkien is something of a meadnering storyteller. Like Lucas, eople have merely been captivated by the "world" he created much more than the story itself.

Unless you're studying film history, I expect Lucas to be mentioned for very little at all. Perhaps one of his movies will be listed among others as examples of early "blockbusters" in one sentence of one paragraph about popular culture of that era.
But beyond that, Lucas's broader historical impact is minimal.

 

Tolkien wrote the Silmarillion during WW1, he wrote LOTR during WW2.

It's impossible to say whether Lucas or any other current filmmaker will be remembered in 200 years time. That's so far in the future that we simply cannot make a judgement.

If however we look at a time framce of around 50-100 years it might be easier. Undoubtedly Lucas will be remembered for Star Wars only but my take is that future generations will look at SW the same way we currently look at James Whale's Frankenstein movie or King Kong. There will always be afficionados who love those old SF or monster films but for most people it will be just an oddity

 

Star Wars will be well remembered as the first film franchise with such a huge fanbase. It will also be well remembered for it´s story, which is exactly what TLOTR is remembered for, not for the way Tolkien wrote it.
And similar to Tolkien, Lucas will not be as well remembered as his story, but he will still be admired by many around the world for telling it and for revolutionizing filmmaking in several areas.

BTW: Thanks to you who appreciate my analogy between GL and JRRT

 

I think he'll just be rememebered as Mr. Star Wars, although we all know all his achievements with cinema production and all that malarky, the average Joe in the street doesn't really know about these, just that he made Star Wars.

 

I agree that Lucas may become the Tolkien of film. However, Middle Earth (The Hobbit, LOTR and all of the backstory and histories) was all the writing Tolkien ever did. He was a professor of literature and mythology, not a writer. Lucas has spread the efforts that Tolkien put towards study into making advances in film. That's the biggest difference.

Darth-Seldon, I am curious why you hate all of the great authors so much? Is it because you are too used to modern storytelling? That changes all of the time, so you have to look at older works with a different eye. It happens with movies, too. Even Star Wars will be looked at in 100 years the way you look at Shakespeare today by a great many people. Yeah, until you get to where you can read Shakespeare or Dumas or Melville well, it can be hard to read and enjoy, but these stories have depth and validity even today. Sometimes it just takes a bit of age to get to where you can really understand a story before you can enjoy it. I remember that from a media literacy class I took. The reason people don't understand some things, and therefore don't like them, is because they don't have the experience to do so. I'm not saying that this is necessarily the case with you, but you never know, in a few years you might look at these stories differently.

Sorry, that was a bit too rambly and I'm splitting my attention between this and work, so I better stop before I dig a big ol' hole for myself, assuming I haven't done so already.

 

i hope gl is remembered as a person who pushed technology. a filmmaker who pushed vision not once but twice. i hope he is remembered and thanked for having the guts to do what he wanted to do, and push his vision. and most of all i think he should be remembered as a great storyteller.

 

"most of all i think he should be remembered as a great storyteller."

With all due respect, that'd be debatable IMO. There'll be some that say yes, and some would say no.
What critics wouldn't be able to deny is the changes in the craft of making movies, showing movies, and selling movies, he introduced.

On the technical side of the business everyone would have to admit he's a genius. (for ill or good-that'd be debatable too)
As far as the artistic side of the business he'd atleast have to be considered visionary...I mean who else woulda thought up Star Wars as we love it today.