CT How well did the average movie goer really understand SW in 1977?

Many people comment how episode 1 the phantom menace is so difficult for the lay person who isn't steeped in SW lore to follow and understand but when you set aside the pop culture phenomenon that Star Wars became and examine that original film on its own in 1977, I could definitely see it feeling very strange and difficult to follow. We are thrown into this completely alien galaxy that is supposed to be long ago and far away but has humans and planets that share earth features and accents and cultures and customs and yet living alongside droids and aliens and advanced technology with a long, long history and references to events and the movie never ever stops to explain any of this at all. It treats everything as normal and routine, every day. You also have a thinly explained main plot about a rebellion engaged in a civil war with a galactic empire and stolen plans to a death star and we are dropped smack into the middle of this conflict with little to no context on what exactly the empire is, its territory, resources etc etc.

To top it all off we get this concept of the Force and the Jedi and the Clone Wars and the old republic and it's earth like with ordinary humans but yet has nothing to do with earth and is futuristic yet set a long time ago. The movie moves so fast and the exposition very economical where you just barely get the bare bones of the plot and nothing of the setting besides passing references which is awesome and what I love about the movie and what Lucas intended....but I have to ask...

Did most people know what the heck was going on in this movie when it first came out in 1977 and names like Darth Vader and Obi Wan Kenobi weren't part of the pop culture lexicon?

I think many fans take for granted how much of the SW galaxy and characters and situations in the OT we learned through the toy boxes, EU books, comics and other merchandise. The prequels do the same thing (albeit the story is a bit more complicated and involved and complex) and yet its detractors point this out as a flaw.

 

Back in 1977, what was so tough to understand? It was a fun adventure story. It had snazzy VFX, laser swords, zap guns, great music and characters, and even some magic tossed in. All the obsessing over the fine details came much later.

 

I wouldn't call The Phantom Menace "difficult to understand". I also don't think Star Wars was complicated either. I didn't watch it in 1977 (wasn't alive then), but I did watch it as a kid without knowing much about it in 1997ish. And it was pretty simple. The guys wearing the helmets with the foreboding music were the bad guys; we see the bad guys doing something bad, so we don't like them. The guys with the heroic music are the good guys; we see them trying to rescue a princess so we like them.

And while the movie does start off in "media res", the audience is quickly brought up to speed once Luke is introduced on both the plot and the mythology of the universe. Additionally, the characters are very accessible and relatable which makes it easy to accept how vastly different the world is to our own. To give some perspective, I was able to completely follow Star Wars as a small child. But many years later, as a much older child, I had difficulty understanding the Lord of the Rings movies. So I think some of the biggest strengths of Star Wars are that it has a simple story and accessible characters, which contrasts rather well with its other-worldly creatures, environments, and technology.

 

That's me! I didn't find TPM all that complicated, even as a kid. It was simple: bad guys are trying to invade peaceful planet so they're bad, and good guys are trying to rescue this planet so they're good. With the political stuff, I understood that the politicians were taking too long to decide whether or not to help so the Queen just decided to take back her planet on her own & with the help of the Gungans. I don't remember being confused at the Chosen One stuff other than not knowing what exactly it meant to bring balance to the Force. But despite all that, my attention was directed more towards the spectacle of the whole thing; I remember not being able to stop thinking about that lightsaber duel for weeks after watching the film....so much so that I ended up seeing it again in theaters (common for the typical Star Wars fan, but my family didn't support such "crazy" fanaticism towards a movie franchise lol).

I will say though, that I failed to make the connection that Palpatine was Sidious, which I probably would have picked up on had I been an adult. Though, I don't think I'm the only one because I do remember there being fierce debates on that topic in the years leading up to ROTS.

 

I agree. The story of all the SW movies is simple to understand and even easier to follow (colors, music...). The alien environment and mystical concepts are just background stuff that makes the world interesting (but even those are easy to understand).

Of course, understanding a SW movie doesn't mean you know every historical or geographical detail of the galaxy mentioned in the movie. (An "Empire" is just a regime that sounds evil, same as a "Republic" is a regime that sounds good. "the Jedi, guardians of peace and justice" are the good guys, and "the evil lord Darth Vader" is evil).

 

It was easy to get to because you had Luke who was just like the audience, a fish out of water character who asked questions like the audience would

 

The music and the background settings played a big part in the movies success added to that was the CGI visuals that were out of this world for the time. It was 77 and for audiences back then Star Wars was the future. The whole good v bad is actually quite similar to Cowboy movies. They also have simple stories with the good guy taken on numerous obstacles and getting the women in the end.

Star Wars is a lot more engaging than a lot of the movies that were released back then and even today the blockbuster was a big deal so their was huge hype. The story was not the greatest ever told but with a combination of excellent fight scenes, amazing characters and exciting space chases Star Wars had it all. It is a credit to the era it was made in. Late 70's and filmography was a burgeoning industry.

 

I'm sure you meant to write special effects (SFX) or visual effects (VFX) as the only CGI visuals in ANH were computer screen readouts.

 

Again, Luke was us at the time. Through Luke we're starting to understand everything. Luke asks about the Force, gets the history of the Jedi, who they were, what happened to them, the Empire etc. Rey may be a tad bit like that but not to that point - a person watching TFA for the first time will be somewhat lost in everything, trust me, I know people like this. That goes for PT as well of course, you really have to watch it in the order of OT, PT, ST

 

Back in 77 I'm sure some fan was thinking "if the Stormtroopers are bad, why do they have white uniforms?"

 

Back then I got the message pretty fast: Princess Leia's defenders were the good guys because we could see their faces, the guys in white were bad because we couldn't see their faces, and were topped by that boss of theirs, the dude in black...

 

Speaking of that dude dressed all in black. Is it true JEJ wanted to be unpromoted and uncredited because he thought IV was gonna flop? I'm sure people was like "boy he sounds familiar" if it's true.

 

I don't know about that since he's also uncredited for ROTS and TESB (I could be wrong about that though). But if it's true, then he must have conversely thought that the Holiday Special would be a huge hit since he's credited for that right in the opening credits.

 

The SWHS was a big "hit" in viewers. Now as far as a hit in taste.......

 

I was 9 years old in 1977 and I never had any problem understanding it. The scene in Obi-Wan Kenobi’s hut does a pretty good job of explaining most of the concepts you mentioned. The Jedi were a noble order of wizard knights that protected the realm until the evil Galactic Empire wiped them out. The Jedi received their power and wisdom from this thing called the Force, which Luke Skywalker begins to study in this film.

The Clone Wars were just a throwaway line of dialogue that added a bit of depth and texture to this universe.

Even all the weird aliens and whatnot were pretty easy to understand. We mostly see them in that now iconic cantina scene, and for the most part, again, it added some depth, color and atmosphere to this universe. Think of it as being the space opera equivalent of Rick’s Café in CASABLANCA, where you see all these refugees from all over Europe (I’d be shocked if Lucas wasn’t at least subconsciously referencing CASABLANCA with this scene, especially with all the clear and obvious parallels between Han Solo, who first appears in this scene, and Rick Blaine).

 

"If you don't get on that spaceship, you'll regret it, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but someday, and for the rest of your life."

"Here's looking at you, Chewie."

Yeah, a SW-Casablanca mashup would be cool.

 

What you have to understand about the average moviegoer who saw SW in 1977 is that they didn't really care about having the force explained, or anything else in detail.

This is why it will always be the highest box office SW movie cause it is probably the 'least SW'sy' if that makes any sense.

Once you get into the mythology of any movie franchise through sequels, some fans tune out. The general audience saw SW in 1977 as a classic good vs evil standalone movie with a beginning, middle and end.

 

Yes. The 1977 Star Wars film is simply a space fantasy. Everything that came after is a movie/book/comic/whatever about Star Wars. As James Maliszewski wrote about the 1977 Star Wars film:

link: http://grognardia.blogspot.com/2010/03/star-wars-is-really-good-movie.html