Ark Message from the Maker: Borrowed from our friends across the pond (In more ways than one)

From a newspaper here in Melbourne:

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24101855-2902,00.html

George Lucas is in a galaxy of his own
Claire Sutherland
July 30, 2008 12:00am

"You must be very careful because you will become the very thing you hate.''

So says George Lucas, Star Wars and Indiana Jones creator and independent film producer of almost limitless means.

Lucas' childhood dreams remain unfulfilled, his plans for his future in tatters.

'Two things I hated in school more than anything in the whole world was writing term papers and giving speeches. I hated speech class. Now that's about all I do, is write term papers and give speeches,'' he says.

'My father wanted me to go into business and run his business because he ran a little company that sold office equipment, and I said 'Dad, if there's one thing I know it's I will never, ever run a business'. So I was wrong on all three counts.''

Still, Lucas can't really complain about his wrong turn, leading as it did along a road paved with gold to his own private kingdom.

Forcing himself to write his own scripts for early directorial efforts American Grafitti and Star Wars in the absence of any money to pay a pro to do the job kick-started his career.

A canny decision to include merchandise in his studio deal in an era when that meant nothing more than the sales of a handful of T-shirts paid off handsomely when Star Wars lead to a toy bonanza and allowed Lucas to lay the foundations for his own San Francisco-based production house, Lucasfilm.

Writing and producing the Indiana Jones series kept Lucas' stocks high, seeing him put the finishing touches to his empire, covering film production, special effects, animation and merchandise, set apart from the Hollywood studio system, where Lucas wields total power.

In his book Adventures in the Screen Trade screenwriter William Goldman described Lucas as the only filmmaker for whom rules don't apply.

'I think all artists through all time have struggled to get their vision of things out without it being tampered with and that's what it all comes down to,'' Lucas says.

'I think all people who create stuff bridle under the watchful eye of the overseers, so I managed to get out from under that. I fought for years to get myself away from that.

'In the beginning I was so small and insignificant up here in San Francisco that nobody paid any attention to me. After I did American Grafitti and Star Wars I was so powerful that I was able to finance my own movies and didn't have anybody to tell me.''

Lucas' latest unilateral decision is to release a new, animated, episode of Star Wars, designed to sit between Episode II: Attack of the Clones and Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, and as a launch vehicle for a new animated TV series.

The film is a world away from the kind of computer-generated animation the world has become accustomed to from Pixar (Ratatouille), Dreamworks (Shrek) and Blue Sky (Ice Age).
It uses high-tech devices for a low-tech effect, very much a deliberate policy, Lucas says.

'I really don't like photo realistic 3D animation, it bothers me,'' Lucas says.

'I wanted to have a very different look. When I was growing up there was a very popular kids show on television called Thunderbirds which was done by Gerry Anderson and I always remembered that fondly.

"We did it purposely in that style - as if they were carved wooden characters that have been painted, more like marionettes - so it gives it that philosophy, that look, which I think makes it unique and gives it a personality.

"And you really want the film to have a personality, you don't want it to look like everything else.''

Another inspiration was Asian anime.

'I'm a big fan of Asian culture and I've been a big fan of manga and anime so I wanted to explore that whole part of animation that I've never been able to do,'' Lucas says.

Part of Lucas' reasoning in making the characters so highly-styled was the fact the world has such a clear picture of what Luke, Anakin, Padme and Obi-wan Keno