Theories of Criticism and the Star Wars Saga

You seem not terribly impressed by Eisenstein, and yet his work is ever-present in most works today. I wonder how many of today's directors will be able to boast a similar legacy, 70 years after the end of their professional career. I can't think of any contemporary film maker with as great an impact across time and space and genres off the top of my head, actually...

You?re the first one I?ve seen that makes the claim that Lucas is the first one to use oppositional colours. It might be true, I?ve just never seen that assertion before. Obviously, Lucas had a profound impact on the sci-fi/adventure genre, nobody is disputing that. With regards to the Xs and Ys, that?s your interpretation. It reminds me of one film critic who compared the Red Eye of Sauron in Lord of the Rings with a glowing vagina. Sounds like a Freud Was Right commentary to me.

Similar things could be said for the interpretation of the Star Wars name. Your interpretation could be right, of course, but who?s to say? Also, to claim that it?s ?beyond a brain like Eisenstein?s? is a very bold statement that I would not be able to sustain. Eisenstein operated in a particular context, in a particular age of film making and to make such claims just because Eisenstein never directed a sci-fi movie is disingenuous at best. Personally, I think his legacy speaks very much for itself.

As for the stormtroopers, when we see ANH, they?re patently the bad guy minions. We know nothing about them being clones, which is a complete Retcon fabrication done in the prequels, some 20 years after ANH?s release. In ANH, nothing is said about the nature of the Clone Wars, all we get to know is that Ben, Anakin and Bail Organa used to fight in the conflict. How the Clone Wars might relate to the stormtroopers is not even hinted, so that is pure post hoc rationalization on your part.

 

I'll allow myself a couple of more comments on your analysis, Charles_Grady, as a segdeway to get back to the OPs theme for this thread. First, it strikes me as somewhat odd that you're only using Freudian analysis for one single scene in the movie, when it really can applied to so many more, the most obvious, of course, being the lightsaber (mercilessly exploited by Mel Brooks, of course).

Moreover, it seems that you are using Auteur theory for most of the analysis - i.e. when discussing Lucas' film form, which seems highly reliant on your interpretation of the significance of Lucas' choice to describe his movie like a "clock" (though I found zombie to argue quite convincingly for why you might be overstating the significance of this particular choice of word). I can also add in conjunction to this, that you also assert that there is an underlying story told in the visual, but your expose really never addresses this, we just get a long - though very detailed and astute - accounting for Lucas' film form - his use of geometric shapes to further transitions as the story is told. This enhances the experiences of the story as it unfolds, to be sure, but what the secondary story would consist of is left unsaid in the analysis as it stands.

With regards to the opening (i.e. the name of the film) and the ending, the analysis seems to suddenly jump to Intentional Fallacy (unless you have some undisclosed Lucas source that would guide you with regards to your interpetation here). I find this to be a somewhat inconsistent use of different perspective which probably requires some elaboration to make the connections of the analysis more rigorous.

 

Be that as it may, a quick glance at IMDB show that there are plenty of mistakes in the PT. This makes it hard for me to accept the idea that almost every detail (as you exemplified in the other thread with the example of the silver protocol droid from TPM) is carefully planned and pregnant with meaning when there are continuity issues with several shots throughout the Saga. It doesn't add up.

And this is just the unintentional stuff. What about the disconnect between the look of Yoda in TPM and the rest of the PT? Or the difference in how Palpatine looks in AOTC and ROTS. Or the new behaviour of the battle droids in ROTS compared to TPM or AOTC? Despite the overwhelming creative control in Lucas's hands, he obviously saw things that didn't work and changed them. He is, after all, only human and not a machine. Human error can still creep into modern cinema. Star Wars is no exception.

 

Actually Freud has nothing to do with this, Lucas isn't unconsciously making these symbols operate, he's constructing them and suggesting the Empire has simplified the form unconsciously, and these are Jungian systems of archetypes stemming from pre-socratic identities (simply: the sphere and the vortex are at war, have always been at war). There is no Freudian fear or misidentification of/with sex in here, there is only the fear of destruction BY a sphere. The destruction of the Death Star is seen twice in ANH first in monochrome then in full color (think about why). Converting the last battle into an inverted version of life's biological beginning (into its end and at that massive scale as opposed to the miniscule scale of a gamete) is not Freudian at all, in fact it defies Freud, the OBJECT (death star) operates like a massive mandala warning viewers not to crave this simplification of control/biology/destruction.

I met Howard Kazanjian at a dinner party once in Sonoma and he told me the clones were once on the Jedi's side. This was in 1993 or 4. Do any Imperial officers wear white?

As for Eisenstein, his importance wanes as form/symbol/sign interplay/complexities take over from pure aesthetics. Do you not know what expressionism is?

Again, I am probably aiming way above your head, you see plot in surface layers, I see it at various scales (you do not mention the scale mirroring, so I presume you do not understand what Lucas is getting at).

You, like Zombie and Kieran in the other thread are operating purely on 20th century film logic modalities with isolated awareness (Eisenstein, not Sjostrom, Griffith et al). You're not really seeing why Lucas integrates at all levels commentary and philosophical paradoxes regarding biology (the grand first statement is of course, The Death Star). Others include the fatherless Anakin, there are MANY others.

This is not a simplified Auteur discussion, Lucas doesn't need to direct the film himself to achieve even BETTER results with an audience (EMPIRE is like a proof that the Auteur Theory is totally false, ooops you fell into that trap). We are going WAY beyond that. Star Wars is an advancement of film into a post-structural realm, if you do not comprehend this, no worries, just don't nit pick with the things you think you under

 

Post-Hoc divergence:

As for the origins of the name Star Wars, did you read it carefully? the glyph itself was invented in the late Classic Maya period (600AD). These "Morning Star War" glyphs were only discovered at Seibal, Naranjo, and Tikal (by archeologists throughout the mid-20th century and there are 30 or so Mayan cities excavated, all possible filming locales, Michael Coe identified this glyph sometime in the 60's). This I can confirm. So the choice of city seems more than coincidental, he chose one of three places ON EARTH that invented this type of astronomical warfare to film at, themselves among thirty Mayan cities that were potential shoot sites. Also the Destroyer's pyramidal design certainly appears culled from these temples specifically. Whether or not Lucas was aware of this glyph's naming is uncertain, but the coincidence would be extraordinary.

It would like me inventing a blood sucking fantasy creature that floats through the galaxy and then shooting his secret lair-planet in Transylvania at one of three castles said to been affect by a Dracula. And then being told there was a long forgotten myth about a blood sucking creature that was origined there. Get it?

Danaan, the contrarian aspects of your posts are boring, you, like Keiran and Zombie, seem to want to relate to Star Wars as a simplified 'myth' which it is not. You seem more willing to challenge than to explore.

 

While this type of analysis can be fascinating and creative, and, as a believer in intentional fallicy such interpretations are as valid to me as any others, I find it a little hard to ascribe this kind of research of cultures and places to a director like Lucas, whose expertiece is really on the technical side of film making and whose understanding of said cultures and beliefs are really derived from popular sources like Campbell rather than rigourous scholarly pursuits. Afterall, let's not forget that his film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade featured catacombs under Venice! Anyone with even the most superficial knowledge of Venice knows that this is a physical impossibility, as Venice is a "floating city" built on mud-flats and sunken wood pilings. This in no way detracts from the film, as it was a fun adventure story. However, it does show that historical research was not a high priority.

Anyway, reading your blog was fun. It is clearly written and intelligent, much in the vein of a Michel Foucault kind of fictive historical narrative like Discipline and Punish. Cool stuff, even if written with a tounge firmly held in cheek.

 

Check out, in as much detail as possible, the close-up shot of the screen (hint, hint) showing Nute Gunray at the beginning of The Phantom Menace and the display "errors" his message contains. Frame-by-frame.

All the things that people think are mistakes in these movies are not mistakes at all.

Things change for reasons other than "they didn't work."

 

Could you be more obfuscating? No, I'm not going to fire up the VCR just to see some little detail that might possibly support your stance. If you've got something, present it.

And yes, in the case of TPM Yoda, it is going to be changed because it didn't work. There's already footage of a CGI Yoda replacing the muppet.

But I see no point in going on seeing as you think that there are no such things as mistakes when it comes to making movies which means that this discussion will ultimately go nowhere

 

Lots of different thoughts to cover here.

It could very well be a Jungian symbol as well, but you?re surely aware that Jungian archetypes and symbols are exploited by film-makers quite frequently precisely because they are powerful devices for storytelling, so this is still not in any way indicative of Lucas? alleged uniqueness or genius. But that wasn?t my point. My point is that you seemed be using one analytic framework for most of the movie, but on two particular points you seem to switch. This creates a less than consistent analysis, which comes across as less rigorous than it could have been. So, as for the film form, you seem very much to be basing your analysis on some Lucas quotes (and doing so is quite in accordance with Auteur theory, if I understand it correctly). But for those two points, your analysis comes across as based on...your own assertions, it seems. My question would be ? should we only take your word for it. The Mayan glyph, for instance, is at best circumstantial, particularly when other parts of the analysis seem based on interpretations of what Lucas actually have said.

It might be entirely true that the Stormtroopers were always meant to be Clones, but how is the audience to know this if it is never hinted at in the movie. And what good is a symbol if there isn?t a single clue to unravelling it in the work itself?

I?m quite acquainted with what expressionism is, just as I?m familiar with the schools of thought known as surrealism, modernism and post-modernism. I will reiterate that I am a layman when it comes to the study of film, and couldn?t off the top of my head make any good accounting for the historical development of film art when it comes to how these streams of thought were manifested in film art, as such.

I see scale mirroring as another way of using Eisenstein?s film form techniques, which, again, is not something that is unique for Lucas. More importantly, though, I don?t understand what you are getting at, and why I should consider your interpretation of Lucas? work as more valid than anyone else?s.

This is a very interesting claim to make. I can?t say that I?ve ever seen anyone else classify Star W

 

How is sharing a detail an act of obfuscation? If you aren't willing to check it out for yourself, then why bother responding at all?

How did puppet Yoda in The Phantom Menace "not work?" If by "work" you mean "function so as to make a majority of people like it," then you're slapping heteronomous laws onto the movie that the movie itself doesn't recognize.

I never said "There are no mistakes in movies." I said "All the things that people think are mistakes in these movies are not mistakes at all." If you check out the shot I suggested, you might see why I'd make such a claim.

 

Of course Lucas is well versed very beyond Campbell, a scholar-archeologist I met at a conference was interviewed for the Young Indiana Jones DVD and found Lucas well versed in multiple ancient cultures, critically native and mesoamerican (the interviwee's specialty). You act as if this is like a passing fancy of his, knowing adroitly what myths represent and how they interact with the unconscious is a primal source for filmmaking in general, with Lucas this is even more critical: Star Wars characters are named after diverse but specific humans and mythic beings (go look up Ahsoka and realize who she really is). Their usage is specific and designed for profundity, not random or sloppy. Directors are notoriously obsessive researchers (go watch Intolerance). I was as an assistant for a director of a massive serial killer film and my first role was to research the psychology and the incarceration of people ruled criminally insane. I bought over 200 books, spent hundreds of hours interviewing police, FBI, mental institutional directors, took (maybe) 900 pictures (not digital). Directors always want to know the real before they know the falsity they're inventing, you simply have no idea what you're talking about, your naivete is strange. No doubt liberties are taken (are there really giant spheres that kill poachers in tombs?) but that is the genius of film, it condenses liberties and exacting rituals and creates new merges, and does not indicate research was not a priority: sometimes you have to know what's real to make a fiction. In terms of Venice, while catacombs may not have been possible, the entire city's population was buried either in churches under city street pavement. Have you been to Venice? You enter certain buildings two levels above water and certain buildings have muddy, stone faced basement like underways. Like any house on stilts.

"The existing tradition had been to bury the dead in the churches or below city paving stones, which was less than sanitary by the standards of most cities of the era, and most definitely a problem in a city which floods several times annually. In their defence, victims of Venice's many plagues were deposited on remote islands, often before they had actually expired."

You give Lucas so little credit for his mythological complexities.

 

You guys are tickling parts of my brain that have yet to develop.

 

Sad to say, I can barely feel the tickle. Didn't read much as a child.

I was too busy watching Star Wars.

 

It's not a detail, it's a hint. And if I must find it through frame-by-frame analysis, a small one at that. And where I come from, when questioned in a debate, you present evidence. You don't tell people to go look for themselves.

I'm not taking about any laws that the movie recognises, I'm talking about changes in authorial intent. The sign that muppet Yoda didn't work is that it was replaced in subsequent movies by CGI and that it will be replaced in TPM by CGI. It's not about the movie but about movie-making and how things don't always go as planned

 

I am new to this site and to Star Wars/blockbuster film boards in general. I sent these two threads from the past three days to friends/colleagues and they all read this line back to me (in particular), something I had glossed over.

This quote is a symptom of the strange manner of certain users in here. This quote is like being on a Poe site and saying the technique of Poe's writing is not extraordinary, or to be on a site that dealt with Rembrandt and claim that his painting methods were not extraordinary. A director invents a new genre with new type of optics, a never before seen integration between miniatures, animation and live action and Danaan feels fit to render his technique mundane. If he claims I quoted him out of context, read it above in full, it's even weirder there.

If there's nothing extraordinary with Lucas' work, then what are you doing here? How can you possibly take an opposing stand on anything when you are perched here already dismissive of the board's creative origins. The absurdity of this IS extraordinary. Danaan, what are you doing here?

 

Excellent question, and since you ask me directly, I'll be happy to answer it (others, at least those I have debated with extensively previously, should know the answer, since I have at least alluded to it before).

It's simple. The Star Wars OT is one of my favourite movies serials of all time. I grew up with it, it was a very formative part of my childhood. Make no mistake, among sci-fi/adventure movies, I consider them some of the best. And I will concede your point, Lucas probably did invent the Space Opera genre with ANH, and in that respect it is certainly regarded as a modern classic.

But when compared to other classics and across genres, the movies aren't as impressive as all that. In other words, I differentiate between movies that I like, and what movies I consider to be of high quality. A movie can be of excellent workmanship and very high quality but be a complete bore (this was my first impression of The Bicycle Thief, though to be fair I was very young when I saw it and might make a quite different assesment of it today). Or I might have a great deal of fun and enjoyment from a movie and yet find qualitative flaws with it. Thus, for me fun&enjoyment=/=qualitative. This is partly because as I've grown older, I've read up more and more on films and discovered things about them I didn't know before, which has caused me to reassess my old impressions and opinions.

In short, I'm a Star Wars fan, for sure. I love the OT to bits. I'm just not particularly religious about it. I might be unique in this, but I really don't think I am...

 

Ten_Mills, yodas_waiter is right.

You have information that you say backs up one of your assertions. Yet you withhold it.

I don't see why a person who claims to want to have civilized debate with others would do something like this.

You can easily just describe the scene (or the parts of the scene) in question to him.

 

The problem is that you're saying you're like most people: you want everything offered on a plate; and if it's not, you not only don't bother to follow a lead through with your own research/investigation/powers of discovery, but you attack the idea and dismiss the art, too. This is a constant problem on the Internet, and one that pervades human experience. What a person doesn't understand, they attack; and what they attack, they make no effort to understand. Very sad.

 

In this case you stand under the umbrella of not wanting your cake but eating it too. Anyone like you one crafting alternate scripts and novels to a new genre is without question a religious fan. Religion doesn't even require expertise, merely a faith in a cause or a story, which you clearly reflect. You may appreciate 'film' as an artform, but the attention you give the SW culture is vast, like a religion. You're simply pretending to live as two identities to take any position you want. Nothing could be more disingenuous that your dual frame of mind(s). That you're an academic is totally frightening, but since you do deal with the art of lying (political-science) strikes me as a perfect match, you act like the politician that bends every argument with false candor and glad-facing.

I did not expect this illusory quality to discussion here. It is very perverse that you communicate on boards like this, your role is more akin to a pundit that enforces playa-hate.

 

I'm sorry, I don't agree with this sentiment. My post is directed very specifically at the act of withholding information during a debate/discussion. I don't see the point of doing that if a free and worthwhile exchange of ideas is the goal of all concerned, and I don't think the disapproval of withholding information at all indicates the need for everything to be offered on a plate. IMO the two concepts are unrelated (at least in my case, I can't speak for anyone but myself obviously).

 

Ok, now it's starting to get personal, and nasty at that. I'd advise you to lay off the ad hominem attacks immediately, since, FYI, such posting is generally not allowed in this forum, for the sake of the civility of the forum.

Now, is it possible that I'm not consistent with how I judge and evaluate movies? Heck, yes. I'm perfectly aware of this. This is nothing terribly strange, either. I've stated, several times even, that I am but a layman. I haven't taken a single course of film studies and am woefully (to my own mind) unfamiliar with common operative terms or the analytical frameworks of that field of study. However, all that is required for me to be content is that I feel that I have a certain degree of consistency, and I do feel that, because I do this for a hobby. For anyone else, what I say with regards to the art of film is just the opinions of another layman, and I have never, ever made the pretence that it should be taken as anything else. And this might be a surprise to you, but these forums are for just that: hobby enthusiasts to share opinions with each other. If only professionals where allowed to post, the crowd would be much smaller indeed.

In my profession, on the other hand, I am highly familiar with common operative terms and analytical frameworks and held to constant scrutiny by my peers to boot. To imply that I would make lying my profession is a direct insult.

Moreover, to demand professional rigour on part of what I do as a hobby is absolutely disingenuous (and for some strange reason you only make such demands from me ? which shows a persistent lack of consistency on the part of your arguments).

Finally, you have quite different ambitions, it seems. You want to publish a book, relying on a body of research, to prove that Lucas took the first step on the road to a whole new paradigm of storytelling. That?s a quite advanced undertaking, which doesn?t mean that it can?t be done, it just means that you will be, and should be, held to a different level of scrutiny that a layman making posts in a hobby forum. Yet, in the text on your website, there is not a single source reference listed, not even for the quotes (which means that I can?t go a check if you have misrepresented Lucas? quotes). Nor have you at any point defined any of your operative terms. In one parenthesis, for instance, you make the assertion that one of Lucas? quotes ?hints to biogen structuralism?, but nowhere is this term defined, nor do you provide any justification for why this assertion should be accepted. You also claim (in this thread) that mirroring techniques are vastly different from Eisenstein montage, but have nowhere provided and comprehensive and understandable (for a layman) definition of what "mirroring" is, so again, I am expected to only take your word for it. My not doing so is not an example of being close minded at all, which this video explains very eloquently.

Edit: And your edit of your own post made it even more inflammatory and insulting...

 

You don't get it, I'm the layman here (25 posts) and you're the religious subscriber (hundreds of posts) yet you pretend to be the hobbyist with the knowledge. I am not Lucas scholar, I am a cultural responder, I make media (for Warner Bros, Dreamworks and Viacom) a complex magazine, and a

 

I don't understand why people would be offended by the kind of observations Charles_Grady has made here.

He has a point.

As far as the things he's saying about the underlying story being told through visuals and music alone, I find it to be fascinating.

I would expect others here to revel in his fresh observations, and at the very least would expect it to spark off some kind of effort on everyone's part to understand the things he's talking about.

I read portions of that writeup about the shining and have to say I'm blown away by those observations.

I look forward to buying his book about Star Wars.

At some point this weekend, I hope to sit down to The Phantom Menace without sound.

What would be truly extraordinary (I hope this happens in a future release of the saga on home video) would be the option to watch the saga with just John William's music playing sans dialogue.