Why did Lucas not film Star Wars like LOTR

Why did he not just make them all at the same time like they did with LOTR.

LOTR took like 5 years. When Star Wars is going to be like 9.

 

Because George is crazy.

 

Because Lucas wanted the characters to age some, as there were multiple years between each chapter of the saga. Also, he probably wanted to keep the releases three years apart, similar to how the classic trilogy was released.

 

That's a good question. My guess is that it's more profitable for SW if there's a 3 year gap between films, as opposed to the 1 year gap between the LOTR films.

As it is now, the prequels span 1999-2005. This means 6 years of fans being interested, buying stuff, debating, keeping SW alive and going. If the thing lasted 1999-2002, it would eventually die down too quickly. I doubt a lot of people would care for SW if new films weren't expected.

 

He's never filmed any of the SW movies back-to-back. Why should he? And you're neglecting the fact that he has to write the story. Jackson had the story laid out for him already.

 

Yes, the minor detail that Jackson already had his subject story completely written out decades before he started filming kinda helped him out time-wise.

 

But i thought Lucas had the whole saga written out years ago?

 

Ha, no way.
Probably the central idea for each part, but not the whole thing, no way. He's making 90% of it up as he goes along.

Another point from this - Jackson and New Line were taking a big risk filming the entire LOTR trilogy at the same time. If FOTR had bombed, they would've been staring at a huge deficit when all was said and done. The gamble worked brilliantly, but that's the reason why no-one else tried it beforehand.

 

The actors probably like being able to do other films. And people age in this story.

 

We should not question the way of the master.

 

Laziness? Or maybe he just wanted some time off after his first 3 films.

 

I think he's always had an outline for the entire saga. He just decided to take his time with it. It's a big jump from outline to story, to script, to movie.

 

If you listen to the commentaries on the LOTR FOTR DVD, many of the people involved all say DON'T MAKE three films back to back!!! It was incredibly difficult and for Star Wars, completely unnecessary.

But seriously... from a money standpoint, look at Harry Potter... the first film made $317 million in the US. The second will be lucky to make $270. There's a significant drop there... with the exception of LOTR, it is usually a bad idea to release sequels so close together.

 

But seriously... from a money standpoint, look at Harry Potter... the first film made $317 million in the US. The second will be lucky to make $270. There's a significant drop there... with the exception of LOTR, it is usually a bad idea to release sequels so close together.

As opposed to the significant drop of 130 million of AOTC compared to TPM? Sounds like back to back sequels are better off.

 

I think filming the prequels one at a time gives Lucas the advantage of being able to react to audience feedback for every film. Had he filmed all three at once then we might have put JarJar into a starring role in all three films.He would have also used the Yoda puppet in every film (he more or less admits on the DVD that audience reaction to the TPM puppet was one of the reasons why he made the AOTC Yoda purely digital)

 

As opposed to the significant drop of 130 million of AOTC compared to TPM? Sounds like back to back sequels are better off.

Tsk tsk box office man... your nick implies more awareness of how these things work. We all know that TPM made so much because of 16 YEARS of anticipation and hype. Most people here feel that AOTC is the better film, as do many people who don't live eat sleep and breathe Star Wars like we do. Yet it made less money. Simply being a sequel has little to do with it...

 

Well said,strilo.It seems that some fans consider AOTC's boxoffice as "a significant drop" just because TPM made so much.

Maybe TTT will surpass FOTR,but try to remember,FOTR only made 313+,so it is comparative easy to overtake it.What about a "430 million+ FOTR"?I believe it's impossible for TTT to surpass it.Does it make TTT's boxoffice a failure?I don't think so.

BTW,boxoffice means very little to me.Spider Man is the winner of 2002,but it's one of the most overrated movies I've ever seen.

 

He's never filmed any of the SW movies back-to-back. Why should he? And you're neglecting the fact that he has to write the story. Jackson had the story laid out for him already.

Exactly.

 

Just because the story existed beforehand doesn't mean there's no scripting involved. The LOTR script went through hundreds of rewrites and many years of work. Do you really think it's that easy to make a film based on a book?

I wish people would stop dissing Jackson for "not coming up with his own story". Hitchcock and Kubrick, two of the greatest directors of all time never ever made a film based on their own stories. And guess what? It doesn't matter. The role of a director is NOT to write a story, that's the role of a WRITER.
And second - what counts is the final product shown on screen. Whether the author of a story is called Lucas, Jackson, Tolkien or Sidney Appletree Jr. makes no difference to the quality (or non-quality) of a film.

There's a school of thought that argues that Shakespeare's plays were not in fact written by Shakespeare but by somebody else, possibly Christopher Marlowe. But whether that's true or not doesn't change anything about the quality of the plays, just like the fact that Jackson didn't write LOTR doesn't change the quality of the films.

 

Which is why Lucas deserves respect, as both the director and WRITER of a multi-billion dollar franchise.

I don't think Jackson's work should be denegrated, but neither should Lucas' efforts.

 

Characters aging is a bad excuse. First of all, we have Anakin, who is played by a different person in 2 than he is in 1 anyway. Then the other main characters, like Padme and Obi-Wan are supposed to have aged 10 years, but they've only aged 3, so you have to suspend your disbelief for their aging anyway. And since 3 is two years after 2, then you could easily get away with the actors not aging at all because most people(with the exception of young children) don't age much at all in 2 years.

 

Oh, BTW, Hitchcock did make a few films based on his own stories. His 1932 film 'Rich and Strange' was one example. And usually, he would take one idea he liked in a book and throw the rest out. Even the title was usually changed.

 

(1) The actors need time to age. The PT takes place over many years, while LOTR takes place relatively in the same time period for each movie.

(2) The actors of LOTR seem to have put off doing any other projects once they started filming LOTR. I haven't seen many films with many of the actors from LOTR since the films have been released. With SW, some of the actors like Ewan McGregor and Sam Jackson are quite busy with other projects.

(3) Lucas has said he doesn't like to overwork. He likes to spend as much time with his family as he can, and doesn't want to overwork his actors. Besides that, Lucas is getting older. I doubt he has the energy to spend five or six years working constantly on SW.