Fair enough. Sorry if that sounded brash, I was actually drunk when I posted that I'm interested in why you say it is the least Star Warsy. The mood of it? IMO you learn more about the force than in any other installment. It's good to see the training that to be honest was lacking in the prequels. When I look at Luke's demeanour in Return of the Jedi I instantly think... "that's because of his experience in Empire Strikes Back". Empire gets the most inside Luke's head, one of my favourite things about Star Wars is Luke's progression over the OT, and Empire Strikes Back is a big reason for that.
Really? That didn't show I didn't take offense, so I hope you don't think I did. While I've never felt that the PT needed to show more training, I certainly agree with you about the connection between TESB and ROTJ and the former's importance to Luke's growth. What I mean with "least Star Warsy" is that its style differs somewhat from the overall style of the series. It's a bit more mature in the way things are portrayed and it all has to do with Irvin Kershner, I believe. He really wanted to take Star Wars to the next level and since the story went to more serious places, he wanted the tone of the film to reflect that. Even the humor. He said that he wanted to include humor, but without gags. As it turned out later on, the whole saga is riddled with gags. That's Lucas's style. TESB, however, keeps it more low key and not so much in-your-face. On the audio commentary, Kersh also notes that there's nothing more interesting than the landscape of the human face. I think that's a key to understanding the difference between the styles of him and Lucas. Kershner's focus lies on people. Acting is pushed to the forefront (That's also the case with Marquand, but GL took charge of ROTJ to a higher degree). Lucas, on the other hand, focuses on visual storytelling. It's not so much about dialogue and interaction between people as it is about creating a certain mood and getting a certain point across by use of images. That said, I do think that Lucas has proven himself quite adept at directing people - American Graffiti, THX 1138, ANH and ROTS spring to mind as his finest works in that regard. TESB - it's a people's film /LM
^^ That's a pretty good description of why the ESB is so popular and so highly regarded by the vast majority of film critics and the fanbase. I'd also say that ESB isn't less Star Warsy than what came after it; what came after it is less Star Warsy than the ESB.
Thanks I guess that depends on your point of view. The way I see it, GL established a certain style with ANH that Kershner deviated slightly from - by developing it - and that the subsequent episodes returned to. TESB has its own way of being Star Warsy. This is not meant as criticism towards TESB, BTW, in case someone wonders. I think that film did everything right. Kershner knew what he was doing /LM
I don't know about that last one. Natalie Portman was horrible in my opinion. Samuel L. Jackson sucked. Hayden was ok. Ewan McGregor was good. And Ian McDiarmad seems he did it all himself. I wouldn't say that Lucas did anything special in terms of directing people in the last movie of the PT. Great insight on what distinguishes the two directors though.
With the way he said it it sounds like a dry joke to me. Right, this one dude is the reason everyone thinks it's great. Edit: He also wanted Kershner back for ROTJ, didn't he?
Also, just to note, but every other blog or forum I read this in referenced the above article. The original story comes from this guy: http://moviecitynews.com/2007/02/oh-yeah/ That's David Poland's blog, but I wasn't able to find anyone else who commented on this, or could confirm the story. No news outlets did, since I checked Google archives, so one essentially has to take Poland at his word. And if you really want to be technical about it, "George Lucas" never said that --"Geirge Lucas" did, and the line was completely removed from context. So...yeah. I'll give Lucas the benefit of the doubt -- it sounds like he was trying to make a joke that would make Sid Ganis look better.
Of course he was joking, but it's obviously a too sophisticated kind of humour for haters. That's why Lucas created Jar Jar. Jar Jar makes idiots feel soooooo intelligent. Unfortunately, the idiots subsequent behaviours proves the opposite and their "intelligence" is just an illusion. But that's off topic. I like TESB.
G. Walton is still hating on Irv, a quarter-century later. Let the man & his brilliance RIP. If bored, then go count the billions Irv made for you by making Vader a badass instead of a lackey. Just saying.
I have no problem with Irvin Kershner, but I also have no problem with the idea that maybe Vader was never intended to be a "badass.". In fact, with so many other cool badass characters in Star Wars, I don't understand why attaching that label to Vader is so important to a segment of the fandom. And who gets to define what "Star Wars-y" is, if not the man who created Star Wars from the outset?
If you want to know why it is important for Vader to be a badass, just look at him and listen to his voice. And there's no other character in Star Wars nearly as badass as Vader. The only other remotely "badass" characters I can think of in the entire saga are Maul, Mace, Han and Chewie. I also think it's pretty clear Vader was always supposed to be a badass, considering the first we see of him he's stepping over dead bodies and then he lifts a dude over his head with one arm and strangles him to death. Vader sounds more pissed off on the Tantive IV than he does at any other point in the saga. If this is a consular ship where is the Ambassador? Commander, tear this ship apart until you've found those plans and bring me the Ambassador. I want her alive! Later in ANH he strangles a guy for his "lack of faith". The assault on the Death Star was doing just fine until Vader started shooting down Rebels. As for being on Tarkin's leash, Vader could have killed him at any time and there's nothing Tarkin or anyone on the Death Star could have done about it.
I could not stand Vader in ANH or most of ESB. That said, we may be using different definitions of "badass." To me there's nothing badass about torturing innocent people to death because they weren't forthcoming with information, or because they got outwitted by a smuggler in a Corellian freighter and had the nerve to apologize for it. The part about his being on Tarkin's leash, never really mattered one way or another to me. He could have been at Tarkin's mercy or not, I didn't care that much. I have to enjoy watching a character in order to label that character a "badass," much less a "cool badass", therefore I rarely apply the term to villains. Someone is welcome to pull out dictionary.com to prove me wrong but I think the definition is pretty subjective anyway. James Earl Jones' voice is winning though.
It's interesting, but I've long nursed a pet theory that the decline in Vader's "badassitude" was actually planted in ESB. In particular, it's really to do with everyone's favorite line -- "I am your father." With that line, Lucas essentially altered Vader's purpose in the story. No longer was Luke out to defeat him, instead, he was attempting to save him. Now, one can argue that Lucas could have gone ahead and kept Vader as an antagonist to be killed, but I think he would have found it difficult to reconcile with the story he was trying to tell. For one thing, the OT seems largely (to me) to be a hopeful tale of good triumphing over evil. I think have Luke kill his father might have disrupted that notion, just a tad. There's also the fact that Star Wars has always been largely child-friendly or, at the very least, they are family movies (where parents can explain the more obscure aspects of the films to their kids -- such as what the cave scene meant or how Luke can be a good person even if his father is evil). While kids could accept that Vader is Luke's father, I think it would have been difficult to give them an acceptable story of patricide, especially with the emphasis placed on Luke's admiration/hero-worship of his father. It seems to me that, with the decision to make Vader Luke's father, Lucas also automatically intertwined the idea that Luke would save him from the dark side as well. Here's where Vader's "badass" nature takes a hit then -- to make Vader's redemption seem plausible, Lucas introduces the element of regret and also, the idea that Vader is, in some ways, pathetic and weak. Take ROTJ, for example, where he's bound by Palpatine's will. He has to balance Vader's former presentation as an unstoppable badass with Vader's vulnerabilities -- what made him turn to the dark side and what could bring him back. So one could say that Vader was intended to be a badass in ANH and ESB, but, as of the "I am your father" line (in my opinion) his role was irrevocably changed. And we see this play out slightly in ESB as well, when he spares Admiral Piett's life despite the Falcon's escape. This then extends into ROTJ and, from there, the prequels. Just my take on the matter, though.
It's "bring me the passengers, I want them alive!" It appears the way you wrote it in some versions of the script, but not in the movie. But I agree with your points.
Yeah, I'm guessing they must have changed it pretty last minute... maybe the final version of the script said it the ambassador way and it got changed when JEJ did the voiceover? I think they may have realized that "bring me the ambassador, I want her alive!" didn't totally make sense right after Vader seemed to imply that he doubted whether there was even an amassador onboard ("If this is a consular ship, where is the ambassador?"). So it got changed to the somewhat more generic "bring me the passengers, I want them alive!"
When I was younger and before the prequels came out Empire Strikes Back was my least favorite movie. I watched A New Hope and Return of the Jedi so many times but not Empire. I just couldn't stand the dark tone of the movie. Now that I'm older I appreciate Empire a lot more and it is my favorite of all six movies
