CT Classic Trilogy Rare and Behind the Scenes pics and footage

Thanks! I had been searching for this particular one for quite some time.

Notice that Luke's landspeeder - supposedly relying on repulsorlifts - even floats above the ground when in its final parking position, IMHO rather indicating that it's partially filled with anti-gravitational Tibanna gas and thus rather behaves like an airship.

 

Grounding it just invites womprats and the like to crawl up in under the hood and chew through the electrics, mess with the cd changer etc.

 

Yep George lucas practically had nothing to do with the success of Star Wars. If it wasn't for the concept artist Ralph McQuarrie, the cinematographer Gilbert Taylor and the new team of editors that he brought on board after the first test screening didn't end up so well Star Wars would've been a complete turd.

 

Not sure if sarcasm.

 

Spoiler

 

Do you think Ralph McQuarrie just came up with those designs in a vacuum? Is George supposed to be his own concept artist in order to get credit for conceiving the world of his films?

This is how it works: He hires Ralph McQuarrie, meets with him, describes what he's looking for, and in Lucas' case, he actually made his own sketches of his imagined world, gives those to McQuarrie, who takes all this and creates a series of paintings to take back to Lucas. These paintings are used to inform the set design and costumes, etc.

Ralph McQuarrie also did much of the concept art for the prequels. It takes many artists to make a movie, but that doesn't take credit away from the one who brings them all together, and feeds them the story and world that they are to create. Nor does giving Lucas credit take away from all the others.

As for the "test screening," he showed some friends/filmmakers a very rough cut of the movie, with no VFX, no score, with clips and music from other films cut into it. He had help editing the film, as all directors do. There wasn't a "new team of editors" that just took the film away and turned it into a masterpiece. He was one of those editors.

The DP shoots the what director asks for. They are in charge of camera crews, lighting, they select which cameras to us, which filters, etc, in accordance with the director.

 

Stand down. This is just an example of how collaborators can have a strong influence on an aspect of the movie over the director's wishes sometimes. Lucas had made two features with a quasi documentary type of photography that he was happy to stick with for Star Wars. Unsurprisingly, Gil Taylor thought a more sophisticated look would enhance the exotic nature of locations and production design.

This has nothing to do with minimising Lucas's input. This is just how it is. Another example being how Lucas, wanting to replace Daniels'sEnglish accent, auditioned exhaustively for 3PO's voice until Mel Blanc convinced him that nothing will fit the character on screen better than what Anthony had already done.

 

I'm curious about how Star Wars would've looked with THX 1338's cinematography.

 

Perhaps you didn't see what I was responding to:

"Yep George lucas practically had nothing to do with the success of Star Wars....If it wasn't for...blah...Star Wars would've been completely turd."

You're right. "minimizing" is not accurate; more like "removing credit entirely."

 

Who is doing that?

 

Just a short stay to say hello (I'm currently writing a very rewarding analysis of the lost scenes of 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY) but googling "Ping-pong table Kubrick" I found this BTS image from ESB and didn't want to miss to post it:

 

What a beautiful shot.

 

Ben Burtt screen-testing the original Boba Fett costume at George Lucas's home for the filmmaker and "The Empire Strikes Back" crew, circa June 1978.

 

His beach towel still has the tag on it.

 

Explains why it never made it past concept stage.

 

Ben Burtt was a stud!