Do you really like Star Wars?

[WizarDru]

Wait, Monica Bellucci? On Line Two?

Quick, how do I get to Line Two?

Pffft! Like I'd share.


I'm in agreement with you in a lot of places. I enjoy Empire more not just for the dialogue, though, but because we're on a roller-coaster ride that's hitting all the good parts. Star Wars was great for all the reasons you cited (and many folks don't remember or weren't here to know what a craze it actually was...whole families seeing the movie 11 times was noteworthy, but not unknown, for example).

Yes, Lucas cobbled stuff together, but much of modern cinema's technical wizardry is a debt owed to Lucas and ILM. No one...NO ONE had done the f/x they had done. Quick, look at any sci-fi movie prior to 1977. Look, not just as the models, but at the sound effects and visual choices. The sound of the star wars blaster was a revelation...the sound of a light-saber is still unique and distinctive today...tie fighters screaming past evokes a chill. It was astounding. And the visuals? No film had EVER created such believable sets, such varied locales and such detailed settings for a fantasy world. The death star has a stark look that's arresting; Mos Eisley station feels like a backworld; the millenium falcon is both high-tech wonder and African Queen steamer, all at once.

No, I think Star Wars has some slight technical flaws in editing...but it's still a masterwork. If only Lucas had had some success in other ideas, I'd be thrilled. But much like Coppola, he's trapped by his masterwork...unlike Coppola, though, he's swept along by it much more.

It says something about Star Wars that I can still get captivated by it, over 25 years later, whether on TV, video or elsewhere. Few films can make that claim, for me.

 

[Arnwyn]

My favorite is the original trilogy. The new movies pale in comparison, IMO, but I enjoy them well enough, I think.

I have no love for or interest in the 'Expanded Universe'.

 

[Maerdwyn]

I love the first movie for what it was when I was a kid, and that, despite not being a fantastic movie in it's own right, I can still watch it and get all nostalgic and goose bumby, and watch it doing the same thing to my young son.

Empire is great on that level too, though still a bit over my son's head. Better movie.

Return of the Jedi is enjoyable, and still has most of the Star Wars cache for me.

I loved Knights of the Old Republic, and it was more inspiring, and gave me more of that Star Wars feeling than either of the newer movies, which I thought were passable, except for the midichlorians.

I've never read any of the books.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

I love Star Wars. The OT is the best trilogy in the history of movie making by far, and three of my favorite movies of all time. I still get swept up in the majesty of them. When Luke is shooting down the trench in New Hope I am breathless, when Vader & Luke fight in Return Of The Jedi I get chills up and down my spine. It's magic IMO. I think I'll probably wear out my OT DVD set in a year.

I love the prequels as well. Phantom Menace isn't as good as the other flicks, but I enjoy it. The jedi action, and the beginnings of Palpatines rise to power are done very well. The Attack of The Clones is great. Palpy really shines in this flick, as his power grab mimics real life situations quite closely. Obi-Wan is done amazingly well in the first two flicks, I can see this guy turning into the character in the OT. The battles with Darth Tyrannus are excellent and seeing Yoda fight with his saber had me amazed at the theater, the whole place when nuts when he popped his saber and started TCB. I loved it. The acting is pretty much at the level the whole series has been at, not that great but good enough. Teen Anakin is whiney and moans a lot...so do 99% of the teens I know! I thought that was pretty much in character for a teenager, I don't know why it bothers so many other people. Jar-Jar is the only downer in the first two movies for me, but I'm not a kid so I can deal with it.

As for the EU. I liked the first trilogy that Zhan wrote, and Shadows Of The Empire. The NJO is NOT STAR WARS! I read up until Dark Journey and then I couldn't take anymore. The whole SW feel is killed by the Vong. God do I hate the Vong.
I thought KotOR was great and I am eagerly awaiting the sequal to hit PC's so I can reimmerse myself in the SW universe again.

Star Wars...Nothing but Star Wars...

 

[The_Universe]

I love the original trilogy (and the special editions), and the expanded universe (except Dark Horse Comics' Dark Empire I and II and the New Jedi Order, both of which I loathe).

Return of the Jedi is my favorite, ewoks and all (although I prefer the special edition, which ends with a less-ridiculous song).

Epsiodes I and II pretty much suck. I can't even stand to watch all of 2. I have to skip nearly half of it to make it watchable.

 

[Zog]

The original movie remains fantastic. And every time I hear the theme song a massive smile leaps onto my face. I will love Star Wars until the day I die.

I've never understood why so many people prefer the Empire strikes back to return of the Jedi. Jedi is the climax of the entire series and to me will always be the best. Ewoks and all, after all the victory of the Ewoks over the storm troopers is one of the central themes of the series: that force and power and technology will not necessarily always triumph. That there is another way.

Episode two, while visually impressive, suffer mainly from one flaw. It is one known to all good game masters, as something to avoid. They are not hero centric. Think about it. The main characters of the story do not succeed or triumph or even lose in an interesting way. In gaming terms an NPC, first Mace Windu and then Yoda arrived to save them. If I were playing in that game, I'd be annoyed. Episode one is better in this regard, but instead you have the kid save the day. Totally unnecessary. It negates the heroics of the other characters.

And for everyone who rightly so, dislikes the romance in the second film, look on the DVD or borrow it from someone who has it, at the deleted scenes. There are two scenes where Anakin meets Padme's family. They are very well done, and add a lot of character development. Eliminating them was a major mistake.
I do like the story of the second film, and trying to understand all of the machinations that go on behind the scenes. It actually makes the watchers think if they want to understand what is going on. That part was well done.

I've not read any of the books, I prefer a simple "and they lived happily ever after..."

 

[Ranger REG]

Compare that with Kurosawa's endings -- The Seven Samurai with the graves and the singing farmers, The Hidden Fortress with the terror of Tahei and Matsushichi and their subsequent reformation, Yojimbo with the lone samurai still on his way. Kurosawa is superior because he makes grand adventure tales that nevertheless acknowledge the price paid by the heroes. Lucas' growing unwillingness to portray the real cost of the struggle is robbing his films of their power.

Says me.

It's a difference in culture, really.

We Westerners like happy endings. Japan prefer anticlimactic tragic stories, such as "The 47 Ronins."

 

[barsoomcore]

Um, those Kurosawa movies all HAVE happy endings. So no, maybe not so much a culture thing.

 

[Silver Moon]

Well, Star Wars had it's high points -

1. Bea Arthur singing in the Cantina during the Star Wars Christmas Special
2. The multi-part comic book story back in 1977 that had Han Solo leading a team that included a giant green rabbit.
3. The Ewoks movie and animated series
4. George Lucas's refusal to do any metchandising tie-ins to the films
5. And everybody's favorite character, Jar Jar Binks

But then again, it also had its major weaknesses -

1. The mediocre villain Darth Vader who nobody seems to remember
2. The substandard visual special effects, far below 1977 standards
3. A truly forgetable film score, especially the title song
4. A lack of fan following
5. And the predictabilty of the films, especially the Empire Strike Back, that didn't have a single unexpected plot twist.

So all in all I guess we'd have to call it a toss up

 

[ShinHakkaider]

Um, those Kurosawa movies all HAVE happy endings. So no, maybe not so much a culture thing.

The "good guys" win in those movies, but I wouldnt exactly call those endings "happy". The cost of the victory in SEVEN SAMURAI is way high and for what? It was a noble thing for the Samurai to make the sacrifice that they didi to protect the village but the cost was high, more than half of thier original number dead.

Yojimbo definitely wasnt a happy story to being with. I mean anytime you have a film where the main character walks into a town and the first thing that he sees is a dog trotting by with a severed hand in it's mouth, well, it sets a certain tone you know.

But overall I agree with you about Lucas and Star Wars. I was watching the documentary Empire of Dreams and both Harrison Ford and Lawrence Kasdan (writer) thought that there should be a sacrifice and that sacrifice should have been Han Solo. the impression that I got was that if he died that the audience would know that the stakes would be raised and that anyone could go. Also Hans story arc was bascially completed, there was really nowhere else to go with his character, but lucas refused to kill his character because he wanted to show that good always triumphs at the end.

I like movies where the battle is hard fought and the good guys win, but there's a cost. One of the reason the I absolutely love the original DIE HARD is that every encounter that John MClaine has with the "terrorists" cost him something. He gets banged up so that at the end of the movie he's literally the walking wounded, he's been shot, slammed into the side of a building, burnt, pummeled, cut with broken glass, I mean he's a mess and it shows. He feels that pain. The only one of the Star Warrs movies that comes close to this kind of thing is EMPIRE, because the good guys arre on the defensive from the beginning and remain so throughout the entire movie. I mean not for nothing, Luke gets the CRAP beat out of him by Vader in that duel and it's cool because Luke came into that fight thinking that he was actually going to be effective and was simply outclassed.