Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Man in the Funny Hat" data-source="post: 4974933" data-attributes="member: 32740">Okay, I know it's been covered already, but I just had to say... WHAT? Clearly you couldn't have actually been there and, honestly, given the obviously incorrect nature of it I'm at a loss to understand what you mean or how you came to this understanding. While it may not have been lauded as sliced bread by stuck up English professors in Ivory Towers it was an INSTANT, box-office phenomenon with mass appeal and NOT "just some cult flick". My personal experience was that well before it opened I was already pumped to see it just by the TV ads and I was not alone. My parents took me for my 16th birthday June 7th, '77 - lines around the block and all. We couldn't even get into the showing we'd arrived for which was just unheard of. We got tickets then stood waiting in line for two hours while they kept asking, "Are you SURE you want to see it this much?" Of course the week before it opened my desires had already been plainly voiced and my mother only fueled my enthusiasm by showing me a quite lengthy article in, of all sources, Time Magazine about the movie which was titled: Cinema: STAR WARS The Year's Best Movie. Here's a couple sample paragraphs: The film opens in 50 theaters across the country, but advance screenings and word-of-mouth have already given it an outsized reputation among film buffs and science fiction addicts—two groups united usually only by their enthusiasm. The first week in April, indeed, 6,000 color transparencies from the film were stolen from the production offices; they are now selling for more than $5 each to sci-fi freaks. Some of the spaceship models used for special effects were later stolen from a workshop, and they too are being advertised on the open market. "Star Wars is the costume epic of the future," says Ben Bova, editor of Analog, one of the leading science fiction magazines. "It's a galactic Gone With the Wind. It's perfect summer escapist fare."At a special preview in San Francisco early this month, kids screamed in delight at the film's fantastic effects. At the end, while the lengthy credits rolled, the entire audience applauded for two or three minutes. "It was a supermarket audience, ordinary people," says Lucas, who was there and who still wonders at the reaction. "After something like that, you sit there and say, 'Gee, that's what it's all about.' "  That's BEFORE the movie even opened.  The lines to get in did not let up for weeks, months. My friends and I nonetheless returned repeatedly - and waited in line - for what was then very cheap matinee entertainment. While I actually agree with many points in your post this one statement seriously undermines its credibility.</blockquote>

Verification