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You seriously didn't think the trailer look exciting? And you were already excited about it before the trailer?
And I wasn't just talking about Kurosawa, since you claim he had practically nothing to do with the ideas or actual writing of the movie. Why is everyone who actually did create the movies letting him take credit for everything?
posted
Uh, Kurosawa's works had a lot of influence on the ideas, and I never claimed otherwise.
As for other people, you might take a look at the screenwriting credits for ESB and ROTJ (comparatively, Lucas is the sole screenwriter for episodes 1 and 3, and had only one, partial helper with the screenplay on episode 2):
Much more than Lucas had input. The only one of the first three with a sole screenwriter credit for Lucas is the original Star Wars, and let me tell you about some scenes from The Hidden Fortress.
There's the "Survivors of the battle" scene, where our two intrepid heros, one a dry wit and the other a bit clueless, having managed to escape the enemy's notice, wander around a desert. They even have a quarrel which involves them splitting up, briefly.
Or then there's where they learn there's a princess in a hidden fortress, and decide to go get her.
Or there's where the princess has a warrior-mentor and protector, who is stoic but wise, liked even as one of the pair distrusts him (depending on scene we see more of R2D2 and C3PO in the pair, or Han and Luke).
Or there's where the wise warrior-mentor has to confront his former student so the others can escape.
Et cetera, et cetera. Its not identical, but it darn sure was the source of a lot of the scenes and ideas.
Also, I think you may be misunderstanding. I'm not claiming Lucas did something bad, I'm saying he did something good, and that if he had gone about making the latest movies in the same way they'd have been a heck of a lot better.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
So I've been doing a little research between my fanatical posts.
And yes, you are right about, eh, 90% of what you've said. I think it's unfair to claim Kurosawa was magical when he borrowed rather heavily from American Westerns and other people himself.
But I do agree that Lucas borrowed from him, as well as Flash Gordan and Joseph Campbell. And he did include elements of these inspirations in his prequels as well.
I don't think it's fair to claim the movies he had less involvement in were better. I actually thought ESB was the worst of the three original films. But he had control of the overall storyarch, and controlled the plot and other things, though no he didn't always write the entire script himself. He has always maintained tight control on the storyline, especially afterwards with the EU and games.
Sorry for being so blindly rabid.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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Kershner was on the set of the principal filming of AotC and RotS to give advice and comparison between the original movies and the prequels.
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Oh, I think he certainly did have a lot of control; as he said, these were good things he was doing.
However, he really is a pretty mediocre detail writer. I mean, c'mon: midichlorians, horrible love scenes, really young yet somehow elected queens, all the details of the "trade dispute", almost all the humor with the battle droids, Jar-jar, et cetera.
The overall story's not bad at all (though I think he could have tightened it up some, too) in Episodes 1 and 2, but the writing and a lot of the finer pacing left a lot to be desired.
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posted
And coincidentally, the battle scenes in AoTC are much better than those in TPM, and RoTS looks to be so as well. The battle scenes in ESB were some of the best, too.
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That's really more of a subjective issue don't you think? I felt it was well written (except Jar-Jar), and well acted. Midichlorians didn't bother me at all, neither did the love story, except I wondered a bit at why she ever fell for him in the first place.
My only worry for storyline in the third film is how he will link up all the details of the plots from Episodes I - VI and make it a flowing arc with no disagreements in plot.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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I agree AotC had far better battle scenes. My favorite from the original series is still RotJ, I loved the lightsaber duel from that film the most. Lightsabers were always my favorite detail of the Star Wars universe.
I think RotS will put them all to shame though, if the trailer is but a piece of what's in store.
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The official trailer hit Starwars.com yesterday. Very nice quality, takes a few minutes to download, but worth it.
Posts: 1294 | Registered: Oct 2003
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Here's the thing. In his original negative review of "Attack Of The Clones" Ebert noted how murky and indistinct a film shot fully with digital cameras appeared when transferred onto film. I saw the trailer in my school computer lab before seeing it again later in the day on the big screen, and man oh man is the difference apparent. On the computer screen the trailer appeared bright and sharp--on the big screen it seemed needlessly dark and, as said before, murky. Oddly enough Lucas was bragging about the superiority of digital cameras on 60 Minutes recently. oh, digital cameras! How advanced!!!
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"I actually thought ESB was the worst of the three original films."
*blink* Okay, clearly you come from Bizarro World.
Me love and respect your opinion. Me think you have excellent taste. Me going to be last in line for new Lucas movie, because it will be that good.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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It's true about the digital projectors; digital film looks best on a digital projector, hands down. I admire Lucas' desire to push the envelope--I'd rather he didn't use the Star Wars series as a guinea pig to test it on, but that's just me.
Digital hasn't reached the depth and saturation of 35mm. Take any frame of ESB and match it to a frame from AOTC and you'll see one big difference: one has the density of live objects sharing a common space, the other looks like flat CGI. But it's not the medium that really matters. It's the story. One of the best films of the last few years, The Incredibles, is great because it's excellent storytelling. The DVD is top notch!
I do think these prequels with see greater appreciation over time. The biggest problem with them is writing--Lucas breaks every basic screenwriter rule in TPM. I wish, I wish, I wish Lawrence Kasdan had agreed to write them...
(And like a complete fool, I'll be in line yet AGAIN for Episode III and probably let-down AGAIN and still go back and see it AGAIN. I'm starting to act like Comic Book Guy.)
Posts: 325 | Registered: Dec 2004
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Lucas undoubtedly knows his writing abilities are limited--that he persisted in writing the prequels is merely a matter of him egotistical and clingy. They're his babies and he won't let go. Even a generally good director (in my opinion, anyway) like Spielberg relies on screenwriters. Lucas though simply had to insist on doing most of the writing on these prequels...no wonder they're lacking completely and utterly in that regard. Smart directors know not to write beyond their abilities--Lucas did this and failed miserably in the first two prequels. Can you imagine all the money Lucas was putting up for the Star Wars prequels matched with an excellent writer at the helm?!? Hell, we would've forgot about the earlier Star Wars films!!
Posts: 722 | Registered: Jul 2004
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I saw both the new star wars films in a digital projection theater, and thought the clarity was amazing.
AOTC on IMAX was fun too, but the scene where Anakin fights Dooku in the dark with the lightsabers almost gave me a seizure. At the very least it certainly hurt my eyes.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
He has a fight scene with Anakin, he has to at least be in a good 10-15 minutes of the movie.
That's not that much less than the last movie, or for that matter his actual on screen time in the Lord of the Rings movies.
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