When I was about 4 or 5 years old I was taken to the movie theater in the mall to see Star Wars: Return of the Jedi. I don’t remember the movie so much as I remember walking out of the theater and into a KB toystore where my parents bought me a Darth Vader lightsaber. They were sold out of the Luke Skywalker green sabers.
I rediscovered Star Wars a couple of years later when it aired on TV a few times. That when I got to see A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back along with the Ewok Adventure.
I remember wanting to grow up to be a Knight because of what I saw in Star Wars. It was part of my childhood and became instilled in me.
When I found out George Lucas was going to make 3 more some 20 years later, I was thrilled. And when opening day came for “The Phantom Menace” I was in line with all the other diehards. And when the opening sequence rolled and I got goose bumps all over. However by the end of the film I was disappointed. Everything seemed so different. There were references to similar places and things and characters, but it just didn’t feel like the Star Wars I grew up with. And I know so many others felt the same way. We tried to tell ourselves “George lost it” or “It’s just a newer updated version and we’re not used to it yet” but neither seemed to really work.
When “Attack of the Clones” came out things started to look a little better for the Star Wars universe and maybe I was getting more used to the newer look and feel. But it all still seemed so corny and lame.
Enter “Revenge of the Sith”. For the first time in the course of the newest three Star Wars films did I feel a sense of nostalgia and at the same time sadness. I believe it has a lot to do with the fact that this third film ties in to the original trilogy. Thats why it’s the most powerful to me. It’s the first my eyes almost started to water up and it happened at the end when the tying in got tight.
I have my beefs with this film like I do with the two that came before it. I would have preferred to see some more real life action like storm troopers, less lightsabers (seems like everybody and their brother has one in this new trilogy) and just less computer animation in general. There are times it really is distracting and you’re just looking at someone talking and thinking to yourself how fake that digital background looks behind them. But overall I enjoyed the film. It felt like the end of the universe even though it was really only the half way point of the entire six film series. Somehow George managed to make me feel both sad and joyous at the same time. I’ll never look at the characer of Darth Vader the same again. And yet I’ll have more joy and understanding for Luke and Leia.
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I was 21 when the first Star Wars came out. I was in the middle of
doing the impossible, going half-a-million dollars into debt to make a
feature movie in Seattle.
My best friend and Art Director dragged me away from my editing table
to see it at Seattle’s old UA Theatre. Thank goodness he did.
It was the best. A movie about doing the impossible, for all the good
reasons there are. It amped me up, and made me willing to get up on my
hind legs and do some even more dangerous and exciting things.
I went to Hollywood the next year, and spent much of the summer visiting the
Oscar-winners who made “Star Wars.”
I did nothing to get invited, actually, it just happened. I worked on lots of
movies since then, have worked with and met many of those guys, including
Luke Skywalker himself.
Now I’m just working on my own movies.
The circle is complete.
Dissolve to 28 years later. The music still thrills me, the newer
Star Wars films are different, but it’s set in a different time, so I’m
okay with that.
I can hardly wait to see this new one, and I don’t believe it’s
the end of “Star Wars.”
I was 21 when the first Star Wars came out. I was in the middle of
doing the impossible, going half-a-million dollars into debt to make a
feature movie in Seattle.
My best friend and Art Director dragged me away from my editing table
to see it at Seattle’s old UA Theatre. Thank goodness he did.
It was the best. A movie about doing the impossible, for all the good
reasons there are. It amped me up, and made me willing to get up on my
hind legs and do some even more dangerous and exciting things.
I went to Hollywood the next year, and spent much of the summer visiting the
Oscar-winners who made “Star Wars.”
I did nothing to get invited, actually, it just happened. I worked on lots of
movies since then, have worked with and met many of those guys, including
Luke Skywalker himself.
Now I’m just working on my own movies.
The circle is complete.
Dissolve to 28 years later. The music still thrills me, the newer
Star Wars films are different, but it’s set in a different time, so I’m
okay with that.
I can hardly wait to see this new one, and I don’t believe it’s
the end of “Star Wars.”