Posted on 12/20/2015 12:35:06 AM PST by Rummyfan
Stabilize your rear deflectors! From a galaxy far far away - the summer of 1977 - Star Wars is back, rebooted for the 21st century and in hopes that after a decade's time-out the series has shaken off its turn-of-the-century "prequels", agreed even by hardcore fans to have been disappointing.
Not that it made any difference to the grosses: One of the remarkable features of the franchise is its resistance to quality control. Sci-fi wasn't boffo before Star Wars - if anything, rather the opposite: It was regarded as the upmarket intellectual end of genre fiction. Then George Lucas came along, and hijacked the entire field, with little more than a guy with a bucket on his head, a dog with a stick-on moustache, a talking garbage can and a princess wearing two cinnamon rolls on her ears.
But what do I know? Star Wars is the most successful movie ever. It's supposed to be "epic" and "primal", but, if so, it beats me. A film such as, say, High Noon, which takes place in real time — 90 minutes — on one dusty monochrome main street lined with plywood house fronts and whose only special effect is Tex Ritter's plaintive rendition of the title song, is truly primal: it's big at its core. Star Wars, it seems to me, is epic only in the sense that the telephone book is epic.
(Excerpt) Read more at steynonline.com ...
Good point.
Yes, the humor of Han Solo’s name was certainly apparent to a bunch of teenage boys back in the late 1970s.
And we used to say, “Princess Leia...she earned that name.”
And Chewbacca is actually a take on the Russian “sabaka” (sp?) which means “dog”, implying that Wookies were like man’s best friend.
I should add that Vader is a rip-off of the German “Vater” or “father”. Thus, “Dark Father” was telegraphing his eventual role to us, even in the 1st movie.
“Casablanca” or the “Flash Gordon” serials any time, thank you....and save 12 bucks each, to boot.
Leni”
I loved the Flash Gordon series. I was madly in love with Buster Crabbe, my hero. If we came straight home from Church on Sunday, I wouldn’t miss any of it. What a great show with that rickety tin can space ship. I’ll forever remember the various sound effects and music that went with it. I wonder if the series is available for viewing anywhere, such as on Netflix or Amazon.
I love those westerns where the horses run over a cliff and explode in mid-air! Hee hee (not really!)
I thought for sure you were going to say "but I got dizzy". ;)
LOL! I hope you are here all week.
I am going to see the new SW movie on Sunday with my oldest son.
He is 38 and has been a SW fan since he was very young. I took him to see Return of the Jedi in 1983 when it came out, and he remembers it clearly.
So he is returning the favor and taking me to a SW movie 32 years later.
I sent him a link to this article—I love reading Mark Steyn.
So you were quite the activist in elementary school, heh?
Well, we are fortunate that you have channeled those abilities to Free Republic. The Freepathons would not be the same without you.
I am a night owl as well, I love mornings and nights, but want to take a siesta in the afternoon. I think the Spanish have it right. You get your second wind after a nice afternoon nap.
What surprised me was I was on here at 5:30 am, and so were you, but your time zone is one hour ahead of mine, so that meant you were hitting the keyboard at 4:30 am!
We would have made excellent night security guards.
But they would have to let us Freep!
I’m a fan but I love reading critiques like this one. Probably the most scathing or maybe looked down upon reviews of the old SW movies were by John Simon. There have been some fun raking over the coals reviews on youtube as well. The recent S. E. Cupp one that was posted here on FR was boring since all she said was she was sick of the hype and wasn’t interested. I prefer fun jabs like this one by Steyn.
Thanks! I don’t know if i will buy the DVDs. But at least the originals are (or will be) available, not censored like some old Soviet photo of political leaders who have fallen out of favor . . .
True enough. You can find more about that elsewhere on line.
"I wonder if he really cares about anything. Or anybody," muses Princess Leia, although Han Solo's strangely Onanistic moniker should have been the first clue to his self-absorption.
I had to laugh at that one.
LOL! That wasn’t an issue, but I do get dizzy when there are zooming camera angles. Those “experience of flight” documentaries always made me sick.
Thanks for the input. Great stuff.
I'm suspecting that you are in total agreement with this review..... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxKtZmQgxrI Other than the barrage of 4 letter words, one of the funniest reviews ever..
Ahhhh, the famous “Plinkett” reviews of the prequels. His “Titanic” review was hilarious, too.
Their ongoing shows at Red Letter Media (”Half in the Bag,” “Best of the Worst,” and “Wheel of the Worst”) are really, really funny. I’ve actually learned a lot about film making, screenwriting, story structure, and editing from them, too.
“Using your line of analysis, Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” is anti-Christian.”
“You said it, not me.
But now that you mention it ...”
This back-and-forth illustrates - unwittingly perhaps - why so many less religiously inclined citizens lump Christians together with the Flat Earthers.
Before we know it, mkjessup will be shaking his/her finger at the forum, warning (in the tones and cadences of the illiterate backwoods preacher) that eternal damnation and hellfire will be our lot, less’n we stop wastin’ time readin’ them durned novels, which surely be tools of the Divvil.
Both respondents may have a passing familiarity with J.R.R. Tolkien’s _The Lord of the Rings_ but they haven’t the slightest knowledge of the late philologist’s worldview, his conception of morality or civilization, nor indeed the basics of the fantasy world he envisioned.
Orphaned by the age of ten, Tolkien was a childhood convert to Roman Catholicism and obtained most of his education courtesy of English Catholic organizations.
Many have sung praises for the realism - everyday, gritty, or terrifying - of the world he imagined and brought to life in his two most popular works; he did take great pains to ensure the physical details of Middle Earth were accurate, coordinated, and consistent.
But what is less recognized is the extreme care he took to construct a moral order for his imaginary universe; his additional work in the genre - less polished than _The Lord of the Rings_ - goes into surprisingly fine detail on creation, deity equivalents, angelic entities, the hierarchies that governed all of them, even religious rites observed by lower beings, mortal and immortal.
He just didn’t bother to include much of that backstory, or undergirding, in either _The Hobbit_ or _The Lord of the Rings_.
Of far greater import to the topic at hand is the possibility of finding any moralistic message in Tolkien’s work.
Scholars of greater education and renown than I have opined that the entire tale cycle - it covers thousands of years - is a tragedy.
Those who remain faithful to the legitimate moral order are rewarded. Sometimes it comes to pass only at length; meanwhile, their sufferings, dilemmas, and crises can engender despair in the stoutest of hearts.
Those who rebel - even those who do so for understandable (or at least forgivable) reasons, such as impatience or overmastering passion, to assail an undoubtedly evil enemy - ultimately fail.
Self - seekers who gather power unto themselves, for reasons of vanity or unwarranted aggrandizement, march willfully to their own ruin.
Literary critics and academics are free to disagree.
But the basics are quite accessible, especially since J.R.R. Tolkien’s son Christopher has complied, edited, and published _The Silmarillion_, and numerous additional volumes of his father’s writings, many unfinished.
Pleasant reading.
There’s no movie character I’ve ever identified with more than Martin Blank. Make of that what you will.
I really like Minnie Driver in it. Best thing she ever did....
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