Episode IV - A New Hope

I'll watch this tonight or tomorrow.

Lol no prob

I’ll think I’ll try myself, I’m quite busy with work lately and family visiting but I got tonight off. If not tonight then Monday night should work for me

Yeah that big green fucking dinosaur and the orange astromech that walk in front of Luke's speeder when they get stopped looks so bad... But some additions were alright like those two Tusken scouts on the ridge

A New Hope is not the greatest story ever told but it might be the best way it's ever been told, at least at the time. It's seriously breathtaking for its time. I don't know how many of you have seen Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. That movie came out five years after this one and even with that extra time, the effects in that movie just don't hold up like these ones. There are so many shots were you have to stop and think "how the hell did they even create that in 1977?" I went to a Star Wars exhibit when I was in elementary school and I remembering seeing the insane ways they used miniatures and paintings to bring this film to life. The story for this film could be dogshit and it would still be worth seeing for the breathtaking practical effects. It's all just so incredibly seamless.

The story, while good, is a bit standard. It's basically a typical hero's journey, with all the tropes that go along with that. It is quite predictable once Luke is introduced, but is carried by the likable characters. The opening is a pretty entertaining scene. It could be dark with all these people being mercilessly killed but is kept light by our focus on the droids. I always have like R2 and 3PO's interactions. They are basically the protagonists for the first twenty minutes of the movie, but they move to the side soon enough that they don't become annoying.

And then once we meet Luke and see him look into the suns, we know how the movie is going to go, but that doesn't mean it stops being enjoyable. I won't go beat by beat through this movie, but I'd say it keeps a pretty good pace throughout, never really getting bogged down. There are a few weird cuts in there, especially at Mos Eisley, but it doesn't really affect my enjoyment of the film. We don't get told a lot about the conflict but that's alright as this is the first film in the saga and we know just enough to understand it.

One thing that kept popping up is how a lot of really dark shit happens in this movie (Lars Homestead, Alderaan, Entire Red Squadron) and yet the movie feels pretty light and optimistic. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. On one hand I know why they wouldn't want this to be a bleak film but it makes some moments a lot less affecting than they could be.

Harrison Ford completely steals the show in this movie. He gives a very effortless yet believable performance and he has some great one-liners. The rest of acting is pretty good all around, though Mark Hamill has some pretty bad lines he has to get through and some of them are read like in a high school play.

I guess I should address the changes made. They're a pretty mixed bag. Some are quite nice, like making R2's hiding spot more convincing, and some humorous editions in the Death Star chase. I liked having Jabba in there but he looks nothing like he does in ROTJ. Obi-Wan's Krayt Dragon call is kinda unintentionally funny, or at least the 2011 version. I preferred the 2004 version that sounded like Boga from ROTS. And like I said before, the dinosaurs walking around Tatooine are not very convincing and kinda take you out of it. I wonder why they couldn't have made the lightsaber look better while Luke was training. It still looks kinda strange. Some of the screen displays also look dated even for today. I always wondered why they couldn't have updated those in special editions.

The ending battle is probably my favorite part of the whole movie. It's incredible how well they pulled off the Battle of Yavin in 1977. The scene is so full of tension and excitement. And I always love that moment when Han returns to help Luke. It's a great way to top off the movie.

After thinking a bit, I'll give this movie an 8.5/10. It looks magnificent and tells its story really well. But there are still some undeniably shaky parts and the actual story is mostly predictable. It's an incredible achievement and great movie, but not my absolute favorite.

Another thing I thought of is Owen could've remembered C-3PO since he was on the farm in AOTC. I guess the explanation is it's been a few decades, he looked different and droids are common and sometimes indistinguishable. But he could've remember the name and even voice since they don't all have the same voices

The Lars bodies always freaked me out as a kid.

Honestly I think the 2011 sounds the best. Feels like a force yell

That's probably because originally Darth was his actual first name. Sith titles and Anakin Skywalker were yet to come into play at the time.

Since this is a thoughtful rewatch, I went into this with really open, observant eyes and what I took away was an even greater respect for A New Hope. For starters, this thing picked up where 2001 left off and changed the game with special effects. There was every chance this would look tinny and cheap, yet it didn't. Sure the CGI of today eclipses it, but the stuff they achieved here in the 70s is just insane. Then there's the art design. George made an inspired choice going for a used-and-abused edge. For so long we thought of spacescraft and futuristic gizmos as cutting edge, all sheeny-shiny. Here, that stuff's been around for donkey's years, so you get, what I find, an utterly entertaining nonchalant view of it all by everybody. It's also a world that sucks you in by way of simply showing things like incredibly unique, wacky aliens, mentioning bizarre sounding items, places etc. Aside from the opening crawl, we're left in the dark over the finer details and I love it for that. To think all this effort went into what was the back-up plan for a Flash Gordon movie
Speaking of which, its influence can still be felt. As well as Akira Kurosawa, Buck Rogers and a good dollop of Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey. In a way, the mix of influences means we get a Hero's Journey that, visually and in terms of plotting, stands out as a new spin on it. Sure, Luke's basic arc has all the right beats, but the film doesn't even show him for the first 16 minutes. Instead, R2 and 3PO are the leads and then hand over the baton to Luke, who as a character is really kinda endearing. He lives a dull life, wants more, but doesn't seem able to obtain it, is kind of whiny and immature, then he suddenly gets his way out through luck and a hell of a lot of sacrifice. I mean, think about it. Luke's time in ANH is so grim. He finds his home burned, his family charred bones (still goes down as possibly the darkest scene in the saga after all these years by the way), watches his mentor die and his best friend get blown up. This film would be one dark, moody place if it actually lingered more on these events and didn't use the breezy, don't-dwell-on-it nature of those adventure serials. Whether that would make it a better film, I can't say.
For something with an old school flow, the action always comes thick and fast. The firefights are always tense and appropriately explosive, almost overly so, the turret shooting captures the film's spirit of adventure and of course the trench run scene is just an epic pressure cooker of tension and high stakes. Props to the model guys for making it look so good.
It's really not hard seeing why this thing made a mammoth impact. Nothing like this had existed and while we had the big epics before then, none of them had plasma swords, spaceships, robots and the Force, which will go down in history as one of the greatest sci-fi concepts ever to be dreamt up. All those big, grand ideas, conveyed through a much livelier than usual movie (stuff back then contained a much slower, methodical pacing) pretty set up the perfect storm, the rise of geek fandom as major box office audience, which birthed the glorious sci-fi boom of the late 70s and 80s. Star Wars can be thanked for creating a lot more than just Star Wars if you get my saying.
As for acting, it's pretty top notch. It should be when you've got freaking Peter Cushing and Alec Guinness on board, one being so masterful in being cold, calculating and restrained, while the other brilliantly displaying a man wise, yet tired, filled with regret and a wily drive to see the Jedi live on. Of course, the others equally come to their level. For someone younger than me, I've got to hand it to Carrie for being such a natural. Granted, she had the headstart in having such greatly written and subversive (the good kind, not that Last Jedi, crap kind) damsel-in-distress. Mark brings that youthful energy that goes in all sorts of directions, but never seems out of control, Harrison is a charisma machine, who's oddly likeable for all his selfish grumpiness and Anthony really knows how to keep you engaged for someone without any facial movement, or much limb movement for that matter Oh, and of course James Earl Jones just oozes menace and held back fury as Vader. I just kind of wish David Prowse would put a bit more of that menace into his movement at certain times.
This brings to, perhaps the most miraculous part about Star Wars: it's writing being good. The one liners, the banter, the exchanges, they all (mostly) hit. I don't know how of it was, but I feel like adlibbing was the main reason for this (plenty of folks even back then were more than honest about George's script writing ability). It's all memorable, snappy at times, punctuated by nudges of humour, though bearing some stiffer dialogue.
Meanwhile, the music is, as almost everyone who's ever heard has said, a triumph. John Williams doesn't play into originality here. Gustav Holst is to him what Campbell is for Lucas, but that's why it's so good. The sweeping, bombastic, yet at times gently elegant tunes pretty much give the movie its soul. It's not my all time favourite soundtrack of Williams', but my god, it remains one of the all time greats.
For years I've always respected and loved ANH for gifting us they very idea of Star Wars, despite serving a basic plot we've literally heard for thousands of years, but I walk away from it now finding it more loveable somehow. It's not my favourite, but it's so easy to see why it's pretty much a masterpiece in blockbuster cinema. One, simple reason can be how wide ranging in emotion it can be. It can be happy, sad, tragic, exhilarating, scary, surprising and more than a bit funny. By sheer chance of pursuing his own passion, George Lucas essentially created the secret formula for the ultimate film success and we're all better for it. He is especially

My god, that went on more than I thought, but I really wanted to vent my opinions on this and the words really flowed like a stream

One theory I had was everything after Luke gets knocked out by the tusken raider is a dream he has while he's unconscious... Like the Rebel alliance is just gonna let some kid join them and he is then able to survive the trench run and blow up the Death Star with no training? Lol

My guess is with the prequels, George's word was God's word. Back in the 70s he was just a talented, young filmmaker, who didn't quite have the clout like he did with Phantom Menace. This meant a lot of people kinda followed their own instincts. For example, the cinematographer (who'd worked with Kubrick by the way) struggled to get a hold of Lucas, so he shot stuff the way he wanted without much input from the director. Weirdly, I think this helped the film, though it did lead to him vowing never to work with George again. Actors also sort of followed their own script. I'm more than certain if you had a copy of the original screenplay, you'd find the film differs in a lot of ways and then there's that famous phrase "Star Wars was saved in the editing room". Quite simply, more people back then weren't bothered to follow the word of a shy, young guy who barely knew what he himself wanted with the picture. Once the prequels came along you had this whole generation that thinks of him as the Holy Spirit of sci-fi This might have helped grow a bit of confidence for him and so, he became more determined to make the films his way, which proved a hindrance than a help sadly.