I have to say I thought the movie was strangely moving. It’s certainly the most unremittingly dark of the movies. I wonder how much of my emotional response has to do with the fact that I have had a relationship with this movie-series for the majority of life. I was 10 years old in 1977. Star Wars is one of the first movies I remember seeing in the movie theatre. You know? The whole thing is like an evocation of my childhood – so I’m not sure what’s what. And you know what? It just DOESN’T MATTER.
Minor spoiler below
For example: the last shot of the film. Obi-Wan Kenobi arrives on Tatooine with the baby Luke to give to his aunt and uncle. (18 years later, Luke’s whining about “power converters” in the same dern sand igloo!) But anyway – it’s sunset, it’s the desert. Kenobi gets off this camel-type creature, and the aunt comes out of the igloo, with her arms open. Blah blah. She takes Luke, she joins her husband, they stare at the sunset, with smiles of hope.
The end.
It’s how it had to end. You know … it sets you up for the next film, the “new hope”.
BUT. My main response to that scene was a RUSH of familiarity. I know that place! I know that stupid sand-igloo as though I had spent a summer vacation there myself! I know those weird metal things coming up out of the sand – randomly. I know that ridge over to the side of the house. It’s not even a real place, but it’s as known to me as some of my old childhood haunts – places I haven’t seen in 25 years.
I felt really glad to see Tatooine. (Okay, I sound like a goofball. Either you forgive or you don’t. Whatever. I am not ashamed.) I did. I saw that damn sand planet, and felt: Oh my God. Tatooine …
This is all tied up with … being a KID. With remembering summer vacations, and popsicles, and long car trips, and lying in the “wayback” of the station wagon, and chasing fireflies at dusk … Star Wars is all tied up, for me, in those memories. It’s a part of me – and I had this emotional sense-memory thing happen when I saw that sand planet.
And then … as Luke’s aunt goes to join the uncle on the ridge, holding the baby … you hear the hopeful phrasing of the Star Wars theme (not the dark Darth Vader theme, but the triumphant theme – you know the one I mean). But it wasn’t played with a blaze of trumpets, or anything like that – because, after all, the Republic has been momentarily crushed, the Jedis have gone into hiding, and Darth Vader is now Lord of the Empire. Things are pretty bleak. Why blast your hopeful trumpets about that? But there comes the theme anyway, a softer version, a bit melancholy … (John Williams is a genius. God.) We hadn’t heard that theme ONCE in the entirety of this black-pit of a movie, where everything pretty much just goes from bad to worse.
But suddenly … there it was.
And I felt this odd lump in my throat – and it had to do with 5 million different things … but mostly, it was just this strange almost physical response to that particular piece of music. It’s like … the anthem of my entire feckin’ childhood. Of an entire generation. Multiple generations.
I guess (strangely enough) I didn’t really realize that until the last moment of Revenge of the Sith, when I heard that theme start to play – only a bit chastened now, a bit soft … The time for triumph hasn’t come yet, now is the time for hibernation, for strength to grow in silence and darkness … waiting for the right time … A perfect way to lead in to “a new hope”.
Anyway. I really liked it.
The dialogue is cringingly painful (“Hold me like you did at Naboo”) – but whatever. I didn’t give a crap. I couldn’t take my eyes off the thing. I was riveted, every step of the way. And not just because of the effects – but because I was watching the transformation of that world, I was watching it turn into the frightened totalitarian desert that we saw at the beginning of Star Wars, Episode IV. So. Lucas pulled it off, man.
I do have some funny quibbling observations but I’ll save them for another time. Not in the mood right now. Just want to revel in what I just experirenced.
Also, on a side note: Uhm – is it almost June? Because it’s FREEZING here. I walked home, struggling against the sleet on my face, shivering in my down wintter coat. Weird.
i am so excited to see this. maybe tonite…
I have the soundtrack, and I get chills when the twin sunset theme rises.
Seeing it again tonight, just to make sure I liked it.
I cannot wait to see this.
Warning: Self-focused comment.
Sheila, I know exactly what you mean about your response being tied to being a kid. I am too old to have experienced Star Wars as a kid, and I never felt that innocent-child attachment to that film. My feelings about 2001 A Space Odyssey are similar to yours for Star Wars. I was a kid when I saw 2001, and it was filled with such mystery and import that it opened a whole world of film possibilities to me. To this day, I am often harsh in my criticism of some movies because they had the potential to touch the enormous scope of mystery that 2001 mines, but fail to do so. Life is such an enigma, and 2001 brushed up against that as no other movie I had ever seen to that point in my life. In some ways, no movie since then has done to me what that movie did. I remember telling EVERYONE that it was the greatest movie ever made. Many of my young friends went to see it, and they just didn’t get it. It bored them, or they didn’t like the ambiguous ending/message. Many people wanted something more concrete in a movie, but I loved the idea of being unsure about its meaning–the viewer being left to interpret it all on his/her own. The effects and visuals were incomparable. It is difficult for the modern movie audience to understand just how incredible and different 2001 really was. Today, we are all accustomed to seeing amazing space vehicles, space travellers, and realistic portrayals of the vastness of space. There was nothing like that when 2001 was released–it was monumentally groundbreaking. To this day, I only need to hear any part of the music theme, see 30 seconds of the movie, or even hear the name “HAL,” and I feel again that sense of mystery in the universe–and my infinitesimal place in it. So, I understand your reaction to Star Wars. Like many events in our childhood, there are certain seminal film experiences that shape and affect us in strange ways–they become embedded in our psyches permanently, and are elusive to explanation or reason.
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Bill – exactly!! It gave me chills, too … it was this rush of sensation … just from that one simple phrase of music. Amazing.
I have to see it again, too.
“I know those weird metal things coming up out of the sand”
Vaporators. They suck moisture out of the air. Luke grew up on a moisture farm. And yeah, I’m a bit embarrassed I know that much detail, but that was a detail I always liked. They farm moisture on a desert planet.
Scott – as ever, thank you. I knew it was just a matter of time before someone let me know what they were.
I was betting it would either be you or “popskull”.
:)
Oh, and do not ever be embarrassed about carrying around useless obsessive knowledge in your brain about a fantasy-world. I think it’s awesome, and one of life’s grandest pleasures.
Carry on.
Incidentally, the moisture idea was stolen from Dune. Many have criticized the number of elements Lucas cribbed from other sf sources. What impressed me was how he succeeded in merging them into something new and, I’d argue, his own.
I didn’t shed a tear during the movie (like some Oscar-winning directors did), but I had honest-to-god CHILLS running up and down my spine during that last shot. so freaking amazing.
I had quibbles. I’m letting them subside. I’m seeing the movie again tomorrow early afternoon with my coworkers (a “team-building” event, we call it). And I’m just gonna let myself revel in the film.
Wonderful post, Sheila. And I think it gets at the root of why I’m looking forward to seeing the movie with an anticipation I haven’t felt for many years. It may not make sense on an intellectual level, but the first two Star Wars movies were part of my life – in 1977 I was 17, had just started my first job, was in the midst of my first serious relationship, and in 1980 I was set to head off into great unknown (UC, Berkeley in my case); at a crossroads in my life (even though I didn’t fully appreciate it at the time). “Star Wars” and “The Empire Strikes Back” were inextricably linked to all of that. And what makes everything come full circle now is that with this movie (and you’re right – who cares about the flaws at this late date?), my two sons can be a part of all that. Why this particular movie more than Eps. 1 and 2? Everything that you mention in your post. This is the one that ties it all together, and that matters. I’m not sure I could find the words to explain it, but it does.
Cheers, and sorry for the meandering thoughts.
Great post. I was 8 when ‘A New Hope’…or Star Wars…came out and the SW universe is an intrinsic part of my being. It fueled my love of space and science fiction which in turn fueled a love for reading and dreaming and so many other things. Sure there are “quibbles” with things in all 6 of these movies…so what…this was never supposed to be Shakespeare. Its an homage to the science fiction of old and as such is a wonderful, magical experience. I got chills during the opening scene similar to those felt when I first saw the Star Destroyer chasing the Rebel ship in the opening of Star Wars. And you’re right, Williams is a genius.
I need to see it again before I gather a true impression on how I feel about it. Presently, I was not disappointed by it, but I wasn’t truly captivated by it, either.
I remember bracing for disappointment to the point where I let things slip past me. There were a surprising few of them.
I spent too long (20 minutes) noodling over what to say about the film, which means it’s not lingering in my mind, so I’ll have to go back and see it again, preferable without Jet-Lag, which I’ll blame for my lack of attention.
In fact, the binary language of load lifters is very similar to vaporators.
In most respects…
Do you speak Bocce?
Of course I can, it’s like a second language to me.
I am deeply in love with both of you.
I am fluent in over six million forms of communica…..
Fine.
Shut up.
(shutting up, sir)
Nice post. I was seven when Star Wars came out. It totally overwhelmed me, blew me away, stunned me. The whole experience blew my mind so badly that for some days afterwards I labored under the misunderstanding that ‘Chewie’ was in fact named ‘Julie’ – it took me that long to re-assemble the experience into coherent details in my head.
Exactly.
I really liked the movie – not for the dialog, but for the darkness and the way it tied up every last string into tidy little bows and said “here, you know what comes next”. (Did you catch that Obi-Wan grabbed Anakin’s lightsaber on his way out of the Volcano planet? Just to set up the scene in A New Hope – things like that)
My husband has decided the 6 movies are Anakin’s story.
God, talk about childhood memories. Try this one: Star Wars was the first movie I ever say in the theater. I was 3, and it’s my earliest childhood memory.