Imagine the first one completely in a vaccuum. Low budget late 70s movie, ignore sequels prequels or whatever. If you take it that way the movie is one of the silliest things ever and it rules because of that. "Only a master of evil, Darth."
Yeah the first one in a vacuum seemed to me like a TV movie. Decent for TV I guess but eh. ROTJ was really bad for me, I didn't even watch it to the end.
See, it doesn't work unless you live in 1977 and the only movies you've seen are the ones that have been released up to that point. The movie was a landmark of special effects and a breath of fresh air for the sci fi genre, which at that point was dominated by a lot of self-serious filmmaking. Star Wars was a once-in-a-century cultural phenomenon, and the entire franchise has essentially been getting by on the momentum generated by the first film.
I don't think anybody will ever experience Star Wars the way the first people who saw it did - not just because George Lucas changed the films and buried the original version, but because the culture needs to set the tone of the release just right. Most of the fans now are people who basically got indoctrinated into it by watching it as kids.
Yeah that's what I figured. But generally I think that, say, Kurosawa films, while arguably even more dated in many regards, still are more interesting. Like, I've watched the Hidden Fortress twice and I would watch it again, but not really ANH. I would watch ESB again but I was also kinda disappointed because it gets hyped up as something much more than it was to me. But of course that's just my opinion and I'm sure other people may have had much different experiences.
Generally I think that when you look back at these movies which are dated for one or the other reason, it often benefits movies which were more "intrinsically" interesting beyond them just being interesting by virtue of being novel for a certain audience.
Imagine the first one completely in a vaccuum. Low budget late 70s movie, ignore sequels prequels or whatever. If you take it that way the movie is one of the silliest things ever and it rules because of that. "Only a master of evil, Darth."
Yeah the first one in a vacuum seemed to me like a TV movie. Decent for TV I guess but eh. ROTJ was really bad for me, I didn't even watch it to the end.
See, it doesn't work unless you live in 1977 and the only movies you've seen are the ones that have been released up to that point. The movie was a landmark of special effects and a breath of fresh air for the sci fi genre, which at that point was dominated by a lot of self-serious filmmaking. Star Wars was a once-in-a-century cultural phenomenon, and the entire franchise has essentially been getting by on the momentum generated by the first film.
I don't think anybody will ever experience Star Wars the way the first people who saw it did - not just because George Lucas changed the films and buried the original version, but because the culture needs to set the tone of the release just right. Most of the fans now are people who basically got indoctrinated into it by watching it as kids.
Or just use your imagination.
Yeah that's what I figured. But generally I think that, say, Kurosawa films, while arguably even more dated in many regards, still are more interesting. Like, I've watched the Hidden Fortress twice and I would watch it again, but not really ANH. I would watch ESB again but I was also kinda disappointed because it gets hyped up as something much more than it was to me. But of course that's just my opinion and I'm sure other people may have had much different experiences.
Generally I think that when you look back at these movies which are dated for one or the other reason, it often benefits movies which were more "intrinsically" interesting beyond them just being interesting by virtue of being novel for a certain audience.