- Opinion
- 12 Mar 01
Twenty years after its original release, George Lucas sci-fi epic STAR WARS is back on the cinema screens of the world, fully restored and with several minutes of extra new footage. CRAIG FITZSIMONS explores the myth, mayhem and madness of the film, and attempts to nail down exactly what makes it so great.
IF YOU VE been asleep since 1976, or if this is your first visit to Earth, it might interest you to know that Star Wars is a mildly popular little movie about Luke Skywalker, an unassuming small-town squirt who becomes an inter-galactic hero thanks to his understanding of the Force (an energy-field generated by all living things, that surrounds and pervades them, binding the galaxy together).
Above that, Star Wars is an epic tale with a profound message about the inter-connectedness and interdependence of all living things. It is a film that champions gloriously old-fashioned heroic values such as courage, fidelity and honour: although it takes place in a spacefaring environment, its preoccupation with the ultimate victory of good over evil finds echoes in everything from epic Westerns to Arthurian legends to the books of J.R.R. Tolkien.
The movie s black-and-white worldview has led to some unfortunate comparisons with the entertaining-but-empty Flash Gordon, when in truth Star Wars is incomparable in its scope and profundity. Besides, the special effects are still genuinely special twenty years on. There isn t a quiet hundred seconds, and it s funnier throughout than many nominal comedies. Like all the great works of literature, Star Wars can be enjoyed on several levels (i.e. there s no excuse for leaving the kids at home.)
At its most basic, Star Wars contrasts good with evil by using some rather unsubtle iconography. Compare, for example, the malevolent monotones of the Imperial troops and ships (resplendent in white, grey and black) with the Technicolor exuberance of the rebels base, their uniforms and fighter-craft. Alongside this, John Williams rousing score intersects the Imperial Waltz (in four-four time?) to let you know you re back amongst the baddies again.
The Empire is depicted with generous dollops of Nazi imagery. The cannon-fodder are allied storm-troopers and are conveniently faceless and expendable (and Christ, are they expended!). Imperial officers are jack-booted and wear starched, grey uniforms, and there s a general lack of good cheer whenever they re around. This worked a treat back in 77, when the horrors of the Nazi era were still fresh in the world s collective memory. I m not so sure if it works today: there s a tendency for the baddies in Star Wars to appear one-dimensional to the point of blandness. And of course, what would a 90s audience know of Imperial(ist) oppression? Or to put it another way: how could a 1977 audience have even begun to imagine our blissful paradise of democracy and liberty and free enterprise?
The film s chief baddie is the remorseless Governor Tarkin (Peter Cushing), who vaporises billions as a lesson to others, and yet still fails to be the real repository of wickedness. This position is held by the notorious Darth Vader, a PVC-clad Jedi knight with very bad emphysema: he is the Christian Brother you re glad you never had.
Vader is an accomplished evildoer who combines profound spiritual rottenness with a deep understanding of the ways of the Force (he s also a passable swordsman and fighter-pilot). Vader is the last Bad Guy to survive the film: the Death-Star perishes because Tarkin underestimates the power of the force. Here is one of the film s principal lessons ignore the workings of the Force at your peril. No doubt 90s audiences will interpret this as a warning against environmental destruction (it s not enough to conquer Nature: we must realise our place within its scheme before we burn our beds).
SCUM AND VILLAINY
Essential to the success of Star Wars is the scope of its imagination. It invents several alien worlds for us to marvel at, and demonstrates the workings of good and evil in these worlds as part and parcel of more than just the human condition. Take, for example, the space-port of Mos Eisley, a notorious hive of scum and villainy . It s a galactic melting-pot of the worst kind, an arabesque bazaar of supply and demand in which our intrepid heroes are forced to immerse themselves to gain passage to Alderan. Especially memorable is the freighter-pilots bar, replete with an exo-biotic jazz band, unimaginable substances for consumption, and a menagerie of patrons who would look quite at home in a few Dublin pubs I could mention.
In Star Wars, goodness is not an innate condition of being, rather something that must be developed through individual choices and actions. In this respect Star Wars is streets ahead of the unthinking, amoral action movies of the 80s. The hero Skywalker, for instance, is a reluctant farmer who dreams of joining the rebellion yet when offered the opportunity to do so, he hesitates, citing domestic commitments.
Very conveniently, the Empire s finest put paid to that consideration by barbecuing his aunt and uncle. So our linen-clad everyman is forced by circumstances to help bring liberty and justice to the whole galaxy (I know just how he feels). Skywalker s adventure proceeds as a series of decisions in tight spots, where action becomes the key to success: he is the man of action that Hamlet wished he could be.
Han Solo appears at first to be a cynical profit-seeker, in the action only for personal gain. He suffers from what Marx described as the tendency of material conditions to alienate mankind from its humanity : Solo is unwittingly complicit in the Empire s tyranny, as fear and self-preservation guide his actions (instead of universal moral principles, like the rest of us). However, when the rebel attack on the Death-Star is all but spent, in he swoops straight out of the sun in typical combat-ace fashion. Now we realise that Solo has discovered the inter-dependence of all life-forms . . . the Force that connects them all . . . the Green eco-message of unconditional love for mother earth etc. etc. etc.
Our woman of action is the Princess Leia Organa. Here is one of the film s more serious accomplishments. When she s not scowling at her captors and haranguing them with a tongue of vitriol, she s blasting away determinedly at the bad guys. Appalled at her rescuers lack of foresight, she naturally takes the lead and guides them out of the frying-pan. This may seem unremarkable to a 90s audience. But Leia is a character who would have been a radical departure from type in 1967, and wholly inconceivable in 1957. Then ( 77) and now, she has feminists of both sexes cheering in their seats . . . fair play to ya, luv!
SENTIENT BEINGS
Star Wars had the singular misfortune to have been released in the same year as Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, with which it compared unfavourably then, and still odes now. The criticism levelled at Star Wars at the time was that it was too much of a Bang! Bang! Bang! movie, and that criticism becomes even fairer in a post-Dunblane, post-Hungerford world, loath as I generally am to make too much of the relationship between screen and real-life violence. The film s body-count is truly enormous; storm-troopers are dispatched by Skywalker & co. like redskins in a 30s western. And for the convenience of our heroes, the bad guys are, of course, hopeless marksmen.
Nor would the position of Droids in the scheme of things concur with contemporary ideas of equality. C-3PO and R2-D2 steal our hearts with their banter, even if half of it is unintelligible. These are clearly sentient beings whose relationship develops as the story proceeds, eventually, to the stage of proposed organ-donation. Yet they are slaves, who are bought, sold and broken for scrap according to their masters whims. Their intrinsic worth as persons is only recognised after they ve put their asses on the line time and time again. As C-3PO himself says: Nobody cares how droids feel .
There is a hint of naive racism too. After the heroics of battle, only Luke Skywalker and Han Solo are awarded medals. None for the motorised dustbin or the walking carpet. No sir! Their actions though equally heroic are merely what s expected from them in their condition of servitude.
These minor irritants aside, Star Wars is and remains a classic. You won t notice much that s different in the newly released special edition , apart from a few extra computer-generated creatures: on this score, I couldn t help feeling that what wasn t broken didn t need fixing. After all, a great film is a great film (can t argue with that statement, can you?)
Outstanding in all departments the acting, the storyline, the effects, the humour . . . in short, you really are urged to see this film again. Let go, sit back, trust your instincts, and may the Force be with you. n