After hearing all the tracks from it mentioned in the "500 Best movie music pieces" thread, I popped the Empire Strikes Back soundtrack into my car stereo for a few days' worth of commutes. Even though it's my favorite Williams' score, I hadn't listened to it in a while, and I was surprised at how strongly it affected me. I was flashing back strongly to the memory of seeing the film for the first time, the moments of shock and awe and wonder. And since I hadn't watched the film in a longer time than I'd listened to the score, I decided to watch it today.
And I went old-school -- the last VHS release of the unaltered version. That's the one I wanted to see, no spruced-up wampa, no bigger Cloud City, I wanted what I got back in 1980.
And the prequels are dead to me now.
Empire is such a complete film. Never was Lucas' mysticism and mythological bent stronger. Never were the effects more competent. Never was the music more stirring or appropriate. Never did the actors more completely inhabit their characters. It's not just good Star Wars, it's good cinema.
The one moment this all dawned on me seems silly in retrospect, but it hit me so hard, I had to rewind and watch it a couple of time. The Falcon is fleeing Cloudy City and Lando attempts to activate the hyperdrive, and of course, nothing happens. And Peter Mayhew in full make-up just does an amazing take from Carrie Fischer to Billy Dee Williams. It's such a perfect, in-character reaction, and it's followed by Chewbacca just raging and growling and storming out of the cockpit, not uttering a single word I could understand but so easily and effortlessly conveying character and emotion. Show me that moment in the prequels. Show me the character that we've grown to care about who can command our attention and affection without saying a word. You can't. It's not there. What was probably a throwaway bit of business on the set taking all of two or three minutes trumps nine hours of state-of-the-art.
And the story works so much better without the prequel baggage. Ben is a tragic, fallen mentor instead of Anakin's unwilling tutor. Yoda is mysteriously wise instead of the shortest ass-kicker ever. The Emperor is ominous and not cackling about unlimited power. Everything just feels more epic, more majestic, more powerful without thinking twice about midichlorians and clones. It all makes me wish Lucas had never slapped that "Episode V" on the opening crawl -- then the specter of Episodes I though III wouldn't have sat there like an open wound. It would have been finished.
I'm not going to call the prequels abominations or cry that Lucas raped my childhood. Watching Empire again, they just ... don't seem to matter anymore. They're apocrypha that I choose to leave out of my bible. They're not of the same galaxy far far away.
I'm gonna cling to IV though VI and embrace what the saga was, what I remember it as, rather than get all bitter and angry about what it became.
And I went old-school -- the last VHS release of the unaltered version. That's the one I wanted to see, no spruced-up wampa, no bigger Cloud City, I wanted what I got back in 1980.
And the prequels are dead to me now.
Empire is such a complete film. Never was Lucas' mysticism and mythological bent stronger. Never were the effects more competent. Never was the music more stirring or appropriate. Never did the actors more completely inhabit their characters. It's not just good Star Wars, it's good cinema.
The one moment this all dawned on me seems silly in retrospect, but it hit me so hard, I had to rewind and watch it a couple of time. The Falcon is fleeing Cloudy City and Lando attempts to activate the hyperdrive, and of course, nothing happens. And Peter Mayhew in full make-up just does an amazing take from Carrie Fischer to Billy Dee Williams. It's such a perfect, in-character reaction, and it's followed by Chewbacca just raging and growling and storming out of the cockpit, not uttering a single word I could understand but so easily and effortlessly conveying character and emotion. Show me that moment in the prequels. Show me the character that we've grown to care about who can command our attention and affection without saying a word. You can't. It's not there. What was probably a throwaway bit of business on the set taking all of two or three minutes trumps nine hours of state-of-the-art.
And the story works so much better without the prequel baggage. Ben is a tragic, fallen mentor instead of Anakin's unwilling tutor. Yoda is mysteriously wise instead of the shortest ass-kicker ever. The Emperor is ominous and not cackling about unlimited power. Everything just feels more epic, more majestic, more powerful without thinking twice about midichlorians and clones. It all makes me wish Lucas had never slapped that "Episode V" on the opening crawl -- then the specter of Episodes I though III wouldn't have sat there like an open wound. It would have been finished.
I'm not going to call the prequels abominations or cry that Lucas raped my childhood. Watching Empire again, they just ... don't seem to matter anymore. They're apocrypha that I choose to leave out of my bible. They're not of the same galaxy far far away.
I'm gonna cling to IV though VI and embrace what the saga was, what I remember it as, rather than get all bitter and angry about what it became.
