45 years after the premiere of the film that changed cinema, Star Wars: A New Hope
Although it weighs many, Star Wars changed the cinema forever. The story created by george lucas It not only revived science fiction in the cinema, but also the new methods used for filming influenced an entire generation.
Star Wars: A New Hope premiered in the United States May 25, 1977. The film that most had branded as uninteresting and even class B, surprised everyone.
George Lucas had just directed two films that, although they were well received by critics, went under the radar of the public, we are talking about THX 1138 from 1971 and American Graffiti from 1973.
Influenced by series like Buck Rogers in the 25th Century Y Flash Gordon and films by the great Akira Kurosawa such as The Seven Samurai (1954) or the hidden fortress (1958), Lucas gave life to his space opera.
After some adjustments, George took his idea to several studios, but it was rejected by most, only 20th Century Fox was the only one that, although suspicious, decided to bet on Lucas’s idea.
George’s closest friends, like Brian de Palma, Francis Ford Coppolaincluding the cast chosen for the story, they thought they were facing a failure, just as it had happened to other films of the genre. Against all odds and with a budget that climbed to $13 million dollarsStar Wars grossed more than $775 million dollars.
Leveraging your 45th anniversarywe are going to do something that we really enjoy here in quever.news, review the curiosities most important parts of the film, even those that many are surely unaware of.
George, let’s shorten the name
One of the main supports Lucas received in dealing with his Star Wars script came from his friend, Francis Ford Coppola. Director of The Godfather was one of the privileged to read the first draft of the document, and although it did not give him a good feeling, I thought the story could work.
During the reading, Francis remarked that he needed to do an urgent title reduction if he wanted to sell the idea. At first the story had the “little” name of Adventures of the Starkiller as taken from the Journal of the Whills, Saga I: The Star Wars.
Coppola’s wise words had an effect on Lucas, who did not hesitate at his friend’s suggestion and began to give the story a new title and focus.
A totally different hero
Following in the line of the first drafts, Lucas had approached his characters in a totally different way. For example, Han Solo was a tall, humanoid alien with gray skin.
In the case of Luke, this had been imagined as a retired general, advanced in years and had the name Kane Starkiller. When George began to make changes suggested by Coppola, he changed the hero’s story from him, turning him into a simple farmer, with a big heart and a desire to go out and explore the world, thus Luke Skywalker was born.
The first Chewbacca
Once George had a near-final version of the script, he turned it over to Ralph McQuarrie. The great artist began to bring George’s vision to life. Thanks to Ralph, the story not only had his characters, but also the incredible space machinery seen in the original trilogy.
When Ralph started creating Han Solo and his faithful companion Chewbacca, created a totally different character than the one we know. George saw the design and liked it, but suggested changes. So that the artist could understand what he wanted, George revealed the true inspiration for the character: his dog Alaskan Malamute called Indiana.
The same dog that inspired Lucas to create Indiana Jones served to guide McQuirre in shaping the beloved Wookiee prince and warrior into final form.
Anyway the original design was not discardedonly minor modifications were made, such as remove hair that he had all over his body. Shortly after the character was used in the Star Wars Universe Expansion, being listed as part of the Lasat race. Years later the original chewie was used for the animated series Star Wars: Rebels, where he was renamed Garazeb Orrelios and nicknamed zeb.
Harrison, I need help.
For the casting George made a premise clear, I didn’t want well-known actors and actresseswanted new people. Taking this into account, the team began the search among the people who showed up for the casting.
For the role of space smuggler Han Solo, inspired by Francis Ford Coppola, several renowned stars appeared, such as Kurt Russell or even Sylvester Stallone. He also became part of the casting Robert Englundresponsible for giving life to Freddy Krueger in the Nightmare on Elm Street series.
Although there were a good number of stars, the production still had doubts about the star for the role of Han. In parallel, George asked his carpenter friend and star of his second film, Harrison Ford, to help with the reading of the script to the first chosen ones. Ford did his job so well that Lucas broke the rule of not hiring experienced actors. Habemus Han Solo!
bet between friends
During the filming of Star Wars, the various problems on the set and the impossibility of his vision being reflected, worried George Lucas. The director came to feel that his film was not going to work. While this was going on, George was talking to steven spielberg. The person in charge of jaws (1975) encouraged his friend not to lose hope.
On a visit to the set of Close Encounters of the Third Kind, George was surprised by what Steven was doing, this lowered his self-esteem again and invited his friend to a bet. According to Spielberg, George offered 2.5% of Star Wars in exchange of 2.5% Close Encountersthinking that his colleague’s film was going to be more successful.
George was totally wrong, star wars was devastating, vastly outperforming Close Encounters. Considering all the money the film made, not only at the box office but also in merchandising, Spielberg received an astronomical figure.
the blessed figures
Not only the directors or the cast thought that Lucas’s story was not going to succeed, the Kenner company did too. This toy company obtained the rights to create action figures and vehicles from the film. As they thought that it would not generate an impact, they decided to create a reduced number of products.
Shortly after Star Wars was released, the action figures and vehicles were completely sold out, there was no stock left even for Christmas sales. Kenner was stunned and fans clamored for more figures. The company sped up production by announcing that from February 1978, hopefully, there would be stock.
To this day, many of these blessed figures are appreciated by Star Wars collectors and fans, especially since some of them are valued at thousands of dollars.
All these stories and the others that exist, give more weight to the creation of Lucas. 45 years after the beginning of its path, it is clear that the impact that Star Wars caused on cinema and people will continue for many more years.
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