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Subject: 
Re: He just keeps getting dumber - no original cuts? what's next?
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.starwars
Date: 
Wed, 25 Feb 2004 20:33:34 GMT
Viewed: 
1005 times
  
In lugnet.starwars, Allan Bedford wrote:
But wait....... why not edit in some ancient test footage and animate over
a pathetic Jaba so that Han can slow down, take a minute and have a
'conversation'.  It ruins completely the pacing of the film.  In any DVD
you'd see of a current movie that shot would end up in the deleted scenes
because an editor of any talent would know to cut it.  And don't forget that
it was really just test footage that was never completed.

Fine, make me dig out the old video... (ah, I don't believe I've watched it
since pre-SE days, so I don't mind)  Okay, if you have a copy of "From Star Wars
to Jedi: The Making of a Saga" (released in conjunction with the THX remastered
trilogy), they actually include the Jabba MacHutt footage and George's
explanation for why it was filmed.  It was never meant to be test footage.  They
didn't have the time/money to complete a working Jabba costume for the filmed
version, so what he intended to do was matte a stop-motion Jabba in afterwards.
Turns out he didn't have the time/money to do that either, so it never got
completed.  The very same footage used in ANH:SE was originally intended to have
been included in the original cut.  My biggest complaint about it was that the
scene really does nothing good for Jabba's image.  If it had involved some sort
of shoot-out and Han just barely managing to escape intact, that would have been
better as far as Jabba was concerned.  The storyline pacing isn't affected at
all, since Luke and Ben spend a lot more time on their trip to sell the
landspeeder, but the storytelling pace does slow up a bit more than it should
have.  However, as proven by Peter Jackson, storytelling pace is much more of a
concern when editing for a theatrical release than when doing so for a DVD
release (a lot of the Extended scenes absolutely kill the storytelling pace of
the movie, but many of them are still really cool to watch).  Moviegoers want to
watch the whole movie non-stop and hold that Super-Jumbo-Slurp in until the
credits start (or maybe end).  DVD-watchers are more willing to split a movie up
into multiple viewings as they have the option of hitting the pause button while
they go prepare a snack or answer an important phone call.

The biggest advantage gained by not including it in the original cut was that
Jabba's physical design had never been finalized when it came time to do RotJ,
and none of the ANH-era design proposals that I've ever seen made him seem
nearly as menacing as he does as a giant slug.  I think that has something to do
with the fact that when you look at Jabba lying there on a slab of rock, he
seems like he should be near-helpless and entirely at the mercy of his minions,
but they're all terrified of him.



Message has 1 Reply:
  Re: He just keeps getting dumber - no original cuts? what's next?
 
(...) Was Jabba supposed to be a slug originally? This scene is included in the novel, and Jabba is clearly human. If the filmed scene was supposed to have an animated Jabba superimosed over the actor, then why was the actor in costume? I'd be (...) (21 years ago, 26-Feb-04, to lugnet.starwars)

Message is in Reply To:
  Re: He just keeps getting dumber - no original cuts? what's next?
 
(...) I think he was (key word 'was') both a good director and writer. Don't forget what came before Star Wars. THX 1138 and American Graffiti are both solid, if not classic, works of the screen. (...) Episode I proved that an entire movie without a (...) (21 years ago, 18-Feb-04, to lugnet.starwars)

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