Then I strongly suggest you watch more movies, and that is all I have to say.
George Lucas: Star Wars stood on the shoulders of Star Trek
- Thread starter serenitytrek1
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Then I strongly suggest you watch more movies, and that is all I have to say.
trevanian
Rear Admiral
I've been content to politely disagree up to this point, but man!
"camerawork is as good as anything filmed in the last 25 years." WTF?!
By ANY standard, the prequel camerawork is desultory at best. Moving camera shots for live-action are unimaginative, as is the staging. Christ, look at stuff in TFF -- the way the camera moves to reframe the actors in the officer's lounge is subtle and cinematic, even if the vfx are godawful.
Some of this is due to the digital backlot approach with the minimal to nonexistent sets (something I'm happy to see there being a backlash about now, with most directors wanting at least a half-set to shoot with, even on fantasy films.) Some of it is due to the limitations of the digital cameras, (the shot of Anakin on the flying motorbike in CLONES had me thinking, 'this looks like BARNEY MILLER!') But for the most part, it is due to a director making as few choices on-set as possible, trying to create all his magic in editorial -- and then failing to do so.
No thanks. I've got better things to do.
Lucas snatched up the Star Wars sequel and merchandising rights, while Roddenberry was asked if he wanted to buy the rights from Paramount to Star Trek and he ended up turning it down. Which person ended up with the billions of dollars? Lucas was certainly the better businessman.
As one of those VFX artists, I 100% completely agree with this post.
Hell, Silver Linings Playbook, which I worked on last year, had a pretty large amount of VFX work, all of it subtle, and all of it having to be completely invisible.
As for Georgie....please keep that man as far away from Star Trek as possible. Just look at Red Tails, obviously a passion project for him. Yes, he didn't direct it (though I think he did reshoots), yet it has all of the traits of a more recent GL production, including atrocious dialogue.
He is a great ideas man, and he's added a lot to the world of film making, but his recent directorial efforts have been completely sub-par. Just because he helped think of and create the technology, doesn't mean he is the best at getting the most out of it.
To be a bit of a pedant...
Special Effects refers to effects that happen on set (sometimes called practical effects).
Visual Effects or Optical Effects are those created in post.
As to Lucas, really, he was never a good director of actors, as many stories about Star Wars and American Graffiti indicated even back in the day. He understood how to shoot a documentary look which is what gave those films verisimilitude and grounds Star Wars in particular. As a writer he's not good, which is why he had to bring in other writers to help him polish Star Wars and why he hired other writers to do Empire and Jedi.
And to be fair to Roddenberry, who's to say he had the money necessary to buy the rights to Star Trek back if/when they were offered?
Special Effects refers to effects that happen on set (sometimes called practical effects).
Visual Effects or Optical Effects are those created in post.
As to Lucas, really, he was never a good director of actors, as many stories about Star Wars and American Graffiti indicated even back in the day. He understood how to shoot a documentary look which is what gave those films verisimilitude and grounds Star Wars in particular. As a writer he's not good, which is why he had to bring in other writers to help him polish Star Wars and why he hired other writers to do Empire and Jedi.
And to be fair to Roddenberry, who's to say he had the money necessary to buy the rights to Star Trek back if/when they were offered?
serenitytrek1
Commander
George Lucas is underrated and am I the only one who thinks that the Star Wars Prequels were not as bad as people have made it out to be.
Canadian, actually.
Who do you think you're targetting when you sell with sex, action and violence ? Women and the elderly ?
Depends how many times they buy tickets to swoon at Leonardo.
I think they're pretty good, myself, although there's plenty wrong with them, too.
Okay once again you keep telling me movies were exactly the same but which movies are you talking about?
I am also not saying teenagers didn't go to movies, they just were not the main target audience like they are today.
Look up Woman's pictures, I am not talking about things like Titantic. Try looking at films of stars like Bette Davis, Olivia de Havillland, Barbara Stanwyck, etc.
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Well, he's one of the most famous directors of all-time, and given countless amounts of credit for things he aint done, all because of his work on one movie. I'd class that as the opposite of underrated.
They're very flat.
To describe Lucas's direction for Star Wars Episode I, Star Wars Episode II, and Star Wars Episode III as anything other than functional, strikes me as hyperbole.
Well you must be watching some different films then...because...damn, some bad decisions were made in those movies. The underlying architecture of the plot may be okay, but everything else is serviceable at best, awful at worst.
Yea, agreed, no film is as bad as some make out the Star Wars Prequels to be.
Having said that, there are many problems with them, dialogue and wooden performances being the chief amongst them, which comes down to George Lucas operating in a capacity it would be best he didn't (IE: Writing script by himself and Directing actors)
He will be very valuable in the future of Star Wars, continuing to pitch ideas, but, no more writing of dialogue or Directing the performances, please. He got terrible performances from some very good actors.
First off, please include the name of the person you're quoting, if you want me to know you're replying to me.
Second, I never said they were exactly the same.
Another thing I didn't claim. Mayhap you should read my posts more slowly.
Why exclude movies the box office returns of which women contribute greatly to ?
I did not erase your name on purpose. I was replying on my iPod and sometimes it is hard for me to quote on there.
Okay and I never said everything was a 100% different just that that there is a difference.
And maybe you shouldn't make assumptions. I never said you claimed this. I was clarifying my own points that I was referring to the primary target audience not actual movie audiences.
My point was that today that primary target audience is teenagers, in the past this was not the case.
Because I was talking about a very specific type of film.
Yeah there are still women's pictures today & maybe you can claim Titantic is part of this (and was a big success) but you can't claim that studios are clamoring to make dramas for adult women today, when in the past this was a huge market. And I am not talking one successful movie every few years.
No, there are other people that are also wrong.
Ok at this point you're just replying for the sake of replying. Let's drop this.
Like no-one else? Seriously? More than the Lumiere brothers, Sergei Eisenstein, DW Griffith, or Orson Welles?
Lucas had the good fortune to work with a terrific, innovative special effects company. He had the luck of being the director of the movie their special effects sequences were placed in. To view him as not only a cinematic genius, but THE cinematic genius, is ludicrous.
I'd take ENT S3 and ENT S4 over a huge chunk of Star Trek, so I must disagree. I think it's a damn shame ENT was cancelled, and in no way is this a satisfactory replacement.
A terrific, innovative special effects comapnay he helped create.
The SW prequels were totally ruined by the unbelievably miscast Annikin Skywalker. This guy becoming Darth Vader fits about as well as Wesley Crusher growing up to be John McClane.
And they sucked besides.
And they sucked besides.
They weren't that bad. Yes the dialogue is silly and the humour is lame, but they were visually impressive (mostly) and they had plenty of memorable stuff. I can't say if I blame Christensen for the bad portrayal of Anakin or Lucas for his direction. Anyway, I like them, but to me there's no denying that the CG series is better.
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