Are the people here of the opinion that George was never talented, or do you guys think it’s more of a Francis Ford Coppola situation where he just lost his touch?
The second. Star Wars is a fine film. It is often said that it was saved in editing, and that the first cut was terrible, but I simply can’t picture the editors turning a really bad film into the one we know today. If anything, post-production enhanced material that was already in place.
You should take a look at what was chopped out of the original. There aren’t many deleted scenes to view right now, but just reading about what was cut… I’d say the film was saved by Marcia Lucas during editing.
George is great at ideas, but needs people to help steer. That’s not a slam against Lucas at all. I think it’s been pretty well documented that Lucas realized this himself and that’s why he took a step back for ESB. Then production difficulties forced him to resume some of the duties during ROTJ. By the mid 90’s I think his hubris got the better of him and he started to believe his own hype.