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Post #1081901

Author
poita
Parent topic
4K restoration on Star Wars
Link to post in topic
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/1081901/action/topic#1081901
Date created
7-Jun-2017, 9:38 AM

I bit the bullet and contacted everyone I know at Disney, that is in any way related to film restoration. The answer every time wasn’t a ‘can’t say’ or ‘no comment’ but more a baffled “Original Versions? No, no-one is assigned to anything like that” or variations on that theme.
I don’t think they have any plans at all for an original release, or at least nothing in the next five years, things could always change, but nothing appears to be even vaguely on the drawing board.

With that in mind, and the awful feeling in my gut that the SE of Star Wars has now been around for longer than the time between the first screening of Star Wars in 1977 and the Special Edition of ANH being released, I am putting together a team of professional restoration people from companies I work for and have worked for in the past, to restore the damn thing from the available prints, in 4K at a much higher quality level than we have been able to do before. The fan base has achieved amazing things, but so much more can be done now.
Starting with Empire as it is the one about to disappear due to print fade, and then Star Wars, and finally Jedi.
There are places in the world where the Star Wars copyright runs out within the next decade, I feel it is important that a proper, professional restoration takes place now, and is held until the copyright expires, to ensure that the original theatrical versions are not lost. Also that the originals are available, and restored for anyone studying film history, or researchers to be able to use as a definitive version, representative of the films as they were in 1977, 1980 and 1983.
I know many love the Special Editions, and I don’t begrudge their existence, but film history is also important to preserve.

I also have a personal health deadline that is approaching slowly, and I want to ensure this gets done, even if I can’t continue. I have registered an official archive, which lets us hold prints and restore them, I am getting some help to get the online side of things up and running, but hopefully by the end of next month, we will have it all up and running.
More news soon.