Originally posted by: Mielr
I actually suggested having Jay be the leader of this a while back, but somebody said that Jay might not approve of buying the DVDs in the first place. I'd still really like to hear what Jay thinks about this sendback idea, though. The purpose of this site now could be to organize a mass-sendback movement, instead of the petition site that it once was.
Originally posted by: Mike O
We won't know until we try. Don't worry, you don't sound like a curmudgeon. You're just being a realist. But before, it was a waiting game. Now, it seems, that the battle for Helm's Deep (the OOT) is over and the Battle for Middle Earth (a high quality release) is about to begin. [passionate rant] We must fight.
I actually suggested having Jay be the leader of this a while back, but somebody said that Jay might not approve of buying the DVDs in the first place. I'd still really like to hear what Jay thinks about this sendback idea, though. The purpose of this site now could be to organize a mass-sendback movement, instead of the petition site that it once was.
Originally posted by: Mike O
We won't know until we try. Don't worry, you don't sound like a curmudgeon
. You're just being a realist. But before, it was a waiting game. Now, it seems, that the battle for Helm's Deep (the OOT) is over and the Battle for Middle Earth (a high quality release) is about to begin. [passionate rant] We must fight. I'd fully be behind another petition, but I won't be giving my money to Lucas for a non-anamorphic, "limited-time-only" DVD set that treats these historical movies as bonus features. This treatment screams that he is only begrudgingly putting the originals out. And not only that, but it amounts to scare-tactics as well. "You better be happy that we're giving them to you at all. Now, pre-order them before there never available again!"
The marketing that his company has done for the SE release has been nothing short of misrepresentation, if not outright lying. Anyone who goes into Best Buy to buy the currently available DVDs will find no indication that the DVDs are anything but the original versions. They are simply labeled as STAR WARS TRILOGY.
It's the attitude that Lucas seems to exude regarding the originals that really has taken a lot of the fun out of being a fan. The illusion of a masterpiece has been shattered, now that the supposed master seems to be only a leader of a team who has produced three movies that he doesn't consider to be his "true vision", aka, not true master works.
Lucas seems to pride himself on being an auteur filmmaker, and, yet, so much of what made his originals so powerful seems to be the creativity of so many others that worked with him. And this creativity, he seems to readily disregard in favor of supplanting it with his own extrremely after-the-fact retooling.
Why won't he graciously accept the fact that the originals are what made him and that people love the versions they grew up with?
As Aldous Huxley, author of the sci-fi and literary classic BRAVE NEW WORLD, said about his most popular work:
"[T]o attempt to patch a faulty work into the perfection it missed at its first execution, to spend one's middle age in trying to mend the artistic sins committed and bequeathed by that different person who was oneself in youth - all this is surely vain and futile."
I won't be paying Lucas for SE ammunition to throw right back at him. I'll be more content to tell my kids, "Not too long ago in a reality not too far away, there existed three of the most magical movies ever made..."
That is, unless of course, they end up on Blue-Ray or HD-DVD, which isn't a possibility too far afield.
It will be interesting to hear how all of this pans out, and I will be sending another round or two of emails to the people in charge telling them that I won't be buying the September release. But, for now, this is the straw that broke the bantha's back.
SW: R.I.P. - 9/12/06