This one has nothing to do with the movies, or lining up for the movies ....
... but rather was a trip to Death Valley to visit all the Star Wars filming sites!!!!!
Words cannot describe how awesome that was. We were a group of around 25 ... and while a few of us were visiting Star Wars second unit filming locations .... most of us were on frelling TATOOINE!!!!!
Sand gets everywhere on the Dunes where Artoo took off on his own, much too rocky way. Having a miniature R2 really helped recreate the scene (actually, just one shot in the movie was filmed here).
Toys also helped sell the perspective of the Sandcrawler canyon. And I could swear I saw a landspeeder zooming across the salt flats in the center of the Valley, where the heat distortion subsituted nicely for vaseline-smeared lenses.
The most fun was to be had at Artoo's arroyo, as there were several shots filmed here of the poor droid's encounter with scavenging Jawas. And nearby was the bluff where Sandpeople were spotted by an unsuspecting Luke Skywalker, as well as the canyon floor where those same Tusken Raiders hop adroitley upon their Banthas (both played by a single elephant trucked in from Los Angeles). So many second unit shots were captured in this particular area that even the most stoic among us finally felt as if they were really visiting a certain planet farthest from the bright center of the universe.
But I think I most enjoyed the Mos Eisley overlook. Because we could get cars almost right up to the cliff edge, we were able to blare the appropriate John Williams soundtrack que .... over and over and over again. How many times can you never see a more wretched hive of scum and villainy?
Kudos to my friend Kolby who, on previous visits to Death Valley, had researched and mapped out all the filming sites, and had interviewed many of the national park personnel and local residents who had memories of the second unit filming for the unlikely hit movie.
And though there were probably less than a dozen shots filmed in Death Valley for Star Wars, the location simpy IS Tatooine. It was eerie, and more coolsville than I could have possibly imagined.
(Oh, and we visited a couple of Return of the Jedi Tatooine filming sites, too.)
What a great Star Wars Day!