Originally posted by: zombie84
By the same token Luke rushing back to the farm only to discover it burnt to the ground and his family massacred is probably the most memorable scene from The Searchers. The Cantina brawl is from Yojimbo, many other plot points from Hidden Fortress, and 1/4 of ESB is taken from Dersu Uzala, including the characters of Yoda and the scene where Han has to save Luke in the snowstorm. Star Wars is an amalgum of sources, some of the specific, some of the vague, some of the just images and shots and some of them whole scenes and characters. I don't think its fair to write off a scene because it was taken from somewhere else. If it works, it works. And Superman wasn't the only one to have a scene such as that--its an archetypal scene relating to the powerless people have over inevitable death.
Originally posted by: CO
I agree that Lucas took many things from his directors he loved as a kid, but the Anakin at Shmi thing is more of a plot point rather then a visual that was lifted from a previous movie.
This scene where Anakin talks to his mom at the grave is the key to the whole PT, this is the changing of Anakin, and eventually is the reason he turns to the darkside, and the exact scene and plot point is from Superman:The Movie, except Anakin couldn't turn back time by flying around the earth.
The key death scene in the OT is when Obiwan falls to Vader with Luke looking on, and Luke is never the same after that, and as far as I know that wasn't lifted from any movie, cause I can't remember any movie using the force ghost issue before SW.
Originally posted by: zombie84
Well thats hardly an legitimate argument against it. By that logic, most of the OT should be discarded because Lucas completely took scenes and imagery from other films--in fact the shot of Luke viewing the burning homestead, is, as i mentioned, taken from John Ford's The Searchers. Personally i found the schmi death to be a typical moment of the PT--a highly charged emotional scene that had the power to be poignant and touching, but was madly mishandled and only achieves a fraction of its power. Pernilla August was dreadful, the editing was sloppy and there is that cheesy moment that just instantly pulls you out of the film--she is having a poetic death scene but then she slumps her back dead, instantly. Its like a high school play. It's moments like that that just make even the best of the PT have some kind of ackward mar on it that any other director would been aware enough to avoid.
Well thats hardly an legitimate argument against it. By that logic, most of the OT should be discarded because Lucas completely took scenes and imagery from other films--in fact the shot of Luke viewing the burning homestead, is, as i mentioned, taken from John Ford's The Searchers. Personally i found the schmi death to be a typical moment of the PT--a highly charged emotional scene that had the power to be poignant and touching, but was madly mishandled and only achieves a fraction of its power. Pernilla August was dreadful, the editing was sloppy and there is that cheesy moment that just instantly pulls you out of the film--she is having a poetic death scene but then she slumps her back dead, instantly. Its like a high school play. It's moments like that that just make even the best of the PT have some kind of ackward mar on it that any other director would been aware enough to avoid.
I agree that Lucas took many things from his directors he loved as a kid, but the Anakin at Shmi thing is more of a plot point rather then a visual that was lifted from a previous movie.
This scene where Anakin talks to his mom at the grave is the key to the whole PT, this is the changing of Anakin, and eventually is the reason he turns to the darkside, and the exact scene and plot point is from Superman:The Movie, except Anakin couldn't turn back time by flying around the earth.
The key death scene in the OT is when Obiwan falls to Vader with Luke looking on, and Luke is never the same after that, and as far as I know that wasn't lifted from any movie, cause I can't remember any movie using the force ghost issue before SW.
By the same token Luke rushing back to the farm only to discover it burnt to the ground and his family massacred is probably the most memorable scene from The Searchers. The Cantina brawl is from Yojimbo, many other plot points from Hidden Fortress, and 1/4 of ESB is taken from Dersu Uzala, including the characters of Yoda and the scene where Han has to save Luke in the snowstorm. Star Wars is an amalgum of sources, some of the specific, some of the vague, some of the just images and shots and some of them whole scenes and characters. I don't think its fair to write off a scene because it was taken from somewhere else. If it works, it works. And Superman wasn't the only one to have a scene such as that--its an archetypal scene relating to the powerless people have over inevitable death.
Don't forget Lord of the Rings. People don't usually mention it, but you can construct a large amount of the plot backbone for Star Wars and Empire out of LotR. I wrote something about it awhile ago, let me see if I can look that up...