George Lucas: Changes are not unusual — I mean, most movies when they release them they make changes.
Oh yeah George???
Name one.
Or better yet, name three.
Name the latest three movies that have been released that were 'changed'.
That whole issue between filmmakers and the studios with the studios being able to change things without even letting the director of the movie know … I’m very much involved in that [so that’s not happening here]. …
Yeah, just like Richard Marquard and Irvin Kershner being able to change their-... oh... wait...
The controversy over who shot first, Greedo or Han Solo, in Episode IV, what I did was try to clean up the confusion, but obviously it upset people because they wanted Solo [who seemed to be the one who shot first in the original] to be a cold-blooded killer, but he actually isn’t.
It was obvious that Han was the only one to shoot. And it didn't make him out to be a cold-blooded killer. Han knew that if he didn't kill Greedo, Greedo would've killed him. Also, why didn't you bother to alter a bunch of other time Han shoots first, like when he shoots the panel on the death star... Or when he shoots a stormtrooper. Hmmmm??????
It had been done in all close-ups and it was confusing about who did what to whom.
No it wasn't. And even if it was, the audience would've been able to figure it out by the fact that Greedo's smoldering body flops onto the table, dead, whilst Han walks off.
It’s the same thing with Yoda. We tried to do Yoda in CGI in Episode I, but we just couldn’t get it done in time. We couldn’t get the technology to work, so we had to use the puppet, but the puppet really wasn’t as good as the CGI.
The puppet wasn't any good, but it at least it was a real thing and not a cartoon.
If you look at Blade Runner, it’s been cut sixteen ways from Sunday and there are all kinds of different versions of it.
And do you see people complaining about that? No you don't, by the simple fact that they are all available. If Ridley Scott decided to JUST release his 'Final Cut', people would be pretty pissed off. It is possible for more than one version of something to exist.
Star Wars, there’s basically one version — it just keeps getting improved a little bit as we move forward. … All art is technology and it improves every year.
Not all Art is Technology, you dumbass.
Whether it’s on the stage or in music or in painting, there are technological answers that happen, and because movies are so technological, the advances become more obvious.
But it's also important for people to see how far things have advanced. Like the fact that we now shoot films in colour instead of Black and White, which all films were shot in prior to colour films. It is important to see the progression, like comparing the special effects of something like 'Metropolis' to 'Blade Runner'. Or Comparing 'Chuck Berry' to 'The Beatles'.
Jeez!