You actually make my point! You saw the OT when you had already been immersed in contemporary film making and special effects. You are a product of your generation.
I don’t get that. So you’re saying that it is a huge difference if you watch the PT as an adult and immediatly don’t like it or if you watch it as a kid and first like it but then realize how flawed it is? And this somehow proves that these movies are better than people say they are?
Some of the people that frequent these forums rnage in age from 45-50. They saw the movie in 1977 as young children. At the time, there was nothing else in entertainment even close to SW. Movies were stagnant and rehashed ideas. The cinema experience was droll and nothing too special outside of a good Disney cartoon. So a child in 1977 with his cinema going resume being at most, a spaghetti western, a Disney cartoon or some stale racecar movie had very little to compare to SW. SW blew people away in 77’. But to kids, it transported them to a different place in their imagination, to some, it was life altering. Fast forward 20 years. A child seeing SW for the first time in 1997-2005 already has an exstensive resume in cinematic/TV/media experience e.g. “Jurassic Park”, “ET”, “Harry Potter” etc. So SW isnt going to have the affect that it did in 77’ on a child who experiences it 20-30 years later. The times were so different that they cant be compared. Now, in the present, as adults, its much tougher to impress us. Like you said, we see the flaws, we critique every little nuance. We expect the new movies to move us like they did when we were kids and they dont quite measure up. Since thats the case and we cant return to the innocence of childhood, we have to do our best to channel our inner child and be as objective as possible when viewing the PT. The PT will never match the OT’s affect it had on me as a kid. But I sure try and imagine how I wouldve received it had I seen it as a 7-13 yr old. Im not saying that theyre better than folks say they are. Im saying its tough to be objective when viewing them. We have so many great movies of the genre since the release of the OT to compare the PT to, that its really tough for PT to measure up. The OT had no competition, nothing to compare it to. It was the litmus test for everything to come. I agree with you and others, the PT fell short in more ways than I can count. But I choose to overlook those short comings and look at it as I might of as a child. I go back to a time when I was 9 or 10 and recall how after hearing Obi-Wan tell Luke of the clone wars and how I imagined that it mighve looked. Then I look at AOTC from that that mindset and I get a bit more enjoyment out of it. Thats all Im saying. Despite the PT being a let down, I try and view it as I might have when i was a kid, a kid from 1977 who was blown away by SW. A kid who had no other referance material to draw from. Can you say that your experience was devoid of other comparable material that might have detracted from you first experience of SW?