Save Star Wars Dot Com

I was looking forward to spending a weekend at my parents cottage yesterday, but due to the four consecutive jobs I work, I was unable. Burnt out from work, I became extremely frustrated. I was reading a thread on the Baltimore I.B. Screening and BaronlandoCalrissian remarked how frustrating it is that whenever there's a fucking Star Wars stickerbook released, websites like TFN will report on it, while ignoring what is probably the most important issue facing the franchise today: the suppression of the theatrical films.

In my anger, and with the help of a few beers, I decided: You know what, originaltrilogy.com is nice, but we need more than this. It's a forum and a petition, and of limited use. We need something more visible, accessible and comprehensive, and we need a brighter beacon of protest against all this bullshit.

So I made http://savestarwars.com

Now, it is under construction. I literally just started last night, working from a website template since I have virtually no html skills. Many of the texts and graphics are temporary. Many pages don't exist. But you can view the home page, the editorials page and the resources page and see what is there (the individual articles aren't up, except for How the Grinch Stole Star Wars).

But you can see what I am going for. I don't want to pull any punches, but I don't want it to be just fanboy bitching. And I want it to be well researched and informative, to actually educate people.

I'm posting the work in progress here for some input and suggestions. I might also want to bring in a guest editorial from some people here.

What I know I need right now: 1977 screen photographs. I know the X0 people had a bunch. I've seen them posted from time to time in threads. But they are floating around in a million threads. Does anyone have this complete collection? I'd like to preserve it. Moth3r, I'm looking at you. :p

Also, mods: I realize this should be in the "support" thread. I'll move it there once it's up and running but for now I want to keep it here for visibility while I build it.

Great idea!

Shouldn't the focus of relying on LFL to preserve SW come to a close.  They, like fan editors, want to play with it why the franchise can still draw a crowd.  Let them play, fatigue will eventually set in.  For me it makes sense to at this point attempt to create a distribution system which can link up the few remaining prints of this film with the theaters who want/can still play them.  While I was bootlegging the 30th anniversary ESB presentation in Time Square, a random passerby-er let me know that most of the theaters in NYC have gone digital and all the projectionists are being let go, since you can higher a kid in high school to run the new digital projection systems at vastly reduced prices.  This is not just an issue of this specific movie never to again be able to be seen in it's original form, it's all of movies making the transition.  It would make some sense that the last generation of film projectors and film projectionists should get their day in the lamp light.  Show off their craft and present great movies the way it used to be done.  In one or two generations the last of the film projectionists will probably be dead.  So like this recent screening in Baltimore, it seems like a fantastic idea to create a website which can link projectors with old film stock.  Not sure if that's something you want to consider.

No, not the 70mm scans. Someone took 35mm photos of the theatre screen in 1977. I've seen the SD flyby, the Jawas selling the droids and the R2 canyon scene posted in various threads. Undoubtedly these are just samples from a larger collection.

They were things I threw out there but I do plan on following through. I was just kind of brainstorming ideas to sort of touch upon everything that needed to be, but I think they are solid enough to go with.

I've been adding pages over the last day or two, but I just put up the theatrical audio resources page, it's not completel but if anyone sees any incorrect information there please feel free to correct it.

http://savestarwars.com/theatricalaudioresources.html

Doubleofive: Good page. I'll put in the links section.

The mix and volume level, as far as is reported. See this thread: http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/ESB-ROTJ-Audio-Mixes/topic/10519/

Darth Mallwalker said:

Do you mean the quote from JayArgonaut regarding Lando's line?
IME that's describing a difference between the THX mix vs. its predecessors,
not a difference between 1478-80 & 1478-85.

So I'd forgotten about the UK PAL 1478-80, which shares the same catalog number with it's domestic counterpart. That confuses the discussion.

The NTSC 1478-80 pressed by Pioneer in Carson, California has copyright (c)1986 (not '85) and it Shirley contains a digital track. I'm holding it now.
I've got a hunch that's the one d_j captured too.

As for the actual contents of the PAL 1478-80, that's still up in the air it seems...

 Yeah I think I was confused about a discussion on the dual audio options on 1425-84. All these catalog numbers can be confusing. :p

Msycamore: The 1995 track has bits from the mono mix added into it, IIRC. I didn't know the 1993 release was THX certified though, thanks. They made such a big deal over the 1995 audio because it was THX, I thought that was the first instance.

Also, cool 70mm links, could be useful.

The 1995 mix has mono elements, while the 1993 DC mix does not, right? Even though its just DC+mono, that still qualifies it as a seperate mix. It's based on the DC mix, but it's not the DC mix.

Michael Coate has written articles about the theatrical releases (specifically what theaters and runs) of the films, some of the articles have pictures:

http://www.in70mm.com/news/2003/star_wars/index.htm

Another article from the site with pic:

http://www.in70mm.com/newsletter/2000/62/dolby/index.htm

http://www.fromscripttodvd.com/star_wars_a_day_long_remembered.htm

http://cinematreasures.org/news/16528_0_1_0_C/

These two links are other places which could lead to people who might have photographs/info of the movie, or other information helpful to SaveStarWars.com

The 70mm collector film cels from the 90s, are those of useful reference?

http://astrogalaxy.blogspot.com/2008/05/star-wars-film-cels-posters-and-cards.html