Mike O

I was hoping he'd be able to do the swordfights for The Hobbit to give continuity with the LOTR trilogy. A great contributor to cinema, he will be missed. 

RATLSNAKE said:

greenpenguino said:

I was going through the extras of Gangs of New York, and apparently George Lucas came and visited the set. He kept complaining about why they were building actual sets or something, and he said it should've all been done digitally. Mr Scorsese ignored him.

 

Nothing would please me more than a public statement by his "pals". Marty, Francis, De Palma, etc.

Like off the cuff comments, not intending to be harsh, in an interview about something semi-related, where they just blurt out "...his (Lucas) obsession with digital technology is a little one sided, it's a tool but a tool to use sparingly. He should've released his original movies by now in hi-def, I'm still waiting myself!"

One can dream right? lol I wonder what's the chance Marty said in his mind: "Yeah ok, fuck off now Georgie".

 

I do remember, or perhaps misremember, that when the theatrical version of E.T. was announced to be the one on the Blu-Ray disc, Spielberg talked about how he felt he was done with altering his own films and would look to the future instead of the past. I think he said that he felt that he saw his priorities in this situation as being different from those of Lucas. 

CatBus said:

negative1 said:

i personally try to stay as far away from people as possible, and haven't

had to relate to them in the last several years

"Hell is other people." --Sartre

I work retail, I'll tell you stories.

Mr. Bungle said:

We’re doing 3D versions of all six films, one a year, starting in February of next year. We start with [episode] one and go all the way through six, totally chronological. One a year, if they work. If they don’t, then there will be just one [episode converted to 3D].

-Rick McCallum

I just don't know what constitutes "work".

 

Making money.

doubleofive said:

none said:

Rumor that 3D AotC and RotS to be shifted to 6 month release schedule:

http://twitter.com/#!/CineMeGeek/status/170823038969987072

via: clubjade.net

Yes, when your first 3D release is panned for being a bad conversion, hurry up and get the rest of them out there.

Who cares? People are paying hand over fist for them regardless of what they look like? It say Star Wars, people will go, the SW brand name increases rather than decreases in power as time goes by.

georgec said:

Can't wait for George to blame the fans when they ask for the other movies in 3D and he says that they didn't give him enough money to see Jar Jar get farted on in 3D.

Still can't understand why people would want any of the movies, prequel or original, in 3D. Yes, I realize it's a fad and people like it for the kiddies, but anyone with half a brain should realize that giving George money to sell them the same garbage over and over again is a bad thing.

Yes, apparently not. Like I said, it's a drug, people will pay for anything with the name on it.

darth_ender said:

A should-be, would-be, could-be, or has-been professional movie critic

I wanted to be a film critic, but as I got into college, print media was dying and now that half the people on earth have blog, I don't know if I'll get to achieve my dream job. That's the Internet's fault, not Lucas', but so it goes.

CatBus said:

generalfrevious said:

Well, Lucas is still alive and making money, and Katie is being groomed to take over her father's position. We are still no closer to getting the OOT in an official and presentable release than we were 10 years ago, so getting over it is not really an option right now.

1) OOT

2) Official

3) Presentable

 

Pick any 2.  I will be perfectly satisfied with 1 & 3.  I'm honestly not sure what option 2 gets you, so perhaps you may someday determine it's not that important to you either.

Uh huh, and THX-1138? Fan preservations are for a smal clique of people and aren't going to be remembered down the road. There's a larger issue we have no way of controlling. Unlike the general, it doesn't make me wail with Shakespearean despair, but it does make me realize that we're never, ever getting the OOT properly restored and that in the major public consciousness, Lucas has won the battle and succeeded in what he wants. 

The issue isn't whether the changes improve it or not, the issue is changing things at all and you CAN get the original Hobbit. 

Exactly. This is why our whole endeavor is pointless. The ONLY think that might make Lucas interested in releasing the OOT is lost revenue and if people continue to pay for anything related to Star Wars that'll obviously never happen, and so far Star Wars as a franchise shows no signs of slowing down.

All of the discussion about what fans "Want Star Wars to be is academic amd is part of the continued bad reputation OOT fans keep foisting upon themselves. All that matters is the OOT. Do I like the PT? No, but I don't like Terminator: Salvation either and big deal, I can watch the first two until I'm blue in the face, they haven't been messed with. The OOT is all that's important and all of this just ads fuel to the long burned-out fire. 

CO said:

This interview furthers my opinion that we will NEVER see the OOT fully restored on any format.   I'm sorry, but the guy has comtempt for this part of the fanbase, and seeing his daughters tweets about the OOT fans too, she won't be releasing the OOT either when she inherits Lucasfilm.

 

Agreed. The battle is over. We've lost. This year all of the 3-D stuff and these interviews just salt the wounds. 

zombie84 said:

Yeah, it kind of bothers me that the Hobbit is only available in an edited form. BUT--and this is a big but--the original text is available in the annotated book. Since text is text, it's 100% perfect quality as the original; furthermore, it IS possible to buy ample second-hand copies of the original, again in the highest quality possible because text is text. And also, if LOTR fans were so inclined, one could easily just edit together all the original annotations in the currently-published special book; a kind of fan presentation like how we stitch together sources here. All the resources are there. Since, as far as I am aware, no Tolkien fan has done this, amid all the millions of fans and dozens of Tolkien website and communities, I must conclude that either no one cares enough to do that, or the annotated version or original second-hand copies suffice for the minority interested in the original text.

A situation completely different from the OOT, where only badly-degraded copies are available. It would be like if the original Hobbit had only been published in a photocopy packet with much of the text hard to read and no modern annotated version. Luckily Hobbit fans are fortunate to have the original text, in its original quality, plus older original copies. When Lucas puts all the OOT footage on Blu-Ray in HD as deleted scenes, I would happily shut up and get to work stitching them together into a preservation edit.

That's the thing, restoring text, especially in an age where it literally be stored pretty much anywhere digitally forever, is different from restoring a film.

TheBoost said:

I saw this flick during my little hiatus from this site. Thought I'd share my thoughts.

Didn't like it.

I don't think much of the anger directed at Lucas is fair.

If someone is a weirdo who collects 75 different Darth Vader dolls, or feels he's supposed to, and is angry about it, that's not Lucas's fault. Nor is it his fault if you obsessively collect the EU and don't like it.

If the Prequals aren't to your liking, well, that IS Lucas's fault, but it's not a personal thing. Lots of filmmakers are disapointing sometimes. You don't see "People vs. Ed Burns" for how boring his movies all were.

If the concept of midichlorians offends you somehow, that is also technically Lucas's fault, but again, how pissed can you be about a fictional virus thing?

I don't like that what I see as the only real gripes against Lucas (suppression of the OT, his documented untruths) is grouped in with a lot of (for lack of a better word) silliness.

Actual concern for film preservation and cultural heritage shouldn't be mixed with asshats singing "George Lucas Raped My Childhood."

This is a major part of why OOT fans get such a bad rap, I think, and with all of the things like this, I kind of understand why.

walking_carpet said:

i normally don't like to use anecdotal evidence, but at a superbowl party with a sharp 65' screen, we saw the commercial for the movie.  nobody booed or gave it a bronx cheer but a couple guys said 'with this big tv, why bother seeing it in the theatre? don't need the 3d".  the battleship and gi joe movies got more jeers.  surprisingly, not much enthusiasm for John Carter (man, did that commercial remind me of AOTC).

i mentioned earlier that the recent blu ray releases may put a damper on attendance - another factor is with big tvs becoming mainstream, maybe people won't care to go?

i wonder if we are going to reach a tipping point for cosumers preferring to watch movies at home because the flatscreens are large enough? ticket sales were down from 2010 to 2011 - but that was because of avatar.

anyways, i don't know what opening weekend grosses will be, but overall running I say absolute rock bottom $12 million and no more than $35 million.  Im using the lion king and BATB releases as a guide.

damn, im tired.  time for bed

John Carter I'm kind of interested in. PIXAR have always been real great artists and I like Stanton's work and it's based on a classic book. The Disney logo makes one worry and the trailers haven't been impressive, but I'll give it a shot.

I wonder how much this would have to make in proportion to how much it cost to create the 3-D version? I'm betting it'll do gangbusters because all things Star Wars do, but it'll be interesting to see.

walking_carpet said:

georgec said:

The story of George Lucas' career is a psychologists' wet dream. You see all the effects of people lauding him and giving him credit on the way he did business after Empire. He heard people saying how great he is so often that he began to believe it, and afterwards anybody who disagreed was cast aside. It's so simple in the cause/effect yet so intriguing.

Then you have the unwavering Lucas defenders who defy all logic and facts to salvage his image and prove people wrong because they don't "get" him or something like that.

 he has a core sycophancy and personality cult second only perhaps to joseph stalin.

 

I think it's comments like this that make Lucas feel the way he does though.

Anchorhead said:

AWN article; "Because of the Northridge quake, a lot of the original footage was water damaged. That’s why we knew when we went in that we were going to have to do some extensive restoration work....George went through with the editor, picked a bunch of stuff and re-edited it slightly, just to make it more what he wanted. He realized that there were scenes he wanted to expand upon… at the time with the budget that he had,"

 

Honestly.   Lucas' continued use of  - the originals were damaged, I mean it was the limited budget, I mean it was my Original Vision.  Good God, man - pick one lie and stick to it.  It's the same set of pat answers he trots out for repressing the original version of Star Wars. 

All kidding aside, the man needs an intervention - or he needs to be institutionalized. Anymore these days, he seems to have fluid stories for every project he's involved in.  He's already started it with the Red Tails promotional junkets - it was the studios trying to suppress history\me\my project - it was the critics, I mean the fans. The guy is a pathological liar.

This is the other thing. OK, the originals were "half-complete films." Fine. So what's the completed version? The 97 release? The 04 release? The 11 release?  I might buy this if he could actually stick to a consistent story. I'm not trying to criticize the man so much as trying to make sense of something I can't understand.

If the OOT was just there, this whole discussion would be academic. Lucas has taken a lot of undeserved heat and had to endure a lot immature childish comments, but the question it begs to me is, why is it so important to him? He obviously has fans since there are people who'll buy almost anything with the Star Wars name on it and more importantly, he's rich beyond measure and continues to become richer. Why does this bother him so much? It's your movie George, you said so yourself, that's fine. Do what you want with it, but that doesn't mean everyone is going to like it. That's fine, hell, I think Michael Bay is a bad filmmaker and his answer would be "Fuck you Mike. I drive a Ferarri, you work at a grocery store." Whatever one thinks of the man, he doesn't give a shit about critics.

Lucas is right, he's come under a lot of scrutiny and some of it wasn't deserved. Some of it was. But if it's more than many other filmmakers (and that's debatable), it's because Star Wars looms larger in the cultural consciousness.

TV's Frink said:

Ric O said:

TV's Frink said:

Lucas fat joke in 3...2...1...

Not what I meant.

Harmy said:

Totally true. Also films like the Alien movies, Close Encounters, Blade Runner, Terminator films and others, all have different versions included in the same BD boxset, so like you say, we are not hard to please at all, we just want what is commonplace for fans of other franchises.

Again, this isn't the only film Lucas has messed with either. Even if Star Wars does happen (Which it won't. Ever.), there's still the matter of THX 1138 or even American Graffiti, though I guess that's a minor change. This is a larger issue, and Lucas owns the stuff lock, stock, and barrel and can do whatever he pleases with impunity because, well, it's his. Raising public opinion will only go so far if we can't change his, and nothing will change his mind except him.

I don't. The only exception I could make is if it was something out of print or unavailable (ie, not subtitled in English). I understand that there's lots of shady stuff that goes on with how customers are gouged, but I don't think that gives me the right to steal anything.

Baronlando said:

7FN said:

We could mention the many reasons that have - over the past decade - given rise to the current bad feeling between George and many of his fans.

I think there should be only ever be ONE thing to publicly hold against GL at this point, the OT. The other stuff is just matters of taste and we should 't be mixing that in with a concrete, legit issue.

My sentiments exactly. I don't personally like the PT or the SE, but I don't much care, I can just choose not to watch it. The OOT, however, is the big important issue (I suppose it's too much to ask that he release un-fucked version of THX-1138 and American Graffiti while he's at it).

Baronlando said:

I don't know if Variety and the actual trade papers are what they once were. Wish we could get a banner ad on Nikki Finke/Deadline Hollywood, they all read that thing. 

(Not sure what a banner ad for this would say exactly. Purely informative maybe, we could compare the time and dollar amount spent on ONE episode of the new Star Trek Next Gen vs. giving the Blade Runner '82 treatment to Star Wars.  And then point out they are doing that for 105 more friggin' episodes. The labs don't release those numbers but we can guess pretty close. Or just push the historical, preservation angle)

It would be good to point out that this is pretty much the only filmmaker in history who's been this straight-up revisionist (and with the aforementioned two films as well). Now, whether an ad in the rapidly-dying print media will mean anything is up for grabs, and even with Facebook and all of the other social media OOT fans have tried to use for rallying, and even with celeb support, so far it has been and will probably continue to be academic: the OOT is not out because Lucas doesn't want to release it, end of discussion.

althor1138 said:

I would drop a few bucks into the donation pot as long as the message was clear that the fans want the original unaltered trilogy and it was worded appropriately.

He can make changes every year to the films if he wants and I'd probably buy them.  As it stands now, I'll never buy anything from him again just as a matter of principle until he does this one thing for the fans.

Like I said, it's bigger than Star Wars, but for me personally, I wold pay ANYTHING if the OOT was released PROPERLY, which is why what I'd always hoped they do was release in a big massive boxed set. Make no mistake, that wouldn't make me happy, but regardless of what it was priced, if it had a proper OOT release, I would pay.

Most of all though, this can't just be about Blu-Ray, because as other formats come, we need to stress the need for a release of it in all future formats. And I reiteration about THX and AG too, what's good for the goose is good for the gander, it has to be about the larger preservation issue and not our childhoods. Moreover, this HAS TO BE respectful. OOT fans have a deserved bum rap for lots of "Lucas raped my childhood" comments, this needs to be conducted respectfully and intelligently.

Don't care. Not interested, won't be watching. That's about it. There is one and only one Star Wars product I will pay money for and this is not it. Moving on. 

I find my generation's entitlement complexes pretty disgusting, to be honest. I'm not in favor of SOPA and PIPA because I do think that they're massively excessive and give way too much power to the larger interests, but I understand where they're coming from. I don't dispute that there're tons of corporate corruption or gouging from the megabucks powers-that-be, but I don't think that gives people the right to just download whatever they want and never pay for movies, music, comics, etc either. I understand why these companies are scared and I think that they have a valid point, though I don't think these bills are the way to handle it. But the sheer sense of "I'll just download it" that goes around the Internet is disturbing. I realize there are exceptions (things that aren't going to come out in your country with subtitles, stuff that's long out-of-print, etc.) that needs to be accommodated, but I think a lot of this just sounds like the everything should be free attitude that quite frankly, I find kind of disgusting. There's some stuff here that definafely needs to be dealt with, though obviously I'm glad these didn't pass because I don't think they're the right ways of dealing with the issues. 

Being the vindictive fanboy that I am, I did have a sliver of hope that Red Tails wouldn't do well so that George would have a bomb and might be closer to rereleased the OOT, but that was wishful thinking. In all seriousness though, it is admirable for Lucas to get the Airmen's story out there. Obviously, we can speculate about his reasons, but think that's unfair conjecture and I'll give him the benefit of the doubt that intentions are noble. I'm hearing that the film is actually being criticized largely because many dissenters believe that the Airmen actually deserve a better film (I have absolutely no way of knowing whether or not this is true having not seen the film). However, it is sad that most "Black films" are stereotyped as that (and as a white boy from the suburbs, I'll admit that I do tend to think of Tyler Perry movie ads that way), but excepting him, there really isn't that much "Black entertainment," at least not that I know about, in mainstream cinema and TV. Now, music, with the commercial popularity of hip-hop (and I love lots of old soul and R&B) might be another matter. If it's sad that something has to be looked upon as a "Black movie," while Hollywood blockbusters aren't called "white films," well, I might be part of the problem. I'd be no means adverse to see a critically acclaimed film by a black filmmaker or about African American issues if it built some critical acclaim, (Boyz N the Hood, Menace II Society) but most of it looks like stuff I'm just not interested in (Tyler Perry, etc.). Then again, I could just be ignorant. I've certainly not ruled out the possibility.

TV's Frink said:

Lucas fat joke in 3...2...1...

Not what I meant.

If only they'd throw their weight around.

walking_carpet said:

It took 30 years...and sadly the desecration of a once-proud saga...but we are finally making progress.

How?!

Mr. Bungle said:

SilverWook said:

Manos The Hands of Fate on Blu Ray. This is actually happening now, although not from Criterion. You get the idea. ;)

 

This is fantastic. I love that someone took the time to do this. I also love fake Criterion covers.

I have mixed feelings about this being restored. It's such a hideous piece of crap, I almost prefer that it rots. I've also never watched it without the MST3K gang. I'm not sure I could unless it was in a theater with other people or something.

 

I saw the MST3K version. Once was sufficient, twice maybe if I was drunk or with friends. Without the MST3K, I think I'd qualify as masochism. And us Star Wars fans have enough of of that.