georgec

$8.65 million on Friday.

America, you disappoint me.

nightstalkerpoet said:

For anyone who thinks that we shouldn't have gone to see the movie in 3D... you really should be thanking us... I've heard a lot of people saying that they want to see the OT in 3D, but if anyone remembers, Lucas won't release all of them unless each film is successful.

I went to a half-filled, very mellow midnight showing, and have to say that I was both impressed and disappointed...

Pros

Personally, I thought that the 3D conversion was AMAZING. Though subtle, it added to the depth of the film in a way that the Bluray release was unable to do (something I feel WAS achieved with RotS).

When TPM was released, everyone who worked on it kept pointing out how many things were going on in each scene. Everything, background and foreground, has been given proper depth. For some scenes, characters are talking, and you can see a battle droid walking away around 50 feet back clearly, with all of its surroundings also thoroughly given depth. Another very interesting feature is the changing of scenes through wipes, because many foreground heavy scenes gave way to star fields, causing wipes to show off the huge depth difference.

Not too many scenes stand out, but I think this is a huge positive. Everything visually meshes MUCH better than any other version of this I've seen.

Cons

The film in 3D was DARK. It took a while for my eyes to adjust to it, so the beginning of the film seem overly black.

Theater sound wasn't as impressive as I had hoped. I've spent two years trying to get my setup right at home though, so I'm a bit spoiled from the bluray audio in a really nice 6.1 setup.

The film is BORING. I haven't had to just sit through TPM in years, without a pause button and some light distraction. I felt stuck on Tatooine for eternity...

Final Thoughts

Go see it if you have any interest in ANY of the films in 3D at all. I'm sure that it could use the numbers boost to pave the way for George to release the rest of the films. Now that this film is over, I'm actually decently excited to see the rest of them this way...

And who knows... maybe George will release the OUT with the 3D Bluray releases. Every new release of these films at least offer a chance for that opportunity. 

 

kilik64 said:

 (although I will say that Hugo has almost changed my mind on it, that movie was phenominal!),

I would say that this conversion was nearly on par with Hugo. I also loved Hugo :)

 

The UOT in 3D (which is not going to happen) is not the UOT.

The Special Edition in 3D would be released.

3D is an overplayed, shallow fad. Movies are already 3D. There is depth in the images. Your eyes perceive this naturally.

Having 2D planes stick out and confuse your inherent perceptions of space does not make the movie more 3D.

Again, another sad attempt rationalization. "I saw the TPM in 3D so that we can get the UOT in 3D."

You've fallen for Lucasfilm's marketing ploy. "We converted one movie. If it makes enough money we'll do the rest." Translation: give us enough money or we won't put out the OT Special Edition in 3D.

??????? Are people this stupid?

kilik64 said:

But what if we make fun of it and have a good time doing that? Make it ok then?

Want to laugh at the movie and have fun?

Put in your old DVD and play Red Letter Media's commentary track as you watch it.

http://redlettermedia.com/phantom-phriday-mr-plinketts-phantom-menace-commentary-track/

Trying that hard to rationalize giving Lucas money...sad.

You be trolling?

kilik64 said:

Best friend and myself are going to see it tonight. Im not really sure why, we both hate the movie, and Im personally not the biggest fan of 3d (although I will say that Hugo has almost changed my mind on it, that movie was phenominal!), but yet we are still going.

We both love Star Wars since our childhood (both of us are late twenties) and we saw all three prequels together, so guess we are trying to keep the streak alive?

Really, why are we going...

Because the Flannel Master has a psychological hold on you, and you feel like less of a SW fan if you don't go, break your streak, and spend more money on crap you've said you don't care to see?

Why? Why are people seeing this?

I don't understand the logic.

Forget the shittiness of the movie itself. Some people claim they're seeing TPM in theaters for the 3D. Unsurprisingly, the 3D conversion itself is extremely poor.

You guys fell for it AGAIN. He sold you another turd and convinced you it was better because of "3D". You decided to give him more of your money, despite all of your reservations and all of the history of Lucas' not delivering good products, because "it's Star Wars."

God damn, it's pathetic.

Instead of saying, "Sorry about the mess," in future versions Han should say, "I'm innocent! He shot first, it was self defense!"

Drew McWeeny at HitFix was banned from Skywalker Ranch for 10 years, until maybe one or two years ago. He has written the only non-negative review of TPM 3D so far. Coincidence?

Every other review I've seen says the same thing - crap in poorly done, post-converted 3D is still crap.

I'm a big fan of PC adventure games and would enjoy movies based on the following:

Monkey Island

Gabriel Knight

Grim Fandango

Full Throttle

King's Quest

Space Quest

and so on

Same old story. I'll say it once and say it again: I can't fathom how anybody who isn't a full-blown apologist who needs SW 24/7 could possibly justify giving this guy any more money.

He literally sells you shit, tells you to fuck off when you point out the shit you paid for is not the shit you received, then puts out a slightly different version of that shit, albeit one that you haven't asked for, which you buy again and repeat the cycle.

I don't think I'd pay for the UOT on BD at this point.

Are there any official predictions out there for this weekend's box office based on ticket sales?

Crappy movie is still crappy, even in "3D".

Shocking.

TheBoost ruined my early adulthood.

Mrebo said:

SilverWook said:

I've seen "The Hobbit Defense" trotted out a couple times elsewhere to justify the SE changes George has made.

What was the early print run of The Hobbit in the 30's? More people likely saw Star Wars between 1977 and 1997 by a mile.

That seems likely. There is going to be less outrage if we never knew any better. That is the danger of the OT not being released - newer fans never knowing any better nor caring.

I think that is George's intent.

He's going all Eternal Sunshine on our memories of the UOT.

Another promo:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=yQ-NY0WrSoU

I'd guess there was a stash of clothing on the Falcon and Lando borrowed a set of threads since Han wouldn't need them anytime soon.

Better yet, maybe at some point before the carbon freezing Lando and Han underwent reconstructive surgery to look like the other. So, it's actually Lando who is frozen in carbonite, and Han escapes Cloud City with the others.

Maybe that's why it takes a year to rescue "Han" (Lando) from Jabba's Palace. "Lando" (Han) puts off the rescue as long as possible because he's still pissed off at the betrayal.

They undergo further reconstruction sometime before the meeting with Mon Mothma.

It was all a clever ruse by Lando to get some action with Leia, both before the freezing and after. That's the ultimate payback for losing the bet and the Falcon - get with the dude's girl.

Bombed was a poor word choice, I'll admit that. It made a decent profit, but I thought expectations were higher. If it was just meant as a launchpad for the show, then it did its job.

All I remember is people complaining about Jabba's gay cousin or something like that.

TV's Frink said:

Souns like someone needs to either google Ric Olie or watch The Ridiculous Menace.

Shameless plug.

Mike O said:

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.

I'm also curious about what Lucasfilm may define as financial success for TPM in 3D, and what they expect to earn if they want to move forward confidently with the other movies.

Let's not forget that the 2008 Clone Wars movie was a complete bomb, critically and commercially (35mil domestic). And that was a brand new piece of work meant to segue into the tv series.

TPM has already been seen by many people, so if I had to guess I'd say that even fewer people would be interested in seeing it again. That doesn't include newbies, though 3.5 years isn't a huge separation to consider new age groups from 2008.

The box office numbers indicate that 3D is dying down as well.

But, who knows how TPM 3D will do? It could win the weekend, or it could also bomb. The wild card is how many self-loathing SW fans will drag themselves to the theaters to give Lucas more money because "it's Star Wars."

zombie84 said:

George Lucas never stated the restoration of the original was a waste of time. He said, at first, that he simply didn't want to do it because he was opposed to the idea of people watching the originals, and then he said he would like to but that its too expensive. He never said it was a waste of time.

Talk about putting words into George Lucas' mouth...

Alexrd seems to have slunk back into the shadows after you set the record straight in that other thread and now further exposed his hypocrisy and irrationality here.

"His product"...

In name only. Everyone knows SW creatively belongs to many, many people who made it so special.

Maybe there's a reason people respect Peter Jackson's work on LOTR that doesn't have to do with an industry-wide conspiracy against Georgie? More Lucasbot desperate rationalization...it just can't be possible that George is not a good writer or director.

The LOTR trilogy is the perfect example of balanced filmmaking - great source material, great script, great performances, great cinematography, great direction...

Comparing the PT to LOTR is absurd. Jackson went through painstaking effort to ground as much of Middle Earth in real locations as possible. When CGI is used, it blends into the surroundings so as not to exist solely for the sake of spectacle.

Most importantly, the characters feel so real and relatable. There is real emotion amidst the grand scale of the trilogy's settings. Every character goes through transformations, growth, grief, inner struggle, etc.

In other words, the LOTR trilogy is the antithesis to the PT, which I regard as the most disappointing movies of the last two decades.

Anchorhead said:

walking_carpet said:

 well...if we are to take lucas' comments literally, he said people are yelling at him. nothing about making mean posts on the internet

so which one of you guys have been going over to san rafeal, standing outside his house and yelling at him?

Man, I don't want to be the one to point out the obvious here, but.........

 

;-)

 

Oh, come on!  No room for levity in this charged climate?  Yeah, that's right -  I went Indiana Jones.

Hahaha nice.

You know, this brings up an interesting idea. Lucas has blamed the critics and blamed the fans. It's not entirely improbable that at some point he's going to blame the kids. If TPM 3D bombs, maybe Georgie will say it's because kids don't appreciate a good, fun adventure and have been spoiled by other CGI movies? When the toys, games, and other crap stop selling so well, will Lucas complain that kids have become more difficult to please/entertain?

Just an idea. Just an idea. Although, I'm going to bookmark this post and save it for the future.

Bingowings said:

It is to be expected that some aspects of this thread would go a bit barmy going by the thread title.

Almost every time we have a thread with an incendiary title (and it survives long enough) the content within gets a bit hot and spicy.

I'm not saying that the underlying issues aren't pertinent and people are clearly passionate about what they are saying but aspects of this sort of discussion are exactly the kind of material the more zealous devotees will drag out to prove Mr Lucas right.

Some of what George is reported as saying in all seriousness is almost as potty as what I say in jest so we can be at least united in a bit of a giggle even it comes at the expense of the calamity of cultural vandalism.

The only reason it becomes hot and spicy is that some people who have no argument try (and fail) to use faux semantics to refute clearly established points and facts. They drag down the discussion by making comments like, "That's not what he meant."

Why some people are so desperate to serve their Flannel Master, I'll never understand.

Harmy said:

@georgec: Oh, man that interview always cracks me up. That is exactly Goerge Lucas of today, he wants it to be a white house and no matter how many people who know what they're talking about tell him it should be a green house, he's gonna paint it white. When George was writing the script for the original SW, he'd show it to his friends and they'd tell him, George this and this is crap, you have to rewrite it and he listened to them and that's why SW was such a success, he didn't yet become arrogant and he was willing to listen to other people's opinion.

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.

Either way, George Lucas can continue to play the victim card, but he'll get no sympathy from me.

Guys, that single quote by Lucas is the only one ever spoken in reference to him being offended by criticism. Lucas has never uttered thoughts about critics not liking his movies at any other time.

Oh...wait...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SC17psKGg3k#t=2m35s

Lock the thread!

edit - zombie beat me to it

The entire crux of Alexrd's faux argument is meaningless and, well, dumb. Lucas said one thing, and he's interpreting it in a very isolated manner regardless of the decades of context surrounding it. Epitome of straw man.

I've pointed out the fallacies in his posts and he mimics that in his responses. Again, he uses the, "No, you are!" argument that a child, unwilling to cope with truth and facts, uses.

Move along.