They could have avoided the "Han walking over Jabba" bit with a cut-scene or something around the conversation but I guess they chose to leave it all in because it was "lost footage" of sorts.
As much as I hate a lot of the stupid little things added, "like robots smacking each other", I think the bulk of it did make the movies look better.
Oh... and one of the stupid prequel things done was the use of a 3PO puppet suit in EPI... why on earth they didn't just use Daniels for motion capture and throw in a CGI character is beyond me... but hey... 20 years later they apparently forgot how to make a decent Yoda puppet too.
<font color="#cd6600" size="1">[ May 07, 2006 01:58 PM: Message edited by: Spore ]</font>
Since that was almost ten years ago they were working on TPM I suspect the reason they didn't do 3PO as a CG character was because they already had enough to deal with.....
Hell TPM really was the first use of a CG character in as many shots as Jar Jar appeared.
I'm with Spore.
Hopefully now the SW purists will shut the hell up about the changes. (yeah right, they'll still bitch about them even though they don't have to watch them).
Someone needs a bottle.
<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">just the fact that they were ever put in is enough to piss me off thats for sure [img]tongue.gif[/img]Originally posted by Peter Hoffman:
I'm with Spore.
Hopefully now the SW purists will shut the hell up about the changes. (yeah right, they'll still bitch about them even though they don't have to watch them).
Lucas is striking again! Just watch!
Seems the new Star Wars original DVD releases won't be released in anamorphic, to accomodate HDTV owners....
What ya wanna bet that within a year's time, they decided to ALSO release "new improved" anamorphic widescreen versions for HDTV owners??
And 2 years from now, we'll see special collector editions with BOTH versions of the films, on the blue ray discs coming out soon?
Seems others are looking into the DVD release very skeptically as well.
From www.thedigitalbits.com:
(EARLY UPDATE - 5/18/06 - 12:01 AM PDT)
Well... it seems we've started a bit of a firestorm with this business we posted yesterday
about the original versions of the Star Wars films on the forthcoming (9/12) DVD release
being offered in non-anamorphic widescreen video only. So be it. Sometimes, you have to
call it like you see it. The news is absolutely true by the way. We've confirmed it specifically
with reps of both Lucasfilm and Fox. It is no rumor.
By the way, for those of you who don't know what anamorphic means on DVD, we refer
you to our in-depth guide on the subject. [Editor's Note: Keep in mind that this guide was
written some six years ago. Anamorphic enhancement has since been widely adopted as
the industry standard for presenting widescreen films on DVD... and HD-DVD HAS
obviously arrived. Just FYI.]
What you will, in fact, be getting on the second disc in each of these new 2-disc sets
(unless something changes dramatically and soon) are transfers of the original films that
were done for the 1993 "definitive collection" laserdisc box set release. (By way of
confirmation, Lucasfilm's Jim Ward had this to say about the transfers in the recent USA
Today story: "It is state of the art, as of 1993, and that's not as good as state of the art
2006.") Great. Thanks. Swell.
So the transfers, and the technology used to produce them, are MORE than a decade old.
Of course, they're going to be digitally cleaned up a bit, and even a non-anamorphic
transfer is going to look better in digital video on DVD than the same transfer would when
presented on an analog laserdisc. Colors are going to bleed less, detail will be a little
sharper. There's also apparently an additional bit of tweaking being done, because Episode
IV will feature the original 1977 version of the opening crawl (sans the "Episode IV" text)
which has NEVER been released on home video before, save for in excerpted form in the
2004 Empire of Dreams DVD documentary (which, we feel strangely compelled to point
out, WAS ANAMORPHIC WIDESCREEN). In any case, the bottom line is that the transfers
we're getting on DVD are old and they're non-anamorphic. The video resolution and
quality is going to pale in comparison to the look of most other widescreen films on DVD.
A lot of people have been e-mailing us asking why Lucasfilm doesn't simply do new
anamorphic, high-definition transfers of these versions of the films. Well... after
confirming and posting the non-anamorphic information yesterday, we started making
follow-up calls to various experts and industry insiders... you know, just to figure out
what the hell was really going on. Were we crazy in feeling a little outraged about this?
Was this really just a half-assed effort designed to milk Star Wars fans yet again? What was
the real reason for the lack of new anamorphic transfers?
It's been reported previously that when Lucas went back to the original negatives of the
Star Wars films in the mid 1990s, they were found to be in bad shape. Such bad shape, in
fact, that had they not been restored immediately, the films could have been lost forever.
So restoration is exactly what Lucas had done. Except that when he was creating the new
1997 Special Edition versions of the films... he cut the original negatives. So the original
negatives of the theatrical versions no longer exist. Okay, we knew that. But what's the big
deal? What about the original interpositive prints? What about high-quality release prints?
Why can't Lucasfilm just use either of those elements to do a new transfer for DVD?
Well... at the same time as he was preparing the 1997 versions, Lucas apparently went on
a little tear and recalled every release print of the theatrical versions that he could get his
hands on, and he had them all destroyed. Which means that when Lucas said back in 1997
that the original theatrical versions of the Star Wars films no longer existed, he was
serious. He apparently tried hard to make sure of it.
Nonetheless (and thankfully), we know for a FACT that beautiful dye transfer prints of the
original versions of the films still exist in private hands, and that additional copies are
preserved in a number of film archives around the world. What's more, Lucas would have
been foolhardy if he didn't keep the original interpositives carefully stored in a climate-
controlled vault for preservation's sake. Come on... of course he did. No one is THAT
stupid that they'd just trash all the original elements of the films that made them rich
beyond the dreams of avarice.
If good quality original elements don't exist, where did Lucasfilm get that footage of the
1977 opening crawl that was used in Empire of Dreams? And how could it have been
presented in anamorphic widescreen on DVD unless a new anamorphic transfer of the
footage was done or was already available? So why then can't anamorphic transfers of the
films be done now for the new DVDs? It makes no sense whatsoever. In any case, neither
the man himself nor senior Lucasfilm executives are willing to admit that they exist,
because as Lucas has said many times in the past, "They no longer exist." So what we get
are excuses and bogus claims: "We returned to the Lucasfilm Archives to search
exhaustively for source material that could be presented on DVD." Right. Guess they didn't
look too hard. Give us two days here at The Bits and we'll make some calls. We'll find you
good quality source materials outside of the Lucasfilm Archives that could be presented in
high quality on DVD... and in anamorphic widescreen too. All it takes is the money and the
will to get it done right the first time.
What are we left with? Either the films truly don't exist anymore, so it simply isn't possible
to give them to you in state of the art quality (unlikely in the extreme, as we've said,
despite public and private statements to the contrary)... or Lucasfilm DOES have copies of
the original versions in their vaults, and they're just unwilling (or too damn cheap) to
spend the money to give them to you in state of the art quality... yet. If the former is true,
there can be no future anamorphic release of the original versions on DVD, and there can
be no high-def release on the new Blu-ray Disc or HD-DVD formats. Laserdisc is as good
as it will ever get for those original theatrical cuts. If, on the other hand, the latter is true
(and we believe it is)... Lucasfilm's greed is truly boundless.
Bottom line: This notion that Lucasfilm is doing the fans a favor by finally giving them the
original versions on DVD in 2006... but in 1993 laserdisc quality... is baloney. In fact, it's
unacceptable. Even though most of them probably don't even know what anamorphic
means on DVD, or why they should care about it, the fact remains that the fans are getting
bilked. We hate to say it, because we've known many of the folks at Lucasfilm for years
now. But someone HAS to say it. It needs to be said. Lucasfilm can and should do better.
Who knows? Maybe they're already planning to do better for the 30th Anniversary of the
original Star Wars next year... and this is just one more bite at the pie in the meantime.
The strange thing is, Lucas himself doesn't seem to think the fans are even interested in
the original theatrical versions of the films on DVD. Witness his comments in this recent
interview at MTV.com: "It's just the original versions, as they were," Lucas said. "We didn't
do anything to it at all. But we're not sure how many people want that." That's just an
insane thing to say given how many Most Wanted DVD lists the original Star Wars films top
around the Net, and the folks at Lucasfilm have to know it. So here's an unsettling
thought... Lucas finally agrees to include the original versions on the new DVDs, but he
won't pony up for new transfers. Do you suppose there's a deliberate reason for that? If
people don't buy them because of the lack of quality, Lucas can simply say, "See? People
didn't buy them. They don't want 'em." And if they do buy them, but in a year or two start
asking for better quality, Lucas can say, "Gimme a break. I already gave them to you on
DVD. Now quit bugging me about it." D'oh!
In any case, rest assured that we're as sick of talking about the Star Wars films on disc as
you probably are of hearing it. But our motto here at The Bits is right up there in our logo:
"Celebrating Film in the Digital Age." It's awfully damn hard to find anything worth
celebrating about this. Which is a real shame... because it was pretty damn cool news
there for a little while.
We'll be back with a new Bottom Shelf column from Adam Jahnke later today. Don't forget
that Barrie Maxwell's latest edition of Classic Coming Attractions is up now, so be sure to
check it out.
Stay tuned...
Bill Hunt, Editor
The Digital Bits
[email protected]
to be honest, I don't really notice a difference between my vhs tapes and my dvds, so the anamorphic (or whatever) thing means zilch to me. [img]redface.gif[/img]
It only really makes a big difference on High Def televisions.
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