Movie – Star Wars

Movie – Star Wars
Aka  :Star Wars IV : A New hope
Score : 9/10 
Year :1977
Director: George Lucas
Cinematography: Gilbert Taylor
Music:  John William
Country: USA 
Language: English (and invented alien ones)
Duration: 2h01 (Theatrical) ; (2h05 special edition)
Writers:  George Lucas

Full cast & team (IMDB)

This is very the first and original Star Wars movie that started the entire saga, at first only called Star Wars  and is know also by its fuller title Star Wars IV : A New hope, as Lucas had started the story in its middle. It starts in the in-universe cusp year of 0 BBY/0 ABY, corresponding to an important battle during the history of this far-away galaxy, where a Rebel Alliance is fighting against a tyrannical Empire. 

In this chapter,  Luke Skywalker, a farmer on desert planet Tatooine, stumbles into the adventure when he sees a cryptic holographic message projected by one of his two newly bought droids. He meets a Jedi Knight, an arrogant and self-serving pilot in debt, his Wookiee pilot, Princess Leia and the droids. Together, they join forces, alongside droids, in an attempt to foil the Empire's destructive aims at the galaxy, and Luke becomes part of something greater than himself in a character-evolution based arc.

New standards were created with Star Wars' cutting-edge special effects, its narrative story telling that started slowly and built into more action as time passed. It marked its era and withstood the test of time, though Lucas subsequently re-worked specific scenes and effects for dvd and bluray re-releases. Another standard he set was for sound, via his THX sound mastering, present in all of the saga's movies.

The opening credits start with - now well known - the opening crawl with the famous musical theme that anyone can (or should) recognize at a glance. Each of the other Star Wars movies starts with the same crawl, summarizing the point in the history reached in the chapter. 

Star Wars, like most (good) science-fiction, has sociopolitical comments - the first of which is evident : fighting tyranny and oppression. Right from the first movie, we get this, mixing dramatic, intense moments, with laser sabre fights and humorous dialogues thrown in, that even at a slow start, the movie isn't dull. 

A common point to many movies, especially Sci-Fi of the 1970's produced in the USA, there are only two women in the entire film : Luke's aunt, and Princess Leia. On the other hand, the Princess isn't just 'another damsel in distress' but takes control of many situations, helping herself and her mates in peril, has a lot of pro-feminist dialogues that were really progressive on-screen at the time, so the Star Wars (IV) here is a mixed bag as to this regard of gender-balance. 

Acting is over really good, although at times I feel Luke is an annoying, sheltered brat... It's an interesting journey to watch him grow as the movies progress in his own story-arc. 
Characters are well written, endearing or great villains, meshing well into the story.
Costuming choices make unique characters with their own apparel, and there are only two costumes for Stormtroopers, all uniformed and conformists.

Editing is overall good, and though the pacing isn't uniformly even, it's not meant to be, as one only discovers the story as it unfolds, and learns to discern characters from the two rival teams : the Rebels and the Empire. 

Starring :  Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Peter Cushing, Alex Guinness, Peter Mayhew, et al - including voice actors for some of the characters. 

******

 Star Wars (IV : A New Hope) has two main versions, with individual duration. Theatrical in 1977 was 2h01, and the special edition 2h05. The differences aren't merely added and extended scenes, but sometimes shifting the order in which specific actions are taken. This isn't the place to discuss the many differences, although most are only visual and only a handful scenes have been added, mainly for continuity, as far as I can. 

There are quite a few external websites that describe the changes made, and you can see comparisons on youtube videos as well. 

I therefore include this imdb list for alternate versions, changes in versions on wiki, and let you find other sources.

I personally like both, but prefer the theatrical for the most part, although I cannot watch it on a bigger screen, nor at a better sound set-up than 2.0 stereo. I'll discuss this in the media section, bellow.

****** 

Star Wars... in the media.

Before I detail my dvd's, for comparison I'll add here that the original theatrical image aspect ratio was 2.35:1 and had dolby stereo sound. 

There are numerous dvd and bluray editions, so I can only cover mine.

EAN 5039036028288 is a limited, double-dvd, zone 2 PAL edition, released in 2006. 

Disc 1 : 
2006 version. . Duration 2h00. (Pal speedup). 
Movie, widescreen format enchanced for 16:9 TVs, original aspect ratio 2.35:1.
 Language/ Sound : English (only).  Dolby 5.1 surround EX, and dolby 2.0 surround. 
Subtitles: English for the hearing impaired, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish. +hard-coded English for the alien dialogues.



Bonus : 

• audio commentary by George Lucas, Ben Butt, ennis Muren and Carrie Fisher - haven't listened to it.
• DVD-ROM weblink to exclusive content - I assume the link is broken, but cannot ascertain at the moment.

Disc 2 :
Original 1977 theatrical version.  Duration 1h56 (Pal speedup). 
4:3 Letterbox format with aspect ratio 2.35:1. 
Language/ Sound : English (only),  dolby 2.0 surround. 
Subtitles: English for the hearing impaired, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish. 
+hard-coded English for the alien dialogues.

Bonus : 

• LEGO Star Wars II video game PC demo and trailer

Both discs have an animated menu with direct access to scenes, options and bonuses- which are meagre as you can notice.  

Now, the theatrical version is presented with the original aspect ratio but in a 4:3 Letterbox format, which causes the image to shrink and less visible than the first disc's full 16:9 format, especially on a small-ish tv like ours (81cm, or 32''). 

 The other downside to this version on this dvd is the reduced sound quality , limited to stereo 2.0 : even on a decent Yamaha HiFi system, we can hear the dialogues better only in the 2.0 stereo set-up and any other makes dialogues sound muffled, faraway. 
 
If only Lucas would consent for a proper 5.1 and 16:9 re-release of this version!

Bottom line : I prefer the theatrical cut, but wish it was released in better quality. Certain of the changes in the edited version are nice, but others are either clunky, or unpleasant.

My other edition has no individual EAN and the boxset it's included in is the Trilogy (IV-VI + a bonus dvd), all together is EAN 8712626016342 and seems to be a Belge edition that I'd gotten some years ago, with the 2004 versions of the movies.
I'll discuss this set on a separate entry.