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My Empire Thoughts (For Which No One Asked)

Discussion in 'Original Trilogy' started by BespinMinersUnion1138, Nov 27, 2016.

  1. BespinMinersUnion1138

    BespinMinersUnion1138 Force Sensitive

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    The Empire Strikes Back had huge shoes to fill. It had to give us a new, memorable adventure to the highest grossing film of all time. The pressure on the production staff to make this film, bigger, better and more ambitious than the first plagued the entire filming and post-production office. The film famously went weeks over the filming deadline and went massively over budget. Lucas almost went bankrupt financing the film himself. Nowadays, these types of red flags would lead to massive box office and artistic failure. But Empire did neither. It ended up being the best sequel in movie history.

    The film is beautifully shot and shows the meticulous filming process that Irvin Kershner brought to the set. Actors marveled that he talked motivations with them and rewrote scenes with them as they were being filmed. The entire history behind the "Han Solo carbonite chamber” scene is unreal. If you get a chance to read the transcript of it, its fascinating. Because Kershner took his time, much more time than Lucas wanted, the film exploded into a frenzy of character and thematic exploration and growth.

    Every one of the main characters in this film grow and change in this movie. Luke starts off still very much naive to the ways of the Force and ends with his soul shattered, but, more in tune with the Force than he ever could have imagined. Leia begins the film still putting the Rebellion ahead of her own personal relationships, until at the end she finally subcumbs to Han, making him just as important if not more than the Rebellion. Han begins desperately needing to save his own skin. However, by the time he’s frozen, he’s admitted his love for Leia and we see the first real tinge of pain and sadness as he’s lowered into the freezing process, realizing that to save himself he needs her. Lando learns in a quick amount of time that he does not want to be known as that guy who destroyed his friend, and he immediately begins to make amends. And finally, Vader. Vader begins the film like a wolf, hounding his prey. He’s willing to kill anyone in his way, even members of his own staff. But, when, Admiral Piett loses the Falcon one last time, Vader doesn’t kiil him. The experience of fighting Luke for the first time after he learns Luke is his son humanizes Vader enough that he no longer looks to kill to release his anger.

    The film acts as a negative image of A New Hope. A New Hope begins with the Rebellion in danger moves into a more intimate portrait of the main characters and then goes back to the Rebellion at the very end. Empire starts with the main characters in danger, then Rebellion, the back to the main characters. While A New Hope is a rip-rolling time, Empire tests the physical and mental wills of our heroic leads.

    Luke gets beaten senseless the entire film: Wampa attack, almost freezing to death, shot down on Both, falling from an AT-AT, crashing on Dagobah, physical and mental training on Dagobah, throughly defeated by Vader, loses a hand and then just to rub salt in the wound, he learns Vader’s his dad. And yet he still suffers more, by falling down a shaft, ending upside down, hanging on for dear life at the bottom of Cloud City - symbolically thrown out the garbage shaft. And yet, Luke makes the strongest and most sacrificial action of anyone in the film. He refuses to join Vader and trusts in the Force letting himself fall. Its at that moment, he ceases to be the former farmboy. He will never be the same as his first entrance in Return of the Jedi shows.

    Leia spends the majority of the film whisked away, saved by Han left and right, lacking any control of her fate. Yet, when she finally must take control after Han is frozen, she takes control of the situation much like she did on the Death Star. She must shed her femininity.

    Finally, Han spend the majority of the film saving Leia or Luke - big brother to Luke, a suitor to Leia, using his past wits as a smuggler to get by. Yet at the end, he questions his entire existence when Leia gives him something bigger for which to fight. The mental anguish on his face when he's lowered into the carbonite chamber is heartbreaking, as he realizes his own past has endangered the love of his life.

    The film is filled with iconic images from the AT-ATs, the asteroid field, Han in carbonite, Yoda, Yoda lifting the X-Wing and the cave. An amazing soundtrack, growing on the themes of the first film, accompanies the film. Yoda’s theme, the Imperial March and Han and Leia’s romantic theme - a theme that starts off on the same interval as Leia’s theme but then moves on to something else. Its Williams most inspired score of his career. Giving us new sounds but indubitably its Star Wars in nature.

    The true genius of the film occurs in Dagobah, however. Traditionally viewed as the slowest parts of the film, watching them now I realize that the language used by Yoda originated the legend of The Force as it enhanced the very little we learned about the Force from Obi-Wan. Without these scenes and the care Kershner took and the unreal performance from Frank Oz, Star Wars may not be the global phenomenon it is today and the Vader/Luke/Emperor conclusion would have less meaning.
     
    • Great Post Great Post x 5
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