i truly resent the special edition of the empire strikes back.
the releases, remasters, whatever --- that was phenomenal, to see and hear the original 1980 masterpiece in all it's awesome glory...
the special edition would've been great, since the color and sound are just that much more vibrant than the rerelease... but the little changes, the pointless, annoying little changes, just ruin it for me.
in the original, han, betrayed by his old friend lando, says to lando in the carbon freeze chamber, "what's goin' on... buddy," with spiteful inflection on "buddy". that single word is omitted from the special edition.
luke, taking the bigger man's exit from a no-win situation by falling beatifically to an unknown fate, does so silently, to "falling" music in the original. inexplicably, in the special edition he screams with the emperor's voice as he falls. not just with the emperor's voice, actually --- they simply dubbed exactly the same sound effect from return of the jedi over this fall. this is wrong for several reasons, not the least of which is that it doesn't make sense -- he didn't fall on accident, and it's not his voice.
i can take or leave the windows in could city. they actually add to the size of the location, which is something that was somewhat lacking in the original. the interspersed shots of people just walking around while lando makes his announcement are completely gratuitous and not very well done --- it looks like people in bad clothes, acting.
and, the one that takes the cake, beats the band, screws the pooch and steps out the door --- the fucking new footage of the wampa ice creature!
- INTERIOR, ICE CAVE ON HOTH
- luke awakens from a blackout to discover he has been hanged like a side of beef.
- INTERIOR, SOUND STAGE IN CALIFORNIA
- a guy in a suit badly pretends to be an evil monster eating sloppily.
- INTERIOR, ICE CAVE ON HOTH
- luke struggles with his bonds...
it really is that bad. i swear i fucking hate that scene. but the absolute worst part of this worst scene is when luke swings at the approaching monster, you see the severed arm hit the floor, and then you see this guy in a suit going "OMG OMG! that d00d just hax0rd off my arm! fucker!"
i mean, HONESTLY! the original scene used a cool motif --- you never actually see the whole monster! you see parts of him, suggestions of how scary and evil it is, and it works! when i was little i imagined it as the scariest moster imaginable. this was spielberg's influence on lucas.
now, lucas is his own rich man, and lets film school hacks splice stuff in, and we get shots that thematically and cinematically simply do not fit.
i'm not arguing that lucas doesn't have the right to update his own works, but he should at least have the sense to keep things smooth. those additions didn't work -- they reek of testing the waters to see how well you can mess with the footage.
you know how everybody goes on about how they think empire was the best one? it's because irvin kirshner directed it, and leigh brackett wrote the screenplay.
Tue Jun 17 22:38:26 EDT 2003