Nora Martinez’s HUM210 Blog

                                         George Lucas Writer and Director
 

George Lucas was born the 14^th day of May 1944 in Modesto California. During his teenage years Lucas was fascinated by drag car racing and had aspirations about becoming a professional racecar driver, however, life had other plans for George Lucas. After his high school graduation he suffered a terrible car accident which completely altered his view of life and his decision to become a racecar driver. Instead he attended Modesto Junior College and then transferred to the University of California film school. One of his short films as a student allowed him to earn a scholarship from Warner Brothers Studios. This also gained him access to watch the making of a movie that was directed by Francis Ford Coppola. “As a film student he made several short films including THX-1138: 4EB (Electronic Labyinth) which later won first prize at the 1967-68 National Student Film Festival. In the scollorship and his new friendships gained him access to also observe the making of Finian’s Rainbow (1968) which was also being directed by Francis Ford Coppola” (Maltin, Leonard.).
 

After becoming good friends Lucas and Coppola started a new company that they called American Zoetrope. The first project of this company was Lucas full-length version of his THX 1138 short film. Coppola going in to the production to the film “The Godfather” which allowed George Lucas to start his own company know as, Lucasfilm Ltd. American Graffiti was filmed in 1973 in which Lucas wrote and directed the film himself. This movie became a success earning George the Golden Globe as well as five other nominations for the Academy Awards. This movie gave him the credibility he needed to undertake his future projects. American Graffiti was a low budget movie that introduced actors such as Harrison Ford, Charles Martin Smith, Cindy Williams and Richard Dreyfuss. The movie goes around a group of teenagers that barely graduated from high school and the adventures they go through during the night before some of their friends will leave for Collage. The next movie to come would earn George Lucas International recognition not only for his movies but the level for story telling and detail of the associated special effects. This movie Star Wars: A New Hope was the first movie of the Star Wars Trilogy. This movie was about an adventurous boy who discovers that one of his two new droids carries a message from a beautiful princess that needs help. Leaving his land behind in search for the princess finds in his way into an intergalactic rebellion. More than twenty years later Lucas is finishing the last of his prequels, Star Wars: The revenge of the Sith was the culmination of the Star Wars movies. It is the introduction to George Lucas’ Star Wars a new hope and it revels the mystery surrounding the dark ominous Figure from his first Star Wars film knows as Darth Vader.
 

Most of the films that Lucas has directed show a common theme across the board. The films THX-1138, American Graffiti, Star Wars: A New Hope, Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, Star Wars: Attack of the Clones, and finally Star Wars: The Revenge of the Sith, all share several common themes. Many people would quickly assume that are all Sci-Fi films, excepting American Graffiti of course. This is not completely accurate. While many elements could seem Science Fiction, there are to many other elements which exist out side of the realm that Science can explain. The introduction to the first Star wars movie for example states “In a galaxy far far away” (Star Wars IV). This is intended to create a nostalgic fairy tale feel to the show. It goes well with the theme of super natural forces of good and evil that will do battle. However now that his directing career can not be classified as Sci-Fi it is important to also look at the main themes that permeate his films. The theme of growing up and going it alone perhaps is one of the strongest film themes found in all of Lucas’s films. American Graffiti is at its core about experiences Lucas himself went through. His fascination with racing and what it mean for as a youth to first experience the freedom of mobility. (American Graffiti.) This also seems to be a theme present in many of his films including Star Wars: A New Hope, where it was represented by Luke Skywalker’s desire to leave the planet he grew up on and head out into his known universe. The scale and type of travel may be different but the desire to break free from childhood experienced by most adolescents is very strong.
 

Another theme present in these films is technology. Possibly more specific is the way man a being that follows only self imposed and social rules deals with the world as compared to machines which must follow norms and directions given to them. In American Graffiti the racecar served as the focus of man and machine interaction. In the movie Star Wars: A New Hope, Lucas explores both the integration of man and machine in Darth Vader as well as machines designed to carry out human functions. C3PO a android which introduces it self as Human Cyborg Relations in the first Star wars film as well as in those to come later or before however one chooses to look at it. It is interesting that when Darth Vader is introduced he is said by Obi-wan the protagonist Luke Skywalker’s new found role model “to be more machine now than man, twisted and evil”. This could be related to the life changing car wreck he had growing up. This accident brought if you will the “Dark Side” of technology into his life.  Lucas also uses blue screen technology and taking it to a new leveling in many of his films. Many older films used it to display the countryside in car windows and create the effect of motion while the car sat on a set with actors in it. These techniques while useful at their time now but did not look very real. Lucas’s use of them however went light years beyond them creating entire battles and complex sequences filmed entirely separate from each other and then combined to make spectacularly believable scenes of space battles which audiences had only ever imagined up to that point. This technique was one of many Lucas developed grew into an entire special effects company know as Industrial Light and Magic ILM for short, which has worked on most of his films and many others. Another development in motion pictures has been the addition of computer generated graphics ILM has been there pushing the technology forward with leaps and bounds. (Lucas Film ltd ) This allowed him to digitally edit many scenes in his most recent three Star Wars films numbered I, II, and III. Doing so allowed for direction and creation of takes that never actually occurred.
 

When George Lucas Directs it is in the strict sense of the auteur in that he has been intricately involved with the creation of his story. The fact that he is directing it I feel only means that he is that much more concerned about the finished product he wants no other person to have the final say in any part of the film. He seems to care deeply about the art value of films and also about the additional creative aspect of allowing his actors the freedom to improvise. This kind of improvisation is supposedly the way most of Shakespeare’s original plays were written. In documentaries about his films a lot of time is given to showing how every detail of every scene receives all of his personal attention and care but still giving the actors space to improvise, and then encourages that they do so. The production crew is also His directing style is said to lack much complexity he is often quoted as having said to his actors “Terrific, go it again”, “Faster,” and “More intense.” (Star Wars I: The Phantom Menace)
 

Sources Cited

**American Grafiti. American Grafiti. Tiger Sweat.Com.  No date of posting/revision given. Tiger Sweat 04/15/06 http://www.tigersweat.com/movies/graf/>
 

***Lucas Film ltd. Imdb.com. 2006.  Lucas Film Lid.com 04/15/06. http://www.lucasfilm.com/>.
 

** Maltin, Leonard. Biography for George Lucas. Imdb.com. 1994. Internet Movie Data Base 04/15/06.http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000184/bio>.
  

*** Star Wars IV. Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. Absolute Astronomy.org. No date of posting/revision given. Absolute Astronomy 04/15/06.
 

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