A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

"I'd sooner kiss a Wookiee!" (C) 1980 Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL) The Coming Storm Cast: Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill)  Princess Leia Organa (Ann Sachs) Han Solo (Perry King) See Threepio (Anthony Daniels) Artoo Detoo  Chewbacca General Carlist Rieekan (Merwin Goldsmith) Deck Officer (Ron Frazier) Sentry Narrator (Ken Hiller) Announcer: OPENING CREDITS. Music: Opening theme. Narrator: A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away there came a time of revolution, when Rebels united to challenge a tyrannical Empire. Now, it is a dark time for the Rebellion.  Sound: Hoth winds. Narrator: The freedom fighters have established a base inside the ice caverns on the frozen planet Hoth. Luke Skywalker, patrolling the Hoth wasteland for Imperial probe droids, has been injured by a savage wampa ice beast. Wandering in a delirium, nearly at the end of his endurance, he has seen the image of his Jedi instructor, and been told that he must seek further train

"Sir, Starfleet Headquarters reports that a Rebel convoy has been completely destroyed near Derra IV." Freedom's Winter Cast: Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) Han Solo (Perry King) Princess Leia Organa (Ann Sachs) See Threepio (Anthony Daniels) Artoo Detoo Chewbacca Ben (Obi-Wan) Kenobi (Bernard "Bunny" Behrens) General Carlist Rieekan (Merwin Goldsmith) First Rebel Coordinator Droid Second Rebel Deck Officer (Ron Frazier) Command Center Sentry Renegade Four Commander Narra Renegade Seven Renegade Three Renegade Two Captain Needa (Nicholas Kepros) Imperial Officer Narrator (Ken Hiller) Announcer: OPENING CREDITS* Music: Opening theme. Narrator: A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away there came a time of revolution, when Rebels united to challenge a tyrannical Empire. Now, it is a dark time for the Rebellion. Evading the dreaded Imperial starfleet, a group of freedom fighters, led by Luke Skywalker, has established a s

Officially?  None.  Star Wars: The Force Awakens  and its two sequels, Star Wars: The Last Jedi   and Episode IX  are all-new original stories based on concepts by J.J. Abrams, Michael Arndt, Lawrence Kasdan, and the Lucasfilm Story Group. (George Lucas, when he sold Lucasfilm to Disney, handed in a treatment for  Episodes VII-IX,  but it was not used.) Unofficially:  Some story elements of  The Force Awakens  bear some resemblance to plot points from the  Star Wars  Expanded Universe novels and comics. For instance, in the film, Han and Leia have a son (Ben Solo) who is strong with the Force and is seduced by its Dark Side. This is also a plot point in the old EU, except that in the books the son is named Jacen Solo (who has a twin sister, Jaina) and after undergoing training as a Jedi in Luke Skywalker’s academy, turns bad and becomes Darth Caedus.

What do you get when you combine the talents of writer-director Lawrence Kasdan, whose films are character-driven and meditative, and Stephen King, whose stories often focus on ordinary people in extraordinary (and often horrific) situations? You probably expect to see an odd hybrid that is part “The Big Chill,” part “Stand by Me.” Well, if you toss in a smidgen of thematic material from Byron Haskin’s 1953 invaders-from-Mars classic “The War of the Worlds,” the result of such a mashup is Kasdan’s 2003 film “Dreamcatcher,” a science fiction/horror tale based on King’s eponymous 2001 novel. Co-written by Kasdan (“Raiders of the Lost Ark,” “Star Wars: The Force Awakens”) and William Goldman (“A Bridge Too Far,” “Misery,” “The Princess Bride”), “Dreamcatcher” tells the tale of four lifelong friends (played by Damian Lewis, Thomas Jane, Jason Lee, and Timothy Olyphant) who stumble upon an alien invasion while on their annual hunting trip to a cabin near Derry, Maine. Kasdan be

Starwars.com  Less than five weeks before the release of Disney/Lucasfilm’s “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment joined the pre-premiere frenzy with its third reissue of the Classic and Prequel “Star Wars” Trilogies on Blu-ray. On Tuesday, November 10, 2015, the studio that originally released George Lucas’s space-fantasy saga set “a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away” rolled out the six existing “Star Wars” films in all-new Limited Edition Steelbook packaging. As many fans know, “Star Wars” is one of the most frequently re-released movie series in the history of home video, and chances are that Fox – which owns the distribution rights to the five films financed by Lucasfilm Ltd until 2020 and owns “Star Wars – Episode IV: A New Hope” outright – will milk its cash bantha in the future. Most studios, after all, stay profitable through home video sales and digital downloads, so it’s not surprising that Fox is offering this Limited Edit