A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

Poster art by Greg and Tim Hildebrandt. © 1977 20th Century Fox Film Corp.  On Quora, member Kisty Arant asks: How did George Lucas finance a big-budget movie like Star Wars when he’d only directed two movies previously? George Lucas did not self-finance 1977’s  Star Wars.  He had to get a major studio to put up the money in order for Lucasfilm Ltd. to make the film, and it was no easy task. First of all, while Lucas had helmed two feature-length films ( THX-1138  for Warner Bros. and  American Graffiti  for Universal), only one was a box office smash. Second, even Universal’s Ned Tanen, who appreciated the success of 1973’s  American Graffiti,  was reluctant to invest the studio’s money into such an iffy proposition as a space fantasy film aimed at young people. In the 1970s, American moviegoers tended to eschew escapist fare in favor of more gritty and realistic films. Furthermore, science fiction and fantasy films tended to cater t...

(C) 1977 20th Century Fox Film Corporation and Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL) Did the fact that "vader" means "father" in Dutch give any clues to the identity of Darth Vader when Star Wars was originally released in 1977? According to George Lucas’s post-1999 revisionist history of how he created the   Star Wars   saga, the story was always going to be about the conflict between Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader and his twin offspring, Luke and Leia. In every interview or audio commentary track related to the   Star Wars   movies - especially the prequels - that was the Gospel According to George. That’s the “official version” in 2018. But just because that’s what Lucas said between 1999 and 2012 doesn’t mean it’s true. According to most authoritative accounts of the genesis of the original   Star Wars   trilogy (the saga’s Holiest of Holies, as it were), Lucas originally thought of “Darth Vader” as a supporting character and not as   The Star Wars ...