With all of the hype surrounding the newest release, it is
easy to wonder sometimes, what would a world be like without ‘Star Wars’, what
if George Lucas had never assembled that cultural collision of westerns,
samurai films and science fiction to create his epic space opera. What would
the film industry be like without the impact of ‘Star Wars’?
Well looking at the immediate effect that probably means
that George Lucas never gets to make ‘Star Wars’ so it becomes unlikely that a
studio would be willing to spend $18 million for his writing project of Indiana
Jones, and without that staple under his directorial belt it would be safe to
assume that Steven Spielberg’s career might be in a very different place. Never
mind the countless adventure films that took inspiration from ‘Raiders of the Lost
Ark’, ‘Temple of Doom’ and ‘The Last Crusade’, you also have the fact that
without this franchise Harrison Ford would not become the greatest action star
of all time. In fact he probably would not have become a star at all, the
former stage hand for The Doors and self-trained carpenter would be far from
the superstar we know him as, as would all the other cast members. But if there
is some good news, Tom Sellick doesn’t have to regret passing up the role of a
lifetime as he declined the role of Indiana Jones in favour of ‘Magnum P.I’.
But George Lucas did a lot more than just write a few films
outside of the galaxy far, far away. In preparation for the effects of ‘Star
Wars’ Lucas founded ILM (Industrial Light and Magic) and special effects would
not have advanced as far as they have by today. For a start, one branch of
their computer graphics division was bought by Steve Jobs in 1986, headed by
John Lasseter and went on to form Pixar animation studios. So no ‘Star Wars’ would
mean no ‘Toy Story’, ‘Incredibles’ or ‘Inside Out’. , not to emntion the rival
animation studios so say goodbye to ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ and ‘Shrek’. But
the projects that ILM helped develop also led to the pioneering effects that
created Andy Serkis’ Gollum for Peter Jackson’s ‘Lord of the Rings’ trilogy and
it is hard to imagine anyone attempting to bring that character to life in any
other form, so maybe safe to assume that the epic trilogy would still exist
just on paper (and an unfinished animated film).
You would also find yourself short of the breath-taking
effects that assembled ‘Avatar’ and ‘Gravity’ so as a subplot of that you could
discontinue the whole 3-D revolution. Then there’s the concept of a movie
franchise as epic as this, spanning multiple worlds and characters, so would
anyone have confidence in a shared Cinematic Universe for Marvel Comics, it’s a
long shot, but one worth thinking about.
Moving on to a little known film that followed ‘Star Wars’
called ‘Alien’. Ridley Scott has often said it was the atmosphere and texture
of Lucas’ film that inspired him to make his own science-fiction film.
Naturally that means the sequel ‘Aliens’ (directed by James Cameron) would also
never come to fruition, but back to Ridley Scott. Much like Lucas, without the
success of his earlier films to back him up, Scott’s career as a director might
have gone in a radically different trajectory, so no ‘Blade Runner’ (further
contributing to Harrison Ford’s non-existent acting career), ‘Gladiator’, ‘Black
Hawk Down’ or ‘The Martian’. Then the lack of ‘Blade Runner’ launching the
tech-noir genre means no later staples of the genre such as ‘Dark City’, even
worse was the fact that ‘The Matrix’ was only made by using leftover sets from ‘Dark
City’ so maybe, just maybe we never get to know kung-fu wth Neo.
‘Aliens’ is credited with popularising the action heroine
thanks to Sigourney Weaver’s turn as Ripley, so would female driven franchises
like ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ or ‘Kill Bill’ be around? When you’re talking
about thins instigated by ‘Star Wars’, just look at the revival of ‘Star Trek’,
it is unlikely that the cancelled TV series would live on as a movie franchise,
and that means that there would be no later TV outings for the USS Enterprise
like ‘The Next Generation’ and that would mean no resurgence in the science
fiction genre on TV like ‘Battlestar Galactica’.
Then just look at the list of directors who have claimed to
be influenced by ‘Star Wars’ (we’ve already mentioned Ridley Scott and James
Cameron, who quit his job as a truck driver after seeing the film in 1977 to
pursue directing). But there’s also David Fincher (‘Fight Club’), Christopher
Nolan (‘The Dark Knight’), Gareth Edwards (‘Godzilla’), Joss Whedon (‘Avengers
Assemble’), Peter Jackson (‘The Lord of the Rings’) and Kevin Smith (‘Clerks’).
So with all of that in mind, even if you personally do not
like ‘Star Wars’ just stop and wonder how many of your favourite movies would
not be around today without its influence.
No comments:
Post a Comment