Star Wars Episode I Making-Of Documentary On YouTube (Free) Is A Beautiful Disaster
Need something free to watch while working from home? Love Star Wars? Hate Star Wars? Either way, this documentary is likely one of the most fascinating "making-of" productions you'll ever see.
In the first few minutes, George Lucas utters this famous line...
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"JAR JAR IS THE KEY TO ALL OF THIS."
I have heard that line so many times over the years and it still baffles me. The entire thing is trainwreck after that moment to open the documentary. From them spending a ton of time deciding on the rat tail (WHY DID THEY HAVE RAT TAILS!) for Ewan McGregor's version of Obi-Wan...
…to fumbling the Anakin Skywalker casting (this features clips from the documentary and a few other moments)…
and everything in between, such as sand storm destroying sets or George being surrounded by a ton of "yes men." (The assistant director might have been the world's biggest "yes man," like he was built in a lab) When George finally saw a rough-mostly-final cut of the movie, his reaction was fucking priceless…
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"What the fuck did we do…"
Not only is the sad realization that they made a bad movie and it was too late pretty funny, but it is also sort of sad. Imagine if things had been different? More voices were heard? George had pushback on things in the Original Trilogy, but everything was clearly different the second time around. Ben Burtt, Academy Award-winning sound designer, seemed to be the only person giving George any pushback at all.
The one silver lining with the documentary? John Williams composing "Duel of the Fates" for the movie…
George got so into the weeds with animation and technology with the Prequel Trilogy and left the story elements to the side. They did things differently for 'Attack of the Clones' (a big "no shit" if you watch 'The Phantom Menace' documentary and saw how much they revealed) and just showed all of the animation changes, including the painful process of creating the character Dexter Jettster…
If you don't know who Dex is, you're probably assuming he is a big important character, maybe a villain, or a Jedi… no… he is a fucking diner owner!
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JUST PICK ANYTHING! HE RUNS A RESTAURANT!
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the documentary. It is fascinating watching how everything fell apart.
BIG NEWS THOUGH!
Tonight on the Lights Camera Barstool YouTube page, we will be watching 'Star Wars: The Phantom Menace' LIVE. You can watch and follow along (Disney+) as I will be joined by Robbie Fox, KenJac, new hire Joey Mulinaro…
You can subscribe to our channel here and we will post a blog with more details, but expect us to go live around 8:30PM EST.