5. A Return To Its Aesthetic Roots
One of George Lucas masterstrokes in constructing the original trilogy was to portray a used future. Though Star Wars is set in humanitys distant past, its more advanced technology is
far more advanced than ours. But the interesting thing is that no one treats it with kid gloves. At the time, the cinematic convention was to associate futuristic societies with utopianismas if high-tech was a stairway to heaven. This was more a reflection of the hopes surrounding scientific enlightenment than anything else, and it was far more engaging (given that technology will always reflect an inherently imperfect humanity) to see future-tech being used as tools in desperate times. This is why the rebels dont have the money to clean the scorch marks off their fighter craft, or polish C-3P0, or employ anyone better than a ham-fisted Wookiee to arc-weld the Millennium Falcon back together. The used future is a gripping concept because it points to the fallibility of technology, and ultimately to that of its operators. It also has the function of lending technology soul. Certainly, machines which dont work as advertised can drive us nuts, but they also tend to be the ones we develop affection for. Things which truly work perfectly might be appreciated, but their efficiency only draws attention to their cold, inhuman nature. The beautiful, pristine technology available to a prosperous pre-war galaxy (in Trilogy II) did make sense, but it also felt cold. A perfect example is the opening battle of the Clone Wars, fought between the Clone Army and the Separatists, generally consisting of robots fighting clones with very little human (free thinking creature) influence. It was like pitting random wind-up toys against each other; sorely lacking in a sense of gravity and consequence. The other unfortunate effect is that pristine things look fake. They signal to us that theyre CGI, or costumes, sets or props. The paradoxical quality of a lower budget and the relatively crude technology used in making Trilogy I was that it created what felt to the viewer like a living, and lived-
in, world. There were very few moments of this nature in Trilogy II at all. Everything either looked like CGI or a polished set. Even though realism is hardly a priority of fantasy cinema, it does provide the benefit of drawing the audience into its world. Real things on screen remind us of
real life. The rickety X-wing rigs of Trilogy I, for instance, reminded us of fairground rides or dodgy billy carts, conveying the seat of the pants experience that it is to fly one of those things. By contrast, the pilots of Trilogy II never seem to be in any particular danger, so all we can do is sit back and watch the show. Trilogy III would do well to symbolically represent the plight of peoples engaged in rebuilding the galaxy in the state of the technology that surrounds them: full of promise, but sorely in need of skilled operators, and repair.