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starwars.com > Community > Message Boards > Community > Star Wars Miscellaneous > Star Wars Misunderstood: Modern Audiences & Old Melodrama

Star Wars Misunderstood: Modern Audiences & Old Melodrama - 301 replies | 21 pages

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Clancy Horatio Viscount Wiggum
Total Posts: 3115
Member Since: 06/02

Date Posted: Apr 22, 2003 11:02 AM

This message was edited by Clancy Horatio Viscount Wiggum on Apr 22, 2003 11:13 AM

I recently have had the pleasure of watching (and rewatching) the wonderful DVD edition of Lawrence of Arabia. If you haven't seen it, you are in for a treat. It's an epic desert drama, directed by David Lean and starring Peter O' Toole. It was made in 1962.

I was watching it with a friend of mine, who told me he never watches older movies. His reaction to certain scenes was very interesting, and, I believe, shed some light on what I would call the modern misunderstanding of George Lucas' grandiose space opera that is Star Wars.

Lawrence, in it's acting and pacing, in the music, is very melodramatic at times. Older movies were more closely designed to a theatrical style, mostly because in the short history of film, they were just a step away from being performed on a stage. Watch an old silent movie sometime. The makeup is stage makeup, with the purpose of illuminating the actor's expressions for those in the cheap seats.

Clancy Horatio Viscount Wiggum
Total Posts: 3115
Member Since: 06/02

Date Posted: Apr 22, 2003 11:12 AM

And so it is with the style of acting. More grandiose.

Peter O' Toole outdoes himself with his role as T.E. Lawrence. My friend was watching the scene where, after firing on the crashed train in the desert, he urges his small band of marauders onward. My friend Karl laughed! As a scene, it was not designed to provoke laughter, it was quite serious.

Another scene, where Lawrence is about to be tortured, shows the twisted smile of the Turk who is binding his hands. Again, this garners a laugh from my friend Karl.

Definitely, not a funny scene.

It all brought me back to my experience at the movies last year, when a rude, snorting woman, and several other people, laughed and guffawed their way through the melodramatic romance of Anakin and Padme in Attack of the Clones. They didn't stop there...They also laughed at Cliegg Lars'.

Clancy Horatio Viscount Wiggum
Total Posts: 3115
Member Since: 06/02

Date Posted: Apr 22, 2003 11:12 AM

This message was edited by Clancy Horatio Viscount Wiggum on Apr 22, 2003 11:53 AM

They laughed when Shmi Skywalker died in her son's arms.

I have come to the conclusion that modern audiences simply have not been exposed to what is, in it's essence, a completely different style of cinema. Lucas is hearkening back to the older, theatrical, melodramatic style. He's stated this in many interviews over the years, and has repeated this style in Episodes 1 and 2.

When will audiences finally get it, and stop ruining the motion picture experience of adults (and children) who want to take it in and soak in the enjoyment of it? It's a breathtaking escape from the hyper-realism of today's modern movies.

Old Master Ben
Total Posts: 6477
Member Since: 11/01

Date Posted: Apr 22, 2003 11:41 AM

This message was edited by Old Master Ben on Apr 22, 2003 11:42 AM

I know what you mean Wiggum.
When I went to see 'Hanibal' it was totally ruined by a couple of silly little school girls (how they got in I'll never know) when they laughed EVERY TIME Gary Oldmans character (the one with the messed up face) came onto the screen.
Ok not QUITE what you were talking about but close.

I personally LOVE Lawrence of Arabia and have the DVD myself, great film!
I also have friends EXACTLY like yours who don't know how to appreciate a good film when they see one. They are scared of ANY film in black and white, any film with subtitles and any film made before about 1975!

They are missing out on so many decent films- Seven Samurai, Yojombo, It's a Wonderful Life, Lawrence of Arabia, Ben Hur, Seventh Seal, The Fall of the Roman Empire, Sparticus, Kind Hearts and Corenets, Patton, Vertigo, Rear Window, A touch of Evil....
Need I go on!?

Old Master Ben
Total Posts: 6477
Member Since: 11/01

Date Posted: Apr 22, 2003 11:43 AM

What is wrong with people today? Surely people can see past all the modern day FX that they feel NEEDS to be there in order for a film to be watchable. The heart of any film is the STORY (Well most films anyway) that's what's so good about SW, it has both!

Nice thread by the way.

I hope it catches on, I'd like to hear other people's input.

Clancy Horatio Viscount Wiggum
Total Posts: 3115
Member Since: 06/02

Date Posted: Apr 22, 2003 11:50 AM

This message was edited by Clancy Horatio Viscount Wiggum on Apr 22, 2003 11:51 AM

Yeah, thanks Ben.

It's an attitude that I see all the time on the boards, and I was ruminating on a lot of this in my time away from the forums.

I mean, if any of the movies you listed were released today, as they are, they would be greeted in a similar fashion as Episodes 1 and 2.

For some reason, critics consistently apply modern realistic standards to what is really an old-fashioned melodrama.

Side note: I used to think it was just the old adventure movies and serials that Star Wars imitates...but it's not just them, all of the movies, including the classic dramas were theatrical and melodramatic.

Clancy Horatio Viscount Wiggum
Total Posts: 3115
Member Since: 06/02

Date Posted: Apr 22, 2003 01:02 PM

This message was edited by Clancy Horatio Viscount Wiggum on Apr 22, 2003 01:02 PM

Here's a good (albeit tangential), serious commentary on the Love Story as presented in Attack of the Clones.

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/16739/93304

Although McDonald is drawing a comparison between Epidode 2 and medieval romance literature, it is still apropos to the subject of how Star Wars is being misread by modern audiences.

Old Master Ben
Total Posts: 6477
Member Since: 11/01

Date Posted: Apr 23, 2003 06:46 AM

I think you've only go to look at the way the acting (in general) is harshly criticized to see that some people have a great misunderstanding of SW. I've always seen the acting as more theatrical but people like to compare it to modern, more realistic methods.

Clancy Horatio Viscount Wiggum
Total Posts: 3115
Member Since: 06/02

Date Posted: Apr 23, 2003 02:40 PM

Looks like it's just you and me here, Ben. And mostly me.

Guess it's time to let this sinking ship drift to the bottom of the sea.

Old Master Ben
Total Posts: 6477
Member Since: 11/01

Date Posted: Apr 24, 2003 01:26 AM

*In my best Luke Skywalker voice*
No it's not, what kind of talk is that?

There must be SOMEONE out there who has a view on this subject.

(Last try).

Groundflier Skywalker II
Total Posts: 3100
Member Since: 04/03

Date Posted: Apr 24, 2003 02:12 AM

I see both sides of this.

Yes, you are quite right in bringing in the theater performance explanation. Early movies were directed, written, acted, and produced by people with theater experience, so movies looked like filmed plays. It took a while for people like Orson Welles to come along, invent FILM vocabulary AND get audiences to accept it. As a result, a lot of seminal films were 'stagey' and anyone paying homage to them now has to, by definition, make a 'stagey' movie.

Which brings us to the question of why so many people have problems with these movies. I think there are two main factors at work here and I think they are related. When I was a kid, we didn't have vcrs or cable. This meant all movies I saw were either in a movie theater or on regular TV. This meant I saw alot of old movies because that's pretty much all they showed on TV. So I became very comfortable with these kinds of films, even if as a child I couldn't really appreciate the artist value of them.

Groundflier Skywalker II
Total Posts: 3100
Member Since: 04/03

Date Posted: Apr 24, 2003 02:12 AM

On the other hand, for the last 15-20 years, Vcrs and cable have been the norm, that means alot of people have been fed a steady diet of contemporary movies, leading to a different taste in movies.

All is not lost. In my experience, people can be converted, it just takes patience and maybe a light touch. After all, "Lawrence Of Arabia", great that it is, is probably not the movie to use to introduce heathens to David Lean or Peter O'toole

Groundflier Skywalker II
Total Posts: 3100
Member Since: 04/03

Date Posted: Apr 24, 2003 02:21 AM

Progress itself has also contributed to this. Today's world is filled with entertainment alternatives, that stagey swashbuckling adventure that seems so charming to us looks like a waste of time to someone looking for a more visceral reason to go watch a movie. I know I'm not immune to that either, that's why I'm gonna be first in line to see Reloaded

Even so, I bet your friend was more impressed with LOA than he let on. Perhaps he will be inspired to watch it again someday because you showed it to him once.

Old Master Ben
Total Posts: 6477
Member Since: 11/01

Date Posted: Apr 24, 2003 02:43 AM

There! I knew someone would come Wiggum.

Today's world is filled with entertainment alternatives, that stagey swashbuckling adventure that seems so charming to us looks like a waste of time to someone looking for a more visceral reason to go watch a movie. I know I'm not immune to that either, that's why I'm gonna be first in line to see Reloaded

Me too!

Vermilion Angel
Total Posts: 867
Member Since: 03/01

Date Posted: Apr 24, 2003 04:04 AM

This message was edited by Vermilion Angel on Apr 24, 2003 04:06 AM

"If you post it, they will come"
I think people get too used to instant thrills and a story that's paper-thin, espectially some younger people who got to see a film for the fights or the action scenes, and so get bord with the actual plot in-between. Saying that, I believe people are becoming more aware of filmic devices, and are veiwing films more like a critic then the audiences of the past, and so expect 'cutting edge' stuff or their not interested. Personally, I enjoyed all the films.

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