Today is the 30th anniversary of the release of Star Ward V: The Empire Strikes Back. It is, and assuming George Lucas does t return to the franchise, wisely handing it over to better creative talent, always will be y favorite Stars Wars film.I was only three-and-a-half years old, but I was so Star Wars crazy, my parents took me to see it anyway. I had seen the original Stars Wars on vacation in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina when it was re-released in 1979 as a promotion for ESB. We wre having a duel vacation with another family in the used car business. They had a son three years older than me who wanted to see it, so we all went along. I was only two-and-half at that point, but remember distinctly sitting on my father’s lap beig mesmerized by the attack on the Death Star. It may even be my first memory.
Regardless, I was hooked on Star Wars even at that age. My parents took me to Florence, the “big city,” as it were, to see ESB on the day of release. I was going to drive them crazy if we had to wait for our one horse town with all of two screens to play it. As with the original, I only remember two scenes from that night. One was the opening with the Star Destroyer launching the probe druids and the other was my mother commenting on how implausible it was Han Solo did not freeze to death when he was encased in carbonite.
I have no accurate cout of how many times I have seen the original trilogy --once has been enough for each of the prequels--but I have seen them enough to both appreciate it on a mature level while recognizing its flaws. While ESB is no exception in either regard, it stands head and shoulders above the rest.
It is interesting because ESB does not it within the regular conventions of storytelling. It lacks a definite beginning and end, the bad guys win the day, contradicted elements established in the first film, and set up a three year gap set up before the resolution. Yet it worked so well, it has become the norm for movie trilogies. With mixed success, mind. The Lord of the Rings did it well. The Matrix series, not so much.
It is the darkest of all the films. I say that even in comparison with Revenge of the Sith because the latter was intending to hit al the marks we were expecting to see: Anakin v. Obi Wan, the birth of Luke and Leia Yoda’s exile, the rise of the empire, and Darth Vader’s debut. Watching a film with a checklist is not exactly high drama. There were genuine surprises in ESB, though there were problems. Why die obi-Wan lie about Luke’s parentage and is it not a wee bit implausible Leia was supposed to be a Skywalker the entire time?
Nevertheless, I still love the film to this day. Battle scenes were done right, without all the overwhelming effects on screen. Yoda was not the weird joke he was in the prequels. The best part--there was nothing cute about it. How did Lucas resist the compulsion he has now to add too many silly CGI elements to “improve” his films?
So happy 30th, ESB. You still set the standard for science fiction in this overblown, computer generated age.
