By George, they're back
In case you've been orbiting the Abell 2218 cluster all summer, be advised that today marks the official release of George Lucas's first "Star Wars" trilogy on DVD. But you knew that, didn't you?
The three films -- "Star Wars: A New Hope," "The Empire Strikes Back," and "Return of the Jedi," (episodes IV, V, and VI in the still-unfolding sci-fi saga) -- arrive in a handsomely boxed, four-disc set that's had fans salivating since word of their production went forth last February.
What's inside? As the old wedding rubric goes, something old, something new, something borrowed, and, at least indirectly, something blue.
Old would be Lucas's vision of a sprawling space epic marrying state-of-the-art special effects with plotlines right out of a Hollywood western or World War II flick. New are technological fillips such as Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround EX sound and multiple menu sets designed by producer Van Ling. The DVD set, which retails for anywhere from $40 to $70, includes a 2 1/2-hour "making of" documentary plus slightly revised versions of the three films themselves. Previously re-edited for theatrical release in 1997, these versions are, according to Lucas, more faithful to the movies he wanted to make originally.
Borrowed is the marketing muscle that introduces "new" Beatles or Elvis product year after year, or allows filmmakers to repackage their wares to fit each new home-video format. Blue, meanwhile, are fans who fault Lucas for tampering with the originals at all, not including them on the new DVDs, or milking every possible dollar out of a franchise that has already grossed more than $3 billion, with the final "Star Wars" episode blasting into theaters next May.
From any angle, today's release is a milestone for millions of fans -- a must-have, must-see product that could conceivably dull the disappointment surrounding the past two "Star Wars" episodes, which for the most part failed to thrill the faithful. Crowds were expected to form outside stores where the discs went on sale last night at midnight. DVD-release parties are planned throughout the galaxy. May the hype be with us, because the Force surely is.
"The fans themselves are making this a big event," says Carl Nordstrom, manager of Strawberries in Quincy, which threw a party last night featuring a "Star Wars" trivia contest, costumed movie characters, and a showing of the new discs on widescreen TV.
Greg Harrington, manager of Tower Records in Harvard Square, plans to open an hour early today, at 9 a.m., to meet the expected customer demand and the challenge of huge retailers that are also carrying the discs. "It's one of those things everybody has," Harrington says.
Count Lori Sartre among those planning to attend the Quincy celebration. A "Star Wars" fan since age 6, Sartre, 33, cofounded an all-women "Star Wars" fan club and website (www.starwarschicks
.com) in 1999. She avoided buying bootleg DVD versions before, she says, because of her faith in Lucas to do right by them. " `Star Wars' fans are fans for life," Sartre says. "As far as I'm concerned, George can do whatever he wants to them, as long as we finally get them."
Andrew Forcier of Brighton is another fan who cannot wait to get his hands on the new DVDs. Forcier, 29, was taken to the first "Star Wars" by his mother when he was 2 and grew up with a sizable collection of "Star Wars" toys and action figures.
"I haven't watched the old videos for at least a couple of years," says Forcier, who works in advertising. "For me, it's all about having the movies in the most recent and best format."
He plans to buy his boxed set later today. Meanwhile, Mark Murphy of North Andover preordered his copy early last week.
"I grew up on `Star Wars,' so my enthusiasm level's pretty high," says Murphy, 29, a
Still, why all this fuss about a trio of movies that came out long ago and far away, pop-culturally speaking, and have never really left the entertainment universe, either? The possible answer lies in the forces that drive today's marketplace coupled with the enduring power of the films themselves.
Charles Kesler, professor of government at Claremont McKenna College, observes that the good-vs.-evil themes explored by Lucas helped make the films more culturally significant than simple escapist fare, which most sci-fi movies once were. In an era when Vietnam, Watergate, and the Me Decade had left young Americans feeling disillusioned, Kesler says, "Star Wars" celebrated the spirit of the American Revolution and struck a nerve in doing so.
"Lucas captured the nobility of politics and the struggle for self-rule, and people loved that at the time," says Kesler, who saw the first "Star Wars" while attending college at Harvard. The early films "spoke powerfully to a lot of submerged longings in our culture," he adds.
Emerson College sociologist Sam Binkley, another fan of the original films, says nostalgia plus new technology are helping to drive interest in these movies as both cultural touchstones and mind-boggling entertainment.
"We're already nostalgic for the 20th century and the cultural tradition inaugurated at the time, whether it's style or music or movies," says Binkley. Gen Xers and Yers have grown up in a media-saturated environment that demands more stimulation -- visual, sonic, etc. -- at every turn, making epics such as "Star Wars" ripe for adaptation to high-powered home entertainment centers.
Another factor may be the product loyalty of sci-fi audiences in general, notes Roberta Clarke, associate professor of marketing at Boston University and a follower of youth-market trends.
With "Star Wars," says Clarke, "You don't really have to worry about it looking outdated. There's nothing about it that says it's an outdated movie." Also, to the largest movie-going demographic -- teens and 20-somethings -- the movies are new. "If there's enough new material and technological enhancement, then you can justify buying it on DVD," says Clarke.
There's more "Star Wars" mania on the horizon, too.
May 19 brings the release of "Episode III: Revenge of the Sith," the final installment Lucas plans to film. A year from October, Boston's Museum of Science will mount a lavish exhibit titled "Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination." Supported by Lucasfilm Ltd., the exhibit will include artwork, props, and film models plus futuristic technologies such as magnetic levitation and robotics that figure in the fantasy world of "Star Wars."
Exhibit planner Ed Rodley has been struck by how deeply "Star Wars" has influenced the scientific community, not just Hollywood. Over and over again, says Rodley, another fan of the first trilogy, scientists and engineers have told him how much they owe their careers to "Star Wars."
"You'd be hard pressed to find a roboticist around who hasn't studied R2-D2 or C-3PO in detail," Rodley says. Trying to get lay people interested in futuristic technologies can be difficult, he adds, because imagining the future is difficult. "Say `magnetic levitation' and people look lost," Rodley says. "But say `landspeeder,' and a huge amount of audience knows what you're talking about."
When it comes to "Star Wars," few people -- even Lucas -- know what they're talking about more than Ryder Windham does. Author of a new series of "Star Wars" novelizations for younger readers, Windham, who lives in Rhode Island, edited a series of "Star Wars" comic books published by Dark Horse in the 1990s. Watching the old movies with "new antennae," as he puts it, has helped him appreciate how the "prequel" episodes have changed the way the originals are viewed.
"When I got the call last January to write the novelizations, because the DVDs were coming out, my first thought was, `Why? Haven't they been done to death?' " Windham says. Then he began paying closer attention to how Episodes I and II (with III coming) set up later events.
"On a cynical level, you try to figure out how they all tie together," says Windham. But as a fan, he adds, reviewing the originals has its own rewards.
"There's a charm to seeing spaceships that were glued together, not computer-generated," says Windham. "And hard as it is to realize, Harrison Ford wasn't a big star then, either."
As pure adventure movies, these are pretty hard to beat, Windham adds. Which may be, when all is said and done, why the Force still matters, in any format.
Joseph P. Kahn can be reached by e-mail at jkahn@globe.com.
