Star Wars original cover (VHS)

[Anxiety]

Who said that the rip was from the actual footage from the DVD that will be released this September? I mean, if they have the movie ready now, then why would they wait so long to release it? Unless all the other special features will take that long, but I doubt it would.

 

[Bandit LOAF]

They've probably been pressing Star Wars DVDs for quite a while, to allow for the expected demand.

 

[LeHah]

Who said that the rip was from the actual footage from the DVD that will be released this September?

To quote from my good friend and fellow Star Wars nut Garrett on his forum

The Star Wars original trilogy finally comes out on DVD this September. The Jedi DVD has already leaked in its entirety and is available on filesharing programs. The other two DVDs have not leaked as widely in their entirety, but enough people have copies that screen grabs and audio captures have shown up.

The prints used for the DVDs are derived from the 1997 special editions. The DVDs that have leaked still bear a 1997 copyright, and other anachronistic information in the credits. The prints, though not taken from the original negatives, have been cleaned up and color corrected by Lowry Digital and look far far far better than the films have ever looked in a home format.


A disturbing side effect of the color correction is that, as far as people can tell so far without officially-released DVDs, the lightsaber effects in some scenes have been fucked up. The glowing white sabers lose their glowing whiteness - Vader's red saber tends to come off as looking pink all through instead of red with a white core.

Whether the contrast and other settings will be fixed for the final release, who the hell knows. Or maybe it will look fine on the average person's TV.

I've never known Garrett to be wrong on this kinda stuff. He just graduated from USC with a degree in film. He also took a giant, toilet-plugging shit in the George Lucas building on campus to get his revenge on The Phantom Menace.

 

[Benjamin]

A disturbing side effect of the color correction is that, as far as people can tell so far without officially-released DVDs, the lightsaber effects in some scenes have been fucked up. The glowing white sabers lose their glowing whiteness - Vader's red saber tends to come off as looking pink all through instead of red with a white core

Theres a clip of that doing the rounds too, its from Luke and Vader's duel on the Death Star. Every time the angle changes, Vader's saber changes from red to pink. It looks terrible. I think a lot of people are going to be a bit dissapointed with these DVD's if this stuff isnt fixed. From screencaps Ive seen from ANH, some colour has been put back into the lightsabers (though not Lukes on the 'Falcon), so it makes no sense for the saber colour in Jedi to look so crappy, especially when it looked fine to begin with.

 

[Quarto]

Your probably right. Im fairly certain theat clip has come from inside Lucasfilm, or at least I would be if it didnt look so half arsed. Would a professional film studio like Lucasfilm really put out something that looked so bad?

Why not? Back when they were making RoTJ, they went through the trouble of dressing up the film crew in 'Revenge of the Jedi' shirts to fool the producers of unlicensed/counterfeit SW merchandise into producing incorrectly labelled products. It may very well be that the DVD-related stuff currently going around has been released specifically to keep the real version from leaking out and spoiling subsequent DVD sales.

That having been said, considering the changes made in the special edition, it would be naive for anyone to assume that this is definitely some kind of hoax or anti-piracy stunt - the possibility that these changes have really been made in the DVD version can't be discounted.

 

[Benjamin]

Back when they were making RoTJ, they went through the trouble of dressing up the film crew in 'Revenge of the Jedi' shirts to fool the producers of unlicensed/counterfeit SW merchandise into producing incorrectly labelled products. It may very well be that the DVD-related stuff currently going around has been released specifically to keep the real version from leaking out and spoiling subsequent DVD sales.

Thats entirely possible, and I'm praying its the case. Im also preparing myself for the worst though. I figure if I expect these DVD's to contain a new, god awful Hayden Christensen-afied version of Star Wars, then I wont be dissapointed if they do (and I'll use the £35 I was going to spend on them to buy some good DVD's instead). But if they dont, then I'll be very pleasently surprised.

 

[LeHah]

Back when they were making RoTJ, they went through the trouble of dressing up the film crew in 'Revenge of the Jedi' shirts to fool the producers of unlicensed/counterfeit SW merchandise into producing incorrectly labelled products.

No - the final draft was "Revenge Of The Jedi" (which was changed later by Lucas because he saw 'Revenge' as a negative thing and not something a Jedi would do). What you're thinking of is the faux production name of "Blue Harvest" (Tagline: Horror Beyond Imagination!)

 

[Quarto]

No - the final draft was "Revenge Of The Jedi" (which was changed later by Lucas because he saw 'Revenge' as a negative thing and not something a Jedi would do). What you're thinking of is the faux production name of "Blue Harvest" (Tagline: Horror Beyond Imagination!)

I definitely recall reading at least one source claiming that one of the reasons for the title shift from 'Revenge' to 'Return' was to fool counterfeit producers, with "a Jedi wouldn't take revenge" as merely a secondary reason. But then again, I don't even remember what source it was.

 

[Benjamin]

I heard something similar, about Lucas allowing the Revenge title to leak out even after he had changed it to help spot dodgy merchandise.

 

[Patton]

Speaking of changes to "Return of the Jedi," Lucas did not originally have the second Death Star at Endor. It was originally slated to be over Kashyyyk, and instead of Ewoks we would have had Wookiees beating the stormtroopers to death. Why he changed this, we'll never know.

 

[Quarto]

Speaking of changes to "Return of the Jedi," Lucas did not originally have the second Death Star at Endor. It was originally slated to be over Kashyyyk, and instead of Ewoks we would have had Wookiees beating the stormtroopers to death. Why he changed this, we'll never know.

Because they decided that Ewok merchandise, with its high appeal to children, would sell better than Wookie merchandise would.

 

[LeHah]

I definitely recall reading at least one source claiming that one of the reasons for the title shift from 'Revenge' to 'Return' was to fool counterfeit producers, with "a Jedi wouldn't take revenge" as merely a secondary reason. But then again, I don't even remember what source it was.

"When shooting (Jedi) in the United States we called the film Blue Harvest. Camera Slates, invoices, hotel reservations, call sheets, production reports, and crew hats and T-shirts all read Blue Harvest. So when a visitor would ask, 'what are you shooting' and we said 'Blue Harvest,' they went on their way. Can you imagine what would have happened if we had said, 'We're shooting the next film in the Star Wars trilogy'?"

- Howard Kazanjian
Producer
Return of the Jedi: The Illustrated Screenplay

 

[Deadeye79]

That would have been awesome to have a major conflcit involving wookies

 

[Quarto]

"When shooting (Jedi) in the United States we called the film Blue Harvest...

Yeah... I know about the Blue Harvest thing. But I've read that, apart from the Blue Harvest thing (which happened in the first stages of production) the 'Revenge' title was used almost right up to the release of the film for the previously-mentioned reasons.

 

[LeHah]

Still wrong.

The film was originally named Revenge of the Jedi until it was pointed out that revenge is contrary to the Jedi code, though many speculate that the change was always planned to throw fans off. But it has also been claimed that Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan was originally subtitled The Vengeance of Khan, and that the title was changed because of its similarity to Revenge of the Jedi. However, this doesn't seem to be the case, as the third installment of Star Wars was named Revenge of the Sith.

During production, in an attempt to maintain secrecy and disguise the filming from fans and press, it was alleged it was a horror film entitled Blue Harvest and utilizing the slogan "Horror Beyond Imagination".

When Drew was working on this piece the film was still called 'Revenge' of the Jedi. It wasn't until this poster was on the printing press that the decision was made to change the name of the film to 'Return' instead of 'Revenge'.

You see, “Return of the Jedi” was not originally given that title. The original title was “Revenge of the Jedi“. There were even some patches and shirts made with those words in the logo (which I guess are pretty rare if you have one), but George Lucas changed the title to “Return of the Jedi” shortly before the movie was released.

So why did he change the title? Because Jedi do not take revenge; it goes against the Jedi code.

 

[Hamlet]

Sorry for taking so long to respond.

1.) As Benjamin has pointed out, I never mentioned anything about a still photograph anywhere in my previous post.

2.) I also never mentioned Episode II footage.

3.) Behind the scenes video footage isn't that hard to acquire. Starwars.com regularly posts web documentaries, for example. Also, members with hyperspace acounts, or what ever they are called, also have access to other sources of video, such as live webcams of the shooting of Episode III, and various video diaries and such. Also, Access Hollywood and other such programs do occasionally show sneak peaks and behind the scenes footage. As I haven't watched those shows in a while, I admit to not knowing what kind of footage they show.

4.) The creator of the clip in question doesn't necessarily have to be just some fan. Who's to say that it isn't a professional, who had some spare time on his hands? I admit that does seem unlikely.


Anyway, I got next month's issue of Maxim in the mail today (Milla Jovovich, SCORE!) It had an section about the upcoming release of the Original Trilogy. It mentioned that the films have a digital transfer, 5.1 dolby digital surround mix, and a fourth disk containing lots (the exact words were "a Jabba the Hutt - sized load") of extras from the Lucas archives. It doesn't mention anywhere any updated footage or voice overs. You would think updated scenes would be a highlight.


A couple interesting bits of trivia Maxim also gave:

a.) Not one person says the word Ewok in Return of the Jedi.

b.) Princess Leia was the best shot, as she hit everyone she shot at.

c.) The guy who played Tarkin (Peter Cushing) wore slippers in most of his scenes.

 

[TopGun]

Apparently Lucas is a bit upset the they are re-editing The Three Stoogies to be Colour, he says that he is upset that programs that he watched and loved as a child are being tampered with. A bit hypocritical don't you think

 

[Benjamin]

It doesn't mention anywhere any updated footage or voice overs. You would think updated scenes would be a highlight.

There’s supposedly some big press embargo in effect to prevent anyone from mentioning the changes until after a set date.

The entire of the new Emperor scene from Empire Strikes Back is out there now. Its terrible.

 

[Anxiety]

Apparently Lucas is a bit upset the they are re-editing The Three Stoogies to be Colour, he says that he is upset that programs that he watched and loved as a child are being tampered with. A bit hypocritical don't you think

I am loosing all respect for that man.