Lucas and Spielberg discuss Indy 4 and DVD trilogy in Premiere Magazine

[se7en]

Holy smokes. If you're a fan of Indiana Jones than you absolutely have to pick up the new issue of Premiere magazine. 6 full pages are devoted to the release of the triliogy in November on DVD and the production schedule of Indy 4.

Every single key person involved (minus River Phoenix of course) in the 3 Indy movies discusses the productions. Really great insight and behind the scenes info. I don't want to spoil the article or spend an hour trying to rehash it in this post. If you're a fan than you will absolutely love this article.

But I will make one comment that provides a bit of insite into the mind of Lucas. I always knew that Lucas and Spielberg were best friends as reiterrated by both in the article. And because of this I always wondered how Spielberg as Lucas's best friend wasn't more critical of Lucas's last 2 Star Wars flicks. Now I understand.

During the Indy films there are many times in the article where Spielberg admits to deferring to Lucas's ideas even if he didn't agree with them simply because Lucas was so strong headed. Case in point: Temple of Doom being dark. Spielberg admits that it was a mistake to make it so dark. But Lucas wouldn't budge. Spielberg went with it even though he wasn't into it at all.

Also it was Lucas who was pushing for Tom Selleck as Indy and Debra Winger or Sean Young for Marion. Apparently Spielberg had suggested Ford from day one but Lucas was afraid that he'd be forever associated with Ford the way Scorese and Robert Denero were at the time.

If not for Selleck being stuck in his Magnum PI contract and Spielberg working to push Karen Allen we probably wouldn't be talking about these films today.

You just have to ask yourself how can Lucas be so hard headed as to not take the advice of someone like Spielberg in regards to the Star Wars films. Or is spielberg just to much of a wuss to be critical of his friend? Intersting to consider. This Premier interview opens up a lot of thoughts and interesting tidbits. Everyone go read it.

PS. Frank Darabont will have a completed script for a June 2004 film start. Summer release 2005. Ford is the one who really pushed to make it happen. very cool. Can't wait for the 4 disc DVD set with lots of extras.

 

[WaywardFan]

Regarding the SW side of things

Originally posted by se7en
You just have to ask yourself how can Lucas be so hard headed as to not take the advice of someone like Spielberg in regards to the Star Wars films. Or is spielberg just to much of a wuss to be critical of his friend? Intersting to consider. This Premier interview opens up a lot of thoughts and interesting tidbits. Everyone go read it.

You’re right, that is quite interesting insight.

Lucas and the Star Wars universe (also called the GFFA, short for Galaxy Far Far Away) is an oft discussed and debated topic in some circles. I won’t go into too many details, but there are at least two distinct camps regarding this. There is a camp that thrives on the Extended Universe, mostly deriving from the myriad books that tell SW stories outside of the movies. Then there is the camp that believes nothing truly exists outside the movies. This is somewhat interesting, as the books are sanctioned by LucasArts to begin with.

These two camps are diametrically opposed and the feud is long standing and heated.

I think there is pretty much uniform agreement that the original trilogy (OT) was not only ground breaking but iconic. The problem comes with the prequels, and there is a lot of questioning about how things were done. I suppose it is difficult to question Lucas. It is his baby, all his. He can do what he wants with it.

Some of those questions revolve around the writing as well as the directing. Lucas insisted on doing both of those himself, something he didn’t do in the OT. I know there were many attempts on different fronts to sway Lucas one way or another, all for the benefit of the movies, but he wouldn’t have it. This could be his stubbornness coming out.

The writing was almost universally lampooned, and there were hopes of bringing in other directors for the prequels (even clamoring for Spielberg to give one a go). After all, ESB and ROTJ were done by different directors.

Personally, while I don’t think they measure up to the OT, I don’t think the prequels are all that bad. Problem is, they could’ve been much better. And, the hype and unrealistic expectations made it virtually impossible to succeed on a deservable level. I hope the final prequel will be everything it is supposed to be.

The GFFA is tired and that is too bad. It doesn’t help that the prequels aren’t inspiring. Personally, I would have much rather seen the sequel trilogy than the prequel trilogy (for one thing it would have opened up the future. The prequel’s future has already been determined). The GFFA and those who grew up on the wonder of it deserve a rebirth, redemption.