{"id":9426,"date":"2010-07-01T12:55:27","date_gmt":"2010-07-01T20:55:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=9426"},"modified":"2010-07-01T13:47:13","modified_gmt":"2010-07-01T21:47:13","slug":"the-people-vs-george-lucas-alexandre-o-philippe-2010-usaengland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=9426","title":{"rendered":"The People vs. George Lucas (Alexandre O. Philippe, 2010): USA \/ England"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy<\/a>.\u00a0 Viewed at the Ford Amphitheatre, Los Angeles Film Festival.<\/p>\n

\"\"\u00a0 Having lost faith in George Lucas\u00a0since\u00a0his CGI\u00a0hatchet job on the Star Wars Trilogy Special Edition<\/em>,\u00a0and\u00a0from the\u00a0Prequel debacle, I’m convinced the creative genius in\u00a0George Lucas\u00a0no longer exists.\u00a0 The man that churned out the disastrous Prequel with its cheesy dialogue, hokey\u00a0dramatization, and over-the-top CGI, morphed into some sort of\u00a0Bizarro Man counterfeit.\u00a0 Now I and many other fans have been\u00a0happily vindicated with Alexandre O. Philippe’s\u00a0case in point, The People vs. George Lucas<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n

In an attempt to explain George Lucas’ transformation\u00a0from his nerdy film school days to the demigod of consumerism\u00a0he is today, Philippe and his crew\u00a0spent 3 1\/2 years interviewing over 126 people, compiling over 600 hours of footage and then\u00a0assembled his film into chapters.\u00a0 The first chapter briefly explains Lucas’ beginnings from\u00a0his childhood in Modesto to film school at USC, then his early successes with THX 1138<\/em> and American Graffiti<\/em>, and ultimately\u00a0the sleeper hit\u00a0Star Wars<\/em>.<\/p>\n

To explain\u00a0the\u00a0enormous success that followed the Classic Trilogy and the cultural phenomenon that occurred, a multitude of die-hard fans are interviewed in the process, even Francis Ford Coppola – and then there’s the prequel to explain.\u00a0 Most of the fans who grew up on the original Trilogy, back in the 70’s, loved the series so devotedly but\u00a0felt betrayed by Lucas’s attempt to CGI the entire Prequel up the wazoo, not to mention the inferior writing, and casting.<\/p>\n

These fans are serious, humorous, fanatical, and some are even scary.\u00a0 One woman speaks to the camera and proclaims how George Lucas ruined her life, as the camera pans back, she stands alone in a room where every square inch is covered\u00a0in Star Wars collectibles and says “my husband and son spend all of our money on Star Wars!”<\/p>\n

With serious websites created, there’s an entire underworld of Star Wars fans who have re-created (and filmed)\u00a0the entire Trilogy, scene by scene, in various art forms,\u00a0with animation, Legos, or various dolls, while others have re-edited the entire Prequel, making it more palatable for those of us who find it offensive.\u00a0<\/p>\n

After feeling hoodwinked by George’s tinkering and then release of the “Special Edition,” serious petitions\u00a0were written, signed and\u00a0sent to Mr. Lucas himself,\u00a0requesting he release the original theatrical Classic Trilogy on DVD, to which his mind-blowing\u00a0response was “the original negatives no longer exist.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

George himself spoke before Congress many years ago against Ted Turner and his band of idiots who began the colorization process of many B & W classics.\u00a0 Taking those films and altering them, removes their original value and context in film history – this is the same argument many fans have against Mr. Lucas.<\/p>\n

It doesn’t stop with Star Wars, as\u00a0the topic of Indiana Jones is brought up as well, since both franchises share the same fandom.\u00a0 To equate the loathsome reaction by fans\u00a0to the injustice of the highly intolerable\u00a0Kingdom of the Crystal<\/em> Skull<\/em>, a clip of South Park’s The China Problem is thrown in, specifically referring to the animated\u00a0rape scene of Indiana Jones by an animated\u00a0George Lucas and Steven Spielberg.<\/p>\n

The audience in the Ford Amphitheatre\u00a0(a perfect venue for this screening) was lively and engaging, and we all\u00a0laughed hysterically almost the entire 92 minutes.\u00a0 Since the film is compiled very tongue-in-cheek, making it a lot of fun to watch, I’m thinking to myself, one would have to be a fan of the franchise in order to\u00a0fully appreciate the dedication that went into The People vs. George Lucas<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy.\u00a0 Viewed at the Ford Amphitheatre, Los Angeles Film Festival. \u00a0 Having lost faith in George Lucas\u00a0since\u00a0his CGI\u00a0hatchet job on the Star Wars Trilogy Special Edition,\u00a0and\u00a0from the\u00a0Prequel debacle, I’m convinced the creative genius in\u00a0George Lucas\u00a0no longer exists.\u00a0 The man that churned out the disastrous Prequel with its cheesy dialogue, hokey\u00a0dramatization, and over-the-top […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[75,3,144],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-documentary","category-films","category-los-angeles-film-festival-2010"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/49"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9426\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}