The original star wars was released in 1977 it was a big success, it earned a total of 775 million. It surpassed jaws for being the highest grossing movie and stayed there for a while until E.T came out. It created a star wars mania that made the customers demand more and they are still producing more to this day. George Lucas is an incredible producer, and I think that him being such a history buff contributes to his success. There are many clues and hints in the movies, for example the resemblance of the rebel army to Nazi. Even Darth Vader wears a helmet that resembles German soldiers in world war II.
What catches my eye the most was Georges association of Richard Nixon and the Vietnam war to the movie. In the return of the Jedi George Lucas was asked if emperor valentine was a Jedi and George responds with “No, he was a politician. Richard M. Nixon was his name. He subverted the senate and finally took over and became an imperial guy and he was really evil. But he pretended to be a really nice guy.” One resemblance between the character and Nixon is their fixation on being powerful. When Nixon was resigning as president to avoiding the near impeachment the secretary of defense was preparing for him to try and stay in power even if he means to do so illegally. Similarly Emperor Valentine will do anything to stay in power, the main difference between the two is the confidence of Valentine. Emperor Valentine was much less insecure, in the review at the bottom they compare the emperor to Richard Nixon and Ceaser.
George Lucas wrote star wars at the time of the Vietnam war, George almost got drafted into the war however he was diagnosed with diabetes so he was never trained deployed Lucas was going to make a Vietnam war film call “Apocalypse now”. He did not create that movie because he decide to produce star wars instead. George created the battle of the rebellion and the empire to be very similar to the Vietnam war. The ewoks in the return of the Jedi symbolize the Vietnamese soldiers, they were out numbered and out gunned so to speak but they were still able to defeat the more powerful opponent.
Rogue one that was directed by Gareth Edward was brought to the public in December of 2016 he claims that he was trying to make it unique by using scenes from Vietnam and World war 2. Gareth Edwards said this helped him in his goal to create the most real star wars to date. He would watch old war films and recreate the soldiers with star wars characters and fighter jets with X-wings. It created a very real fighting experience that really got the audience engaged. It is interesting to me how the use of history in films makes it much more dramatic cause it will tie into the real world.
https://www.history.com/news/the-real-history-that-inspired-star-wars
Hey Vincent,
This was a really interesting blog post to read, I liked how you began talking about the history of the movie and some of the reasons that you thought I was so popular- like George Lucas being a history buff. I didn’t realize some of the historical parallels that were present in Star Wars, but now that you mention them it is very clear that there was a lot of symbolism in those films! I will definitely try to add more history into my blog posts in the future. I think that most movies have some sort of historical influence on them, even if they aren’t meant to, simply because the people working on them and the actors are aware of the world around them- I also talked about this in one of my last blog posts on here. The video at the end about Rogue One has me interesting in watching that movie now, so thanks!
Hi Vincent, Star Wars and the film I wrote about, Rocky, were released in the same year. It is amazing to me that they are still coming up/ out with and releasing more and more Star Wars films and they’re still fairly successful. One thing I learned from your post is that parts of the movie resemble the Nazi’s in World War II. I would have never known that, let alone though about it, if you wouldn’t have written about it. I liked that you gave quotes within your post and continued on after to support the evidence. I also liked that you gave a background on George Lucas and almost getting drafted into the war. When I write my posts I really need to focus on doing that as well, bringing actual history into the film, so I will do that next time. My only piece of advice for you is to have more links as to where you got your information from, so your audience is able to check it out as well, and make the link an understandable one, not some long URL.
I really enjoyed the brief history lesson behind the original star wars films. I thought it was really interesting how George Lucas connected it to both the Vietnam War and the Richard Nixon. I also find it interesting that this trend continues into the movies today, including the one that was released in 2016. I think it’s also interesting that with all these real world undertones of war and violence, people where still able to love the movies so much. I don’t really enjoy star wars, but I’ve undoubtedly been surrounded by it for as long as i can remember.
Hi, Vicent,
I really enjoyed reading your post, I learned a lot that I didn’t know especially about George Lucas. I like that you start with the history of the film. I thought your talking about George Lucas being a history buff and how he applied it to Star Wars and its characters was very interesting. I also like that you incorporated Rouge one at the end to relate the overall war and history theme that the directors were trying to establish. I do like that you ended it with the short video. I will try to do this in my posts moving forward.