JediDefender.com Forums
Multimedia => The Prequel Trilogy => Topic started by: Darth_Anton on May 29, 2005, 11:09 AM
-
I'm not sure how many of you are aware, but both Lawrance Kasdan and Frank Darabont were aproached to write all of the prequels based on Lucas's stories. Kasdan turned them down because we had moved on from Star Wars (this I heard from his own mouth) and Lucas couldn't reach an agreemant with Darabont due to union issues. This ulimately lead to Lucas's decision to give a thumbs down to Darabont's Indy 4 script which Spielberg approved.
One could only imagine what could have been. :P
-
I don't know Darabont, but Kasdan would've likely been able to flesh out the basic-story, thin that is, which is now both basis and end-story of the prequels.
I'm sure he would also take the first drafts into account and use elements from that as well.
ROTS to me seems like some huge fire-cracker that in the end only goes fizzle-pop. It started out so great, that whole Palps-rescue bit had humour like the OT, action like the OT and the Dooku fight and when Anakin killed him was better than the emotion that the final duel delivered.
I am convinced Lucas is a great, very great visionary, but he is a lousy story teller. He has ideas, a vision, but he can't turn that into a coherent interesting story.
And because no-one had the guts to tell Lucas so during the PT, he obviously, and given the succes of TPM, considered his stories to be excellent.
Yes, he dropped Jar Jar due to popular request, but apart from that he rambled on, tossing in subplots that didn't really matter.
Anyway, it is a missed opportunity and in itself, indicative that Lucas didn't fully believe he could write it addequately himself.
But alas, what could've been.
-
While I agree with most of what has been said, I think that the best thing about Lucas writing and directing Star Wars is that he doesn't belive his own hype.
Any other writer working on the prequels might have approached them with a high-minded pretentiousness that would have been terrible for the flicks. Regardless of what one thinks about the prequels, they are not pretentious. I like that Lucas doesn't take the CONTENT of the films so seriously.
-
I think that with Spielberg directing them (like he offered to do for free in 1997) these prequels would have been the greatest movies of all time. He's one of the few people close to Lucas who would have been able to tell him "Yo, George, I disagree" or at least that's the impression I get.
But Lucas tried all these years to do things his way, and that's what he got. :-\
-
I compare Lucas to Peter Jackson with LOTR. I know that Lucas had to have the vision of his story, to where Jackson had as a basis an excellent literary work to go off of. However, I think the styles of PJ vs GL show the difference in their works. PJ, though having control, picked his people, got them in place, and trusted them to do their jobs. He also listened to his actors and as a result came up with improved camera angles etc. Lucas, for whatever reason, seems to be a control freak from what I've read and controls everything down to the wire. The result is the difference in the two films/trilogies. LOTR is far above the prequels IMO as a result of the directors'/producer's style. I have enjoyed the prequels for what they are, entertainment and background to a story I love. I do wish the GL could have turned over the writting and directing to someone else. I think we would have had a much better product overall. I do agree that Spielberg would have done an excellent job on the prequels (as long as he stayed away from movies/themes like AI).
-
Just a dialogue writer would have made a great improvement
-
agree with Dafoo. In this forum dialogue is a big issue compared to bringing it up in the Jar/Jar forum