"“To me, it [the original Star Wars trilogy] doesn’t really exist anymore. It’s like this is the movie I wanted it to be, and I’m sorry you saw half a completed film and fell in love with it.” - George Lucas, 2004
It is insane how much George Lucas has edited the original Star Wars trilogy. I think no movies have had more edits over time than Star Wars.
> It’s like this is the movie I wanted it to be, and I’m sorry you saw half a completed film and fell in love with it.” - George Lucas, 2004
I don't begrudge any director the freedom to go back and revise their work to more perfectly realize their creative vision. The problem is when they try to erase the original released version of an historically significant film by making it completely unavailable. George had no issue accepting the accolades and billions of dollars from the original trilogy. It's fine to later release his 'perfect vision' but in today's digital media era, there's zero reason or justification to make the originals unavailable. Be proud of what your younger self made and let fans decide which they version they want to watch.
I'm not just being post-hoc selective here. I think original theatrical releases of classics should remain available even in cases like Blade Runner where the OG theatrical release is a widely-hated, critically panned abomination made by a clueless executive producer without the involvement of the director, writer or main star and released over their strong objections. It is objectively awful and by far the worst release of the film - but I still believe even that miserable train wreck should remain available forever (perhaps with appropriate warning labels :-), even if only as a cautionary tale to future clueless executive producers).
This opinion rubs me the wrong way. I don't think you meant it like this, but it really feels like when someone creates something, they now have some obligation to society, should society deem it good enough.
In my opinion, there is absolutely nothing to support this idea. If I make something, I can change it however I want, as many times as I want, and throw away old copies - even if you really really liked those old copies. It's my art, not yours.
Maybe one could make the argument that George Lucas is not the only artist here, and I'd agree with that, but to imply that society is owed something that someone created of their own volition, simply because society happens to like it, feels wrong. He can change it however he wants until the day he dies, as far as I'm concerned.
I get your point, but also on the other hand, art is subjective, and people subjectively appreciate older / imperfect versions of things. Consider film grain - it's an artifact, an unintentional or unwanted side-effect of how films used to be made. But because it was a part of a production, people wanted it back - it gets added artificially to modern films, added as filters to video games, and video encoding has special features to support it without affecting compression negatively too much.
Or take video games, particularly 2d / pixelart ones - they were built for CRT displays and relatively low resolutions. They can remake them now with multiples of the original resolution and fidelity, but for many people it loses some of it. Some art doesn't translate at all - take this digitized artwork from Castlevania, which was digitized specifically for display on CRT displays but which loses all charm (e.g. the eyes reduced to a single pixel) when rendered somewhere else: <a href="https://x.com/CRTpixels/status/1408451743214616587" rel="nofollow">https://x.com/CRTpixels/status/1408451743214616587
But this probably applies to film as well; if a film was made for a 35mm projector from the 70's, it won't look good or anywhere near that "experience" on a modern day 4K OLED display without editing.
At the end of the day I think the viewer should be given options and choices. And for a good while it looked like they would - with DVD and blu-ray offering options like different audio tracks, camera angles, and different versions of the same film in one package. But that never materialized because I suppose it's only a wish from purists. And at that point they're competing with piracy and internet hobbyists like the article.
I could not agree more emphatically with your points on CRTs, OLEDs, etc. So I hope you won't mind me quibbling on one statement.
> Consider film grain - it's an artifact, an unintentional or unwanted side-effect of how films used to be made.
I don't think it's quite so binary. Depending on the context and intent, film grain can be an undesirable artifact of limited celluloid chemistry, optics and available light. But it can also be an expressive aspect of the artistic medium no different than depth of field, focal length, color timing, grading, etc.
There are certainly examples of low light scenes where it's clear the filmmaker reached the limits of then-available optics and chemistry and they were forced into compromises such using higher-speed film and/or 'pushing' the chemistry during film processing. These can increase grain and the result is often shadow detail being lost in the noise floor. I agree that's always bad.
But there are also wonderful examples where directors and DPs very intentionally selected film stocks for their unique texture, gamma curve, color sensitivity, etc as an expressive choice. In those cases, it's no different than a painter intentionally using different canvas textures, brush bristles and pigment viscosity as part of their expressive palatte. In this form, the unique textures of different film stocks are often referred to as 'image structure' (a less pejorative term than 'grain' which is often construed negatively).
> But because it was a part of a production, people wanted it back
Artists hate any limitations on their vision, whether technical, financial or societal. They want maximum expressive freedom yet also grudingly concede pushing against limitations often elevates their work to new heights. When film grain was a limitation they struggled against, they hated it. When grain is an artistic element giving their image texture, they want in their toolbox.
To be clear, not all chemical, optical or technical limitations from the past were expressively useful. No VFX artists are pining for the black matte outlines from misregistered optical printing or generational mismatch in multi-pass composites. :-) Interestingly, as optics, lighting instruments and film sensitivity improved in the late B&W era, it was briefly trendy among some cinematographers to abandon depth of field as an unfortunate historical limitation of the past. Of course, it was just an over-reaction to a long-resented limitation finally becoming a choice and DoF remained an invaluable storytelling tool in the hands of a master (<a href="https://creativecow.net/depth-of-field-gregg-toland-citizen-kane-and-beyond/" rel="nofollow">https://creativecow.net/depth-of-field-gregg-toland-citizen-...). I just want to avoid similarly over-reacting by dismissing the creative value of image structure and texture as we leave unwanted graininess in the past.
I suspect we'd have several enjoyable beers debating edge cases; which visual artifacts of past technical limitations can arguably have expressive utility to visual storytellers going forward and which have no real redeeming qualities outside retro callbacks and nostalgia? I'll nominate anamophic lens flares to start: <a href="https://theasc.com/article/star-trek-into-darkness/" rel="nofollow">https://theasc.com/article/star-trek-into-darkness/. My take: J.J. went overboard intentionally milking them in ST:ID but I'd be horrified if Spielberg digitally removed them from Close Encounters. Philosophically, I think the same principles broadly apply to retro gaming and preservation. So much so I built a custom arcade emulation cabinet around a 27" Wells-Gardner 9200 quad-sync analog RGB CRT and Radeon R9 380x. To me, it's about authentically preserving original artistic intent, especially when the original creators placed individual pixels by hand specifically to leverage certain analog video artifacts.
thewizzardofnl · · focus · HN ↗
It is insane how much George Lucas has edited the original Star Wars trilogy. I think no movies have had more edits over time than Star Wars.
mrandish · · focus · HN ↗
I don't begrudge any director the freedom to go back and revise their work to more perfectly realize their creative vision. The problem is when they try to erase the original released version of an historically significant film by making it completely unavailable. George had no issue accepting the accolades and billions of dollars from the original trilogy. It's fine to later release his 'perfect vision' but in today's digital media era, there's zero reason or justification to make the originals unavailable. Be proud of what your younger self made and let fans decide which they version they want to watch.
I'm not just being post-hoc selective here. I think original theatrical releases of classics should remain available even in cases like Blade Runner where the OG theatrical release is a widely-hated, critically panned abomination made by a clueless executive producer without the involvement of the director, writer or main star and released over their strong objections. It is objectively awful and by far the worst release of the film - but I still believe even that miserable train wreck should remain available forever (perhaps with appropriate warning labels :-), even if only as a cautionary tale to future clueless executive producers).
kulahan · · focus · HN ↗
In my opinion, there is absolutely nothing to support this idea. If I make something, I can change it however I want, as many times as I want, and throw away old copies - even if you really really liked those old copies. It's my art, not yours.
Maybe one could make the argument that George Lucas is not the only artist here, and I'd agree with that, but to imply that society is owed something that someone created of their own volition, simply because society happens to like it, feels wrong. He can change it however he wants until the day he dies, as far as I'm concerned.
After that day, I think the argument changes.
Cthulhu_ · · focus · HN ↗
Or take video games, particularly 2d / pixelart ones - they were built for CRT displays and relatively low resolutions. They can remake them now with multiples of the original resolution and fidelity, but for many people it loses some of it. Some art doesn't translate at all - take this digitized artwork from Castlevania, which was digitized specifically for display on CRT displays but which loses all charm (e.g. the eyes reduced to a single pixel) when rendered somewhere else: <a href="https://x.com/CRTpixels/status/1408451743214616587" rel="nofollow">https://x.com/CRTpixels/status/1408451743214616587
But this probably applies to film as well; if a film was made for a 35mm projector from the 70's, it won't look good or anywhere near that "experience" on a modern day 4K OLED display without editing.
At the end of the day I think the viewer should be given options and choices. And for a good while it looked like they would - with DVD and blu-ray offering options like different audio tracks, camera angles, and different versions of the same film in one package. But that never materialized because I suppose it's only a wish from purists. And at that point they're competing with piracy and internet hobbyists like the article.
[deleted] · · focus · HN ↗
[deleted]
mrandish · · focus · HN ↗
> Consider film grain - it's an artifact, an unintentional or unwanted side-effect of how films used to be made.
I don't think it's quite so binary. Depending on the context and intent, film grain can be an undesirable artifact of limited celluloid chemistry, optics and available light. But it can also be an expressive aspect of the artistic medium no different than depth of field, focal length, color timing, grading, etc.
There are certainly examples of low light scenes where it's clear the filmmaker reached the limits of then-available optics and chemistry and they were forced into compromises such using higher-speed film and/or 'pushing' the chemistry during film processing. These can increase grain and the result is often shadow detail being lost in the noise floor. I agree that's always bad.
But there are also wonderful examples where directors and DPs very intentionally selected film stocks for their unique texture, gamma curve, color sensitivity, etc as an expressive choice. In those cases, it's no different than a painter intentionally using different canvas textures, brush bristles and pigment viscosity as part of their expressive palatte. In this form, the unique textures of different film stocks are often referred to as 'image structure' (a less pejorative term than 'grain' which is often construed negatively).
> But because it was a part of a production, people wanted it back
Artists hate any limitations on their vision, whether technical, financial or societal. They want maximum expressive freedom yet also grudingly concede pushing against limitations often elevates their work to new heights. When film grain was a limitation they struggled against, they hated it. When grain is an artistic element giving their image texture, they want in their toolbox.
To be clear, not all chemical, optical or technical limitations from the past were expressively useful. No VFX artists are pining for the black matte outlines from misregistered optical printing or generational mismatch in multi-pass composites. :-) Interestingly, as optics, lighting instruments and film sensitivity improved in the late B&W era, it was briefly trendy among some cinematographers to abandon depth of field as an unfortunate historical limitation of the past. Of course, it was just an over-reaction to a long-resented limitation finally becoming a choice and DoF remained an invaluable storytelling tool in the hands of a master (<a href="https://creativecow.net/depth-of-field-gregg-toland-citizen-kane-and-beyond/" rel="nofollow">https://creativecow.net/depth-of-field-gregg-toland-citizen-...). I just want to avoid similarly over-reacting by dismissing the creative value of image structure and texture as we leave unwanted graininess in the past.
I suspect we'd have several enjoyable beers debating edge cases; which visual artifacts of past technical limitations can arguably have expressive utility to visual storytellers going forward and which have no real redeeming qualities outside retro callbacks and nostalgia? I'll nominate anamophic lens flares to start: <a href="https://theasc.com/article/star-trek-into-darkness/" rel="nofollow">https://theasc.com/article/star-trek-into-darkness/. My take: J.J. went overboard intentionally milking them in ST:ID but I'd be horrified if Spielberg digitally removed them from Close Encounters. Philosophically, I think the same principles broadly apply to retro gaming and preservation. So much so I built a custom arcade emulation cabinet around a 27" Wells-Gardner 9200 quad-sync analog RGB CRT and Radeon R9 380x. To me, it's about authentically preserving original artistic intent, especially when the original creators placed individual pixels by hand specifically to leverage certain analog video artifacts.