It’s easy for people like me to write thousands of words complaining about the abundance of sequels and retreads in theaters, but there’s little denying that the overall quality of sequels and franchises has improved dramatically in the last couple decades. There may be a whole lot more of them, but in most cases the filmmakers and studios are working to create something reasonably entertaining and worthwhile. In the days before The Empire Strikes Back, sequels were often thrown together with very little thought. Rare was the sequel that attempted to expand the mythology in any way, and movies like The Godfather: Part II were the exception rather than the rule. One can argue that perhaps modern filmmakers are obsessed with franchises to a fault—meaning that they can spend an entire movie doing little more than setting up the next one (see: Thor)—but at least they seem to be trying. Not long ago, making a sequel was a simple repackaging job. With his sequel to Star Wars, Lucas decided to challenge that.
While many rightfully point to Star Wars and Spielberg’s Jaws as the beginning of the blockbuster franchises, I’d argue that The Empire Strikes Back wound up being even more influential in the long term. Sequels weren’t incredibly rare back in the late '70s and early '80s. If your movie was a success—and Star Wars at that point was the most successful movie of all time—then you were probably going to get a sequel. And that sequel would probably also be financially successful. It was much less likely that said sequel would be any good. In the case of The Empire Strikes Back, George Lucas was fortunate in that he already had some idea of where he wanted to go. With the success of the first film, he was also guaranteed that he could do it his own way.
That’s why it might have surprised some that one of the first things Lucas did with The Empire Strikes Back was remove himself from the director's chair. In his stead, he brought in veteran independent filmmaker Irvin Kershner, who had no experience with films even close to this scale. It was a risk, but Lucas knew that he needed a director who could make the character moments count as much as (if not more than) the action scenes. Lucas may understand his characters and he can tell a story on paper, but he’s not nearly as good at making these moments count once he reaches the set. He lucked out with A New Hope because it’s never meant to function as more than a fun adventure movie. When he finally had to tell something of a character story in the prequels, it didn’t always work out so great. He would still have most of the control over The Empire Strikes Back, but the decision to bring in an outsider was probably wise.
For my money, the smartest thing The Empire Strikes Back does is that it never goes back to the same wells used in A New Hope. We visit none of the same planets, there is no second Death Star (that comes later) and it introduces a number of new characters that are vital to the story. A studio-run sequel to Star Wars likely would have had Luke returning to Tatooine before leading another attack on a major Empire stronghold. The story would have cut out enough so that it wasn’t the exact same movie, but it would have hit all the same notes. Empire goes the other way. Outside of the characters, there is nothing familiar about the environments or story. Instead of going backwards, Lucas and Kersher kept pushing forward. Star Wars had a rousing climax where Luke blew up the Death Star and everyone was happy. At the end of Empire, he’s had his hand chopped off, his best friend was frozen in carbonite, the Rebellion is crippled and he just learned that he was fathered by that villainous masked dude with a breathing problem. Roll credits.
Of all the new characters introduced in The Empire Strikes Back, there are two obvious ones: Lando Calrissian and Yoda. While the former is a fun character, not until Return of the Jedi does he become all that interesting. My issue is not with Billy Dee Williams, who does a great job, but with the writing. His transition from a guy who would screw over his friends in favor of the Empire to one who up and joins the rebellion just doesn’t quite click for me. The film plays up his frustration with the deal the Empire gave him, but there’s just not enough consistency for me there. His allegiances more or less fall where the screenplay says they should fall, and he switches sides when it is most convenient. Many may disagree with this criticism, and even I’ll admit that Billy Dee Williams’ charisma atones for many of my frustrations. This is just a quibble, and one that hardly ruins my enjoyment of the movie.
And then there’s Yoda, one of the few characters that appears in both the original trilogy and the prequels. Watching the films in episode order, his introduction in The Empire Strikes Back offers a very amusing contrast to the Yoda we saw in the prequels. Those films showed us a small but brave warrior who was always ready to offer bits of wisdom using his unique syntax. When we first meet him in Empire, he’s a mischievous little elf with a silly voice who immediately digs through Luke’s lunchbox and plays with a flashlight. He eventually becomes the old wise man that we all know and love, but I got a kick out of how different a character he is at the outset.
I can only wonder how audiences back in 1980 felt about this small, ugly creature being one of the great Jedi warriors of all time. Me being as young and familiar with the series as I am, I have always completely bought into Yoda hook, line and sinker. Reflecting on it now, the introduction of Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back is one of the most impressive accomplishments in the entire series. It’s one thing for the Henson company to bring a Muppet character to life for the purposes of family-friendly comedy. It’s another thing to create a character who becomes one of the most important in the entire series. Prior to Empire, I’m not sure anything as ambitious as Yoda was ever attempted. Audiences had to buy that this puppet was an actual living thing, and they had to go along for the ride as he made the transition from goofy imp to the wisest Jedi in the universe. That’s rough to pull off today, so imagine how it was back then.
The more I reflect on all this, the more I come to appreciate Mark Hamill’s performance as Luke Skywalker. His work in A New Hope was perfectly fine with a few actively bad moments, but the scenes in the Dagobah system here are really impressive. For much of the movie, Hamill is working with nothing but a Yoda puppet and R2-D2, and the responsibility of those scenes falls almost entirely on his shoulders. It’s not just because of the technical brilliance that the Dagobah scenes work so well; it’s also because Hamill was at the top of his game. I will never confuse him with Marlon Brando—or even his castmate Harrison Ford—but you have to tip your cap to the man.
The Empire Strikes Back also introduces the romance between Leia and Han Solo, which is a storyline that has its moments but still seems a tad forced. I completely buy that the two of them could fall in love, but the lovey-dovey stuff comes very early in Empire and then continues throughout the film. I might have preferred if the romance crept up on them a bit more, but there’s little denying that the carbon-freezing scene toward the end is incredibly satisfying. The famously-improvised exchange of “I love you” and “I know” has become the defining moment in the Leia/Han relationship. There’s also the kiss between Luke and Leia toward the beginning of the film, which of course becomes retroactively icky once we learn a few things about them in Return of the Jedi.
If someone who has never seen a Star Wars movie ever comes up to me and asks me in what order they should view the entire series, I probably would not recommend doing it the way I have been for this blog. Instead, I would advise them to start with the original trilogy and go in chronological order of release as opposed to episode order. This doesn’t have a whole lot to do with the quality of the films as much as it revolves around the twist at the end of The Empire Strikes Back. (Though even if you haven’t seen the Star Wars movies, you would have had to have heard the phrase “Luke, I am your father” at some point, right? If not, I don't know where you've been living.) If you view the series in episode order, there’s no shock to that moment. Even if you know it’s coming, like everyone does, it is still a powerful moment. Just not all that surprising. The story works no matter what order you watch the movies in, but it works better dramatically to watch Luke’s story first then see the origins in the prequels.
Being the second part of a trilogy is one of the most thankless jobs in the world. Act II has to be just as entertaining as the first—if not more so—while also juggling all the same balls in the air without dropping them. A middle chapter neither begins a story nor ends it, and at their worst they can feel like they’re just killing time in between some sporadically important moments. The Empire Strikes Back is great because every moment feels worthwhile, and at no point does it feel like it’s just waiting to get to the climactic stuff in the third installment. Lucas and Kershner keep pushing the story and the characters further along until they reach their lowest point, and then the movie ends. At that point, the question is no longer whether The Empire Strikes Back can be a compelling second chapter. It’s whether the final installment can possibly end all the storylines in satisfying fashion.
Next time: Ewoks save the universe in Return of the Jedi. Oh, and the humans sometimes help as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment