George Lucas
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More American Graffiti and Spetters: Jim Hemphill’s Weekend Blu-ray Picks
For nearly as long as Hollywood has been making movies they’ve been making sequels, and for most of that time journalists and critics have grumbled about the studios’ lack of originality; yet there’s an honorable tradition of filmmakers using the perceived economic insurance of sequels to create some of the riskiest and most personal films ever to come out of Hollywood. Francis Coppola’s The Godfather Part II, John Boorman’s The Exorcist II: The Heretic, Peter Bogdanovich’s Texasville, Joe Dante’s Gremlins 2 and Jack Nicholson’s commercially disastrous but artistically triumphant Chinatown sequel The Two Jakes are all films that either greatly […]
by Jim Hemphill on Jun 15, 2018 -
On Being an Independent Filmmaker and Watching Star Wars: The Force Awakens Six Times
Like a lot of people, I went to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens when it opened in December. By my fourth screening, I started to feel embarrassed. By my sixth, I was at peace again. Most times, I went with combinations of family and friends (though that third screening was definitely solo) because Star Wars had helped shape these relationships years ago. Just as important, it was the series that hooked me and so many of us on filmmaking. In 1983, PBS aired From Star Wars to Jedi: The Making of a Saga during their December telethon. I was […]
by Tom Quinn on Feb 8, 2016 -
“I Ripped Up Millions of Sprocket Holes”: George Lucas at Sundance on Building His Empire
“Why should we use all this equipment and all this stuff when we can make it better?” In this excerpt from a recent Sundance panel on “The Power of Story,” George Lucas once again attempts to explain how his loathing for the Hollywood apparatus led to the creation of a special effects empire that enabled a whole new super-strain of Hollywood blockbusters. In his narrative, Lucas had to create a special effects house because none existed, and he had to get into the toy licensing business to prolong the life of his movies inn the market place, and he had to create […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Feb 3, 2015 -
Did George Lucas Mastermind an Illegal Wage-Fixing Conspiracy?
A class action lawsuit alleging that a group of Silicon Valley companies, including Google, Apple, Pixar, Intuit and Intel, conspired to fix the wages of computer engineers has been cleared to proceed by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. Writes Mark Ames at Pandodaily, “…Apple’s Steve Jobs sealed a secret and illegal pact with Google’s Eric Schmidt to artificially push their workers wages lower by agreeing not to recruit each other’s employees, sharing wage scale information, and punishing violators.” The suit is the result of a 2010 Obama Department of Justice anti-trust investigation. Pando has extensive details and has also […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jan 25, 2014 -
21st Century Man: Abel Ferrara
In person, Abel Ferrara is a whirlwind of gestures and jokes, of quick smiles and vulgar asides, digressions piled upon digressions, even if he’s much sharper and in control of his staccato New Yorkese vernacular than he lets on. Ferrara, who will turn 60 this year, has had one of American indie cinema’s strangest and most fascinating careers, one which has taken the Bronx native from the old 42nd Street’s row of exploitation and porn cinemas to the Croissette in Cannes. Often we talk of middle-aged artists mellowing, but Ferrara maintains a manic, youthful energy that is both infectious and […]
by Brandon Harris on Jan 11, 2011 -
“THE PEOPLE VS. GEORGE LUCAS” TO HIT EDINBURGH, LA, SILVERDOCS AND MUNICH
After hit screenings at SXSW and HotDocs, Alexandre O. Philippe‘s The People vs. George Lucas will be shown at four film festivals this month: Edinburgh International, LA, AFI’s Silverdocs, and Munich. Philippe’s film examines the relationship between filmmaker George Lucas and his fans over the past thirty years. PvG is one of six documentaries at SILVERDOCS nominated for the WGA Documentary Screenplay Award this year. You can catch the film at any of the following screenings: Edinburgh International Film Festival: June 18 @ 7:45pm (Filmhouse 1) June 19 @ 3:30pm (Filmhouse 1) Los Angeles Film Festival: June 23 @ 8:30pm […]
by Jaimie Stettin on Jun 3, 2010
