Captain's Log

Star Wars Trilogy DVD Review

There are probably tons of other Star Wars DVD reviews out there, but I thought I'd throw my opinions out there with the rest of them. In case you want to read one written by people with more insight, you can try here. I love the movies. I think they are classics and the story is probably the biggest epic written in our generation.

But what about the DVDs? Well, a lot has been made about the changes to the original movies over the years, and people have thrown out lots of opinions on what is good, what is bad, and how evil George Lucas is. I'm going along with his changes, because I trusted him in the first place, and I think he knows more about making Star Wars than I do. Somethings are a little jarring (musical number at Jabba's in Return), but the overall improvment in color and clarity makes the whole thing a lot better. If you are curious about the changes, DVD Answers did a comprehensive review of the changes (video and audio) in all three movies along with some commentary. Frames and sounds clips from different versions are included in the review. If you have any interest it's a neat read:

Star Wars
The Empire Strikes Back
The Return of the Jedi

I don't have a lot to say about the movies that isn't already said in the links above, but I do have some general comments about the extras. The commentary was decent overall. There is a whole lot of talking and very little dead time over the whole movie. It's good that there's a lot to be said, but it's more like they are talking over the movie and not really watching the movie with you. You can decide whether you like that, but I found lots of times where I just wanted to watch a scene when I came to it, and someone was constantly talking. Lucas sometimes talks over big scenes, but isn't talking just about that scene (which would make it less distracting), but he's talking about the trilogy/story as a whole. He does a lot of that... Ben Burtt, the sound designer, throws in neat little facts about how sounds were made here and there, but if doesn't interest you, then it could get boring really fast. I liked it for the most part. (I now hit metal guide wires whenever I get a chance) Dennis Muren, the visual effects supervisor, has some interesting comments, but he doesn't have a whole lot of air time. Carrie Fisher has some neat, inside perspective comments, but also has some weird/awkward ones. On the Empire DVD, Irvin Kershner directed, and he has some pretty neat commentary. You can see where some of the tone and attitude of Empire comes from when he describes what he was trying to do in certain scene. Lucas doesn't do enough of this, I think.

The extras disc has some pretty cool stuff on it. There's a 2 hour documentary, Empire of Dreams, which is 'the most comprehensive documentary ever created on the making of the movies.' That's stolen from the back of the DVD, but I agree. The other featurettes are also cool, and I wish there had been more. Overall these behind the scenes extras rounded out the DVD package well. The trailers were neat, if only to see what previews looked like 25 years ago. I didn't delve much into the still galleries, and I don't have an Xbox to preview the game. I stayed away from the Episode III preview, as I'm trying to go into the movie without having seen 1/3 of it in previews.

If you are a big Star Wars fan, you should definitely think about buying/watching these DVDs sometime. The DVD set was a no-brainer purchase for me. Only $40 for a trip to a galaxy far far away.