Star Wars opened on May 25th, 1977, in 32 American cinemas. The first cut had been a disaster. The director of photography and director were barely speaking. The ILM crew, working in a Van Nuys warehouse in temperatures of up to 130 degrees Fahrenheit, had burned through most of their budget on shots the director deemed unusable. The Tunisian shoot had led to cast injuries and a potential war with Libya. The director was hospitalised with hypertension during production. Its cast were convinced it would fail, as were 20th Century Fox executives. The odds were stacked against it.
And yet... what followed was the biggest box office phenomenon in cinema history.
But there's more to the story than how Star Wars succeeded. It asks what the film meant to 1977 America, to the New Hollywood generation it emerged from, and to the industry it permanently transformed.
Star Wars wouldn't be Star Wars without Marcia Lucas, whose editorial instincts built the Death Star trench run almost from the ground up; John Dykstra and the young engineers at Industrial Light & Magic who invented motion-control camera technology in a Van Nuys warehouse, and Alan Ladd Jr., the one Fox executive who greenlit a film he openly admitted he didn't understand.
It's a story worthy of a 350th episode.
Massive thanks to Andy from Geek Salad for contributing. You can find Geek Salad's latest Star Wars episode in your podcast app, or click here
More info on Harmy's Despecialized Edition can be found here
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