Last week:Everyones an orphan and nobody cares.
Next week: A perv sluglord throws a party above some all-consuming desert dentata.
This week:The good one.
Lucasfilm
Nothing works inThe Empire Strikes Back.
The Millennium Falcon cant jump to light speed, and the failing hyperdrive cackles like a wheezing hyena.
Bad weather is a primary antagonist.
Thats a fun DIY project, in a movie full of tinkering.
We first see Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew) welding on theFalconexterior.
C-3PO (Anthony Daniels) talks to the ship directly, computer to computer.
Leia (Carrie Fisher) is welding right before she kisses Han the first time.
In any DIY project, the first couple of plans will always fail.
You have to improvise.
The AT-ATs have armor too strong for blasters, Luke tells his Rogue Squadron.
So the pilots weaponize harpoons and tow cables.
For artillery, thats positively janitorial and later, theFalconwill escape the Imperial fleet by blending into Imperial garbage.
Meanwhile, even the most trustworthy pieces of space tech prove faulty.
Now the Rebels keep hiding in plain sight, while flummoxed Empire types stare feverishly down at their screens.
Luke sneak-attacks an AT-AT from underneath.
Han hides theFalconin a Star Destroyers blind spot.
George Lucas grew up a gearhead, a car guy from a car culture.
Lucas and Hamill both suffered traumatic automobile accidents: Weird coincidence, or just California back then.
InEmpire, Luke crashes an airspeeder into snowy Hoth, then crashes his X-Wing into the sinking Dagobah swamp.
(Call it a hat trick: He crashlands himself down to the bottom of Cloud City.)
In that first production, Artoo couldnt move more than a few feet per shot.
The space battles were unfinished after long months and big millions.
One duncecap stormtrooper hit his head walking through a door.
ButStar Warsmade Lucas a very rich man who thoughtStar Warsneeded so much more work.
And so he would tinker, replacing the engine, replacing the car.
Maybe its wrong to scan much autobiography here.
Lucas had less to do with this first sequel than anyStar Warspre-Disney.
The Lawrence Kasdan dialogue crackles.
The John Williams score sounds like a cathedral made of fireworks.
Director Irvin Kershner shoots with a walk-and-talk fluidity that makes Lucas own staging look painfully flat.
All hail sound designer Ben Burtt: The tittering probe droid, the braying AT-AT laserspray.
Every aspect of the production design skyrockets, really.
Boba Fett (Jeremy Bulloch) trended iconic off a groovy helmet.
The screenplay co-credits Leigh Brackett, a sci-fi pulp lifer who co-wrote Howard Hawks classics.
Infernal monsters keep trying to eat our heroes alive, and those heroes react by debating whos scruffy-looking.
Thats especially true for Darth Vader (David Prowse), forever after a morose figure of tragedy.
Here, hes a gleeful later-stage fascist.
The execution of subordinates has become.
a regular piece of his work day.
But Ford and Fisher centralize the plot around a zippy mood of flagrant cool.
Early on, Leia leads a stern strategy session on Hoth.
She could be any gruff official in any grimdark battlefest.
The playful spirit ofEmpirecuts the stilted self-seriousness down to size.
I amnota committee!!
The journey of Lando Calrissian (Billy Dee Williams) tracks a similar arc.
Hell, did anyone working onEmpirereally care about the Rebellion?
The opening crawl describes the Hoth contingent as a group of freedom fighters led by Luke Skywalker.
And Yodas whole teaching process is one big cutdown of Lukes apparent rebel-hero status.
Never his mind onwhere he was, the teacher rages, What he was doing!
Of course, Luke gets his hand back by the end.
Its mechanical, though.
Will that malfunction, too?
Something aboutEmpiredoes feel personal to Lucas.
Watchthis, Han says.
Today, no one ever talks about special effects movies because the most mainstream entertainments are greenscreen operas.
So the analog action ofEmpirehas vintaged into propulsive physicality, authentic especially when its not fully believable.
Big talk, no question, for a film about raygun mecha-dinosaurs.
Soon enough this franchise would become a middle-aged mans disinterested dream of adolescence, at once preachy and goofy.
ButEmpirerecaptures the youthful swagger of the firstStar Wars, then challenges it with whimsical wisdom.
The Force, Yoda explains, is a powerful ally:
Life creates it, makes it grow.
Its energy surrounds us, and binds us.
Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter.
You must feel the Force around you.
Between you, me, the tree, the rock, everywhere.
Yes, even between the land and the ship.
During that big speech, even Dagobah looks beautiful.
And Dagobah is a toilet bayousphere made of batwing residue.
And its a universe of machines that break down.
Someone has to fix them, and its better when everyone helps.
My hands are dirty, Leia says.
My hands are dirty, too, Han responds: Who needs to say I love you after that?
There were other movies in 1980 that were so achingly human.
ButThe Empire Strikes Backis hardware, at least, and now all we have is software.
[Next:Return of the Jedi]
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