Would the PT have worked with drastically reduced CG?

cayman shen

cayman shen

Master Member
I know, I know, another PT debate. But I'm curious.

There are many, many objections that people have to the PT: the script, the acting, the editing...but with the new sequels promising to attempt to recapture some of the old school aesthetic, I've been trying to imagine the PT with simplified, practical effects. Would Jar Jar be less annoying as a dude in a mask? Would the battles feel less sterile with clones in real costumes in real locations? Would reducing the number of CG "cutesy" robots and aliens tip the PT's kiddie scale back into acceptable territory?

You know, I kind of believe that one change, radically reducing CG, would have altered the "tone" to the point where the script might have been tolerable. So many lame, cringe-worthy moments (Jar Jar's flip. Palpy's flip. Dooku's flip. Sigh.) would have disappeared. You HAVE to believe the actors would have given better performances with more location work, full size sets, and generally less green screen. Yoda would still be a wise old sage and not Animal from the Muppets, because he couldn't jump around. The Jedi would have had to battle guys in costumes and not termites hurling green spitballs in AOTC.

Sure, "I hate sand" and "NOOOOOOOOO!" and all the awful dialogue would have made it in still, and the pacing/editing would still be horrific on TPM. But had the PT generally looked and felt more 80s, I think I'd be far more inclined to be generous toward them, because they would have at least had a human touch and not felt so top to bottom hollow...like the product of a computer.

What do you think, would radically reducing CG have been enough to balance out the PT's other flaws?
 
The special effects cannot camouflage the storyline miscues whether they be practical or CG.
 
I've said for years and still believe that EP1 is the best of the three. Partially because I really honestly feel the acting is the best, also because it has the most location shooting, the most model work, the less CG and the less blue screen of all 3 movies.

Amazing acting by Liam Neeson
Great acting by Natalie Portman (better than EP2/3)
Great acting by Ewan McGregor (best actor in all 3, probably best in EP3)
Great acting by Ian McDirmid (he was lousy in EP2/3)
Acceptable performance by Jake Lloyd (great considering his age and the scritp)

Everyone else says EP3 was the best. EP3 was the WORST, but it did have some moments. I hate to break it to everyone but EP3 is a stinking turd sandwich. Visually just like EP2 it is STUNNING to look at, but the acting and script are HORRIBLE.

Plus Hayden Christiansen ruined EP2/3. He's just about the worst actor in history. I know he was bound by the script and following direction- I've seen his other movies and he stinks on ice. Simply replacing Hayden would have made the PT better.

To your point, I agree that either less CG or CG that looked more real and less plastic would have helped the PT 'feel' more like the OT and might have improved it.
 
My opinion has always been that a lot of what was on screen was just to do it "because we can now we have CGI".most of it was just unnessesary and just because "we can". "Add more of these here and more of them in there".Like what happened with the additions in the SE. George was better visually when he was restricted by technology. CGI cluttered the screen a lot of the time. I mean instead of a few stormtroopers you've got 5 billion clones.Instead of 10 x-wings there's a million droid ships. Star wars was better when less is more. I love old George though and I just think he's all about pushing technology. He pushed practicle technogy with the OT and won and he tried doing the same with the PT with CGI and while he did make advances it wasn't quite as successful and well accepted. I like the prequels for what they are. They will never replace the OT but they did bring some cool stuff with them. And yes I agree TPM is the most beutiful.

As for saving the PT I think as others have said it would have brought more humanity but they still would have been as they are now.


Ben
 
Look the PT was nothing more than George's way of making Money off his demos of new tech.

He is a Freakin GENIUS!
 
In my opinion no, it's not a movie that could be fixed by practical effects. If everything had been done with practical effects you would still have the story elements clearly aimed at the pre-teen crowd, Jar-Jar especially. You would still have the contradictions from the OT and production designs that are nowhere near as interesting as what came before. You would still have the rock-like performance of Jake Lloyd and the unbelievably stupid battle droids, Boss Ass, the Jamaican Frog aliens, the umpteenth destruction of a round ship by destroying the reactor, Darth Shallow, bland story...etc.
 
GL spent 30+ years being totally focused on SFX realism. IMO it peaked with Ep#1, which was a hell of a lot of make-believe stuff on the screen for how very real it looked.

But after Ep#1 that was it. It's like GL was suddenly "over it" and he hardly even cared if things looked right from then on.
 
It's an interesting question.

In one sense, I think the answer is a pretty emphatic "No." The CGI and annoying moments are certainly irritating, but I think that the real problem is the creative direction behind the films, and the story of the PT itself. We've seen plenty of films that are chock full of CGI or a mix of CGI and practical effects, and the end result is generally pretty entertaining. Marvel's films have, on the whole, been pretty terrific. Same goes for the original LOTR films. Solid stories, even with lots of CGI. Not so with the PT.

However, in a practical sense, I think if you knock out CGI as a crutch for Lucas, it might have reined him in somewhat. Granted, he was still surrounded by people there to do his bidding, rather than working collaboratively, and his impulses are still (in my opinion) the weak link here, but those impulses might've been frustrated by a lack of CGI. Suddenly, it becomes a lot less feasible to do armies of stick-figure droid troopers, so maybe that gets you away from the idiotic "Roger roger" nonsense. Maybe that forces you to start reevaluating exactly what story you're telling, and what you can actually accomplish on screen.

Personally, without people around him to say "That's a really dumb idea, George," I think you'd still have seen the kind of excess we saw in the film. I think the real problem is that George, as a storyteller, is at his best when he works collaboratively, but as his career wore on, he disliked working collaboratively and being told "That can't be done" or "That's a stupid idea and we aren't doing it." CGI made his excesses more possible, but the real issue is that he had the desire in the first place.
 
Solo4114 said:
It's an interesting question.

In one sense, I think the answer is a pretty emphatic "No." The CGI and annoying moments are certainly irritating, but I think that the real problem is the creative direction behind the films, and the story of the PT itself. We've seen plenty of films that are chock full of CGI or a mix of CGI and practical effects, and the end result is generally pretty entertaining. Marvel's films have, on the whole, been pretty terrific. Same goes for the original LOTR films. Solid stories, even with lots of CGI. Not so with the PT.

However, in a practical sense, I think if you knock out CGI as a crutch for Lucas, it might have reined him in somewhat. Granted, he was still surrounded by people there to do his bidding, rather than working collaboratively, and his impulses are still (in my opinion) the weak link here, but those impulses might've been frustrated by a lack of CGI. Suddenly, it becomes a lot less feasible to do armies of stick-figure droid troopers, so maybe that gets you away from the idiotic "Roger roger" nonsense. Maybe that forces you to start reevaluating exactly what story you're telling, and what you can actually accomplish on screen.

Personally, without people around him to say "That's a really dumb idea, George," I think you'd still have seen the kind of excess we saw in the film. I think the real problem is that George, as a storyteller, is at his best when he works collaboratively, but as his career wore on, he disliked working collaboratively and being told "That can't be done" or "That's a stupid idea and we aren't doing it." CGI made his excesses more possible, but the real issue is that he had the desire in the first place.
Click to expand...

I agree that the whole creative direction is an issue. I mean, the costumes and ship designs (and hairdos...ugh!) were so bizarre compared to the OT that it added to the jarring tone. I guess my thinking though is that if only ONE thing could be changed, I wonder if the biggest fix would be in the CG. Sure the story would still be iffy, but I bet a lot of the wooden acting would improve, and the other issues would still be there but...mitigated? It's hard to explain what I'm envisioning in my head, a PT that looks much more OT, despite the more sophisticated locales and politics etc. You are right that many CG spectacles still have great human moments, such as LOTR and GOTG.
 
cayman shen said:
I agree that the whole creative direction is an issue. I mean, the costumes and ship designs (and hairdos...ugh!) were so bizarre compared to the OT that it added to the jarring tone. I guess my thinking though is that if only ONE thing could be changed, I wonder if the biggest fix would be in the CG. Sure the story would still be iffy, but I bet a lot of the wooden acting would improve, and the other issues would still be there but...mitigated? It's hard to explain what I'm envisioning in my head, a PT that looks much more OT, despite the more sophisticated locales and politics etc. You are right that many CG spectacles still have great human moments, such as LOTR and GOTG.
Click to expand...

Well, what I'm getting at with "creative direction" is basically that the problem isn't the tools; it's the workman behind them. CG is just...CG. Sometimes it's more or less effective visually, but the real problem is how and why you use it. Basically, I think the problem is the vision behind it all. If, for example, you strip away the technological advancements from about 1990 on, and give 1997's Lucas only the tools that existed before 1990......I think you have the same underlying problems. He might not be able to make the PT look the way he wanted, but the desire for excess would still be there. The focal point of the story would still be the same. It'd still ignore the Clone Wars in large part. Anakin would still basically just be a whiny demi-god with attachment issues. The political stuff behind the war would still be a jumbled mess. The Sith would still be poorly defined, and Anakin's fall would still be abrupt and awkwardly executed. The fact that they'd have to, say, build sets to do this, or have them do it against matte paintings instead of a green screen wouldn't have changed a ton. The fact that they'd have to shoot models instead of CGI wouldn't have changed that much.

To my way of thinking, the problem is, quite simply, George. Stripping him of some of his tools MIGHT have held him back, but really, I think George Lucas from 1997 on just wanted to tell a story that I (and others) just don't find very interesting. Honestly, even if he'd executed the underlying story well...I'd still find it lacking. Maybe it'd be less of a ****show, but it'd still be a fairly unsatisfying story.
 
Solo4114 said:
...I think George Lucas from 1997 on just wanted to tell a story that I (and others) just don't find very interesting...
Click to expand...
I concur, but I'd take it a step further and say Lucas told a story most fans didn't want to hear. By the time he finally decided to proceed with the Prequel Trilogy years had passed during which most fans created their own ideas of what Vader's backstory should be, how the Jedi operated, and so on. Lucas could have written a brilliant story, hired the best actors available, given them excellent direction, used the most state-of-the-art effects executed perfectly, and some people still wouldn't have liked the story simply because it wouldn't have met the expectations they'd built up during those intervening years.
 
It's missing the obvious.

It goes from (IMO) somewhat annoying but OK kid, to whiny PITA teen Anakin to, in the blink of an eye, child murderer anakin. Jump 20 years and Big badass vader.

What people wanted to see: Jedi's fall from good guy to bad guy. There really wasn't any. Strike 1
What people wanted to see: Vader getting his rep as the big baddy of the galaxy. Again, swing and a miss. Strike 2
What we got, was as noted above. An Anakin no one really like as a good guy and frankly wasn't belieavable in falling to the dark side. Strike 3.

none of which had anything to do with fx.
 
My thoughts have always been this:

Ep1
- Drop the whole midichlorians thing
- Drop Jar Jar and the Gungans
- Make the comedy relief still R2 and C3PO with the banter between Obi and Qui-Gon here and there to lighten things until C3PO meets R2
- DO NOT KILL Darth Maul. Biggest mistake of the whole PT.
- CGI Yoda vs the Puppet or make a Puppet that looks like OT Yoda
- Drop the Uh oh Anakin in a starfighter and Make him pilot the blasted thing to help out. (Luke did it and only drove a speeder. A pod would require more skill)
- Drop the CGI announcers of the pod race and replace with real people

Ep2
- Get rid of Dooku and replace with Maul
- Make Anakin and Padme at least seem like they are in love

Ep3
- Get rid of Dooku and replace with Maul
- Have a better fight between Dooku/Maul and Anakin
- No coughing Grievous
- HAVE Anakin say "Don't make me DESTROY you!" to Obi-Wan instead of KILL
- Get rid of the jealousy stuff between Anakin thinks is there between Obi-wan/Padme
- Eliminate the whole clawing screaming Anakin
- Tone down the epic battle (no riding droids)
- Don't have her die of a broken heart. Have her die of Anakin choking her or choke and throw her causing her harm.

Yup None of that is CGI except the whole EP1 Jar-Jar and Ep3 riding droids thing. Outside of that I don't guess i had an issue with the CGI of the prequels
 
To be clear, I like the PT. I did when the movies came out and still do. But to pose a different question, What if Lucas had written the PT at the same time as the OT or within a short period of time after the release of RotJ? Do you think the movies would be more in line with the OT, having been written at a time when GL still favored story over spectacle, with a completely different story, or would we have gotten basically what we did after he let the story stew for 16 years?
 
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I don't think an earlier GL would have made a huge difference. ROTJ was already shifted towards marketability over story quality. GL's mythic status was built on movies that were heavily affected by his collaborators. I respect what he got accomplished but I don't think he was ever that guy when acting alone.
 
I'm kinda in the same boat as James. I don't mind Ep1. The pod races were pretty cool and the story wasn't that bad. The kids acting is just that. He was young and I can get by it. . Ep 2 I can just barely tolerate and Ep3 is just crap. Hayden just ruins them completely. Whenever I try to watch them in a row I get through Ep1 and 2 and then just cannot get myself to put in the Ep3 disc.
 
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