Spielberg Speaks about ET Blu, Indiana Jones Blu

[Vivek]

Ain't It Cool News: The best in movie, TV, DVD, and comic book news.
Spielberg Speaks about ET Blu, Indiana Jones Blu and Indy 5 at the 30th Anniversary Raiders of the Lost Ark screening!

ET Blu-Ray: It’s coming. Spielberg said he wanted to poll the audience. He asked us if there was anybody in the crowd that would be disappointed if the 2002 Special Edition was not included on the Blu, if it was only the original 1982 version. He was greeted with a roaring “No!” from the crowd and said, “Well, that settles it then.” So, he strongly implied the ET Blu-Ray will be the original theatrical cut only and not even include the gun-less, penis breath-less CGI’d ET version.


Wishful thinking to consider that some of Spielberg's sensibilities would get rubbed off on Lucas.

 

[Wes R]

Re: Spielberg Speaks about ET Blu, Indiana Jones B

I think he realized he made a horrible mistake with that 2002 lame edition.

 

[Kerr Avon]

Re: Spielberg Speaks about ET Blu, Indiana Jones B

GREAT! Maybe he can speak to the hack George Lucas about what ****tards they've been.

 

[dualedge]

Re: Spielberg Speaks about ET Blu, Indiana Jones B

GREAT! Maybe he can speak to the hack George Lucas about what ****tards they've been.

I was just thinking the same exact thing.

 

[PHArchivist]

Re: Spielberg Speaks about ET Blu, Indiana Jones B

Remember a forgettable flick called Indy 4...?

George don't listen to nobody, not even his best pal Stevie...

 

[dualedge]

Re: Spielberg Speaks about ET Blu, Indiana Jones B

Remember a forgettable flick called Indy 4...?

George don't listen to nobody, not even his best pal Stevie...

Me thinks you speaketh the obvious :behave

 

[PHArchivist]

Re: Spielberg Speaks about ET Blu, Indiana Jones B

Me thinks you speaketh the obvious :behave

Totally. I mean, its a pretty well-accepted fact that Spielberg actively campaigned against George's "brilliant" ( :rolleyes ) idea of inter-dimensional aliens, yet finally relented, right?

 

[JPolacchi]

Re: Spielberg Speaks about ET Blu, Indiana Jones B

I give Speilberg far more credit than George.He's turned out more great films(many Oscar contenders and winners) than George.Lucas(as it seems) was just a one hit wonder and whatever creative genius he had way back when has dissappeared.He has the ability to redeem himself, but I have the sneaking suspician that he doesn't want to.Lucas essentially stopped directing after Star Wars...or was it Howard the Duck?Great film to end your directing/film career on.:behave

 

[Solo4114]

As much as I complain about Lucas' choices with respect to Star Wars and later Indy, I think he does have a kind of creative genius -- it's just genius that needs direction and limitations.

The way I think of him is like this. Out of 10 ideas about any given Lucas film:

- 5 are absolute crap that should never see the light of day.
- 3 are so-so with the potential to be tweaked into something good.
- 2 are staggeringly, absolutely brilliant.


Lucas, like many great artists, works best when he is truly collaborating with other people. He, as many of us do, needs someone aruond to tell him "George, that is a REALLY stupid idea. Go back and try again." The thing is, many artists find such collaborative exercises to be incredibly limiting (and they are -- with good reason). They want the freedom to create as they see fit, with no restrictions, limits, or roadblocks. Lucas positioned himself in Hollywood to do just that, so he now has his artistic freedom. The thing is, what he ends up producing...doesn't have quite the universal appeal of his collaborative work.


I take much the same attitude of The Police vs. just Sting on his own. The Police put out some of my favorite rock tunes ever, largely -- I suspect -- as a result of the limitations their collaboration placed on them. Sting couldn't get too pretentious, Andy couldn't get too weird, and Stewart couldn't play quite as fast as he wanted. End result? AWESOME music. Then they split up, and since then...eh. Some stuff's been ok, but most of Sting's work (I haven't heard Andy's or Stewart's) has been bloated and lackluster, in my opinion. But when you hear the stories about the days of the band, they fought like crazy with each other, and the experience, while fun in some ways, was not fun enough or personally rewarding enough to make them stick it out past '86. (Except for the reunion tour, that is.)

Anyway, like I said, George isn't COMPLETELY insane, it's just that he's got no limitations now and, I suspect, is a guy who produces his best work when he's limited rather than indulged.


Note: Indy 4 may be a "collaboration" but from what I've heard, it's more along the lines of "Ok, George, we'll all 'collaborate' with your ideas and make your movie." Again, more of an indulgence by many people than a true collaborative give-and-take.

 

[Mola Rob]

Not a big ET fan but it's nice to know some directors actually care about what the fans think. As long as the original is totally remastered for Blu who cares if the revised version is thrown in as well? It does exist and someone might want it for some strange reason. Maybe some walkie-talkie fanatics like the new version.

 

[AdamNightmare]

As much as I complain about Lucas' choices with respect to Star Wars and later Indy, I think he does have a kind of creative genius -- it's just genius that needs direction and limitations.

The way I think of him is like this. Out of 10 ideas about any given Lucas film:

- 5 are absolute crap that should never see the light of day.
- 3 are so-so with the potential to be tweaked into something good.
- 2 are staggeringly, absolutely brilliant.

Anyone in a creative field should understand - if these are actually his numbers, he's beyond the realm of genius, and into the world of phenomenon. Most normal creative-types range more in the arena of 9-out-of-10 ideas are crap. That's ok, though, because their job is to come up with 1000 ideas.

 

[Solo4114]

Right, and that's kind of my point. When Lucas is on, MAN is he on. But when he's off....yeesh. I just think he's now independently wealthy and powerful enough within Hollywood, and has built up (or allowed to be built up) enough of a myth about his genius (which, of course, led to the inevitable backlash when his ideas turned out not to be universally wonderful) that it doesn't matter anymore. He does what he wants and to hell with everyone else. If you like his work, super. He's glad. If you don't. Super. They're his stories, though, and he'll tell 'em (or re-tell 'em) as he damn well pleases.

 

[decaturvader]

Two thumbs up to Steve on ET.
Glad to hear he's interested in the fanbase.

 

[Dutchman]

The CGI'd E.T. was awful, there was absolutely no need for that.

 

[MooCriket]

Re: Spielberg Speaks about ET Blu, Indiana Jones B

GREAT! Maybe he can speak to the hack George Lucas about what ****tards they've been.

 

[JPolacchi]

Yeah, I didn't really see the need for the extra scenes.The didn't really add anything to the film.I think Spielberg did it to toot his own horn and fix a few things that drove him mad and maybe a little for fans.However, the walkie talkies replacing shot guns was LAME.The whole "being" pollitically correct thing bothers me that it bothers me.People have become too pacified and over protective.It makes me :wackoNUTS :confused that you have to be so tollerant of everyone's feelings and walk on egg shells all the time.Sometimes I just want to find my deserted island and get away from everyone because I can't take anymore.

 

[dualedge]

As much as I complain about Lucas' choices with respect to Star Wars and later Indy, I think he does have a kind of creative genius -- it's just genius that needs direction and limitations.

I've argued that point a LOT.

Most creative types benefit from honest feedback. Too bad George's ego won't let him recognize that.

All that crap about "a film is never finished, just abandoned" is a b.s. excuse from an overactive ego. If anybody deserves to have that kind of ego, Spielberg does but he gets it.

I'd love to go back and tweak logos I designed for people years ago but at some point you've gotta let stuff go.

For that matter, has anyone else noticed how some young, attractive hairstylists have really horrible hair? My guess is that it's because they're always obsessing and tweaking it until they wind up looking like they stuck their head in a blender. That's what I think of when I think of George. A hairstylist with OCD.

At least now I can look forward to seeing a nice clean blu-ray copy of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Before reading that stuff from what Spielberg said, I wasn't sure if we weren't going to wind up with some kind of Raiders "Special Edition."