Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back

commentary

15 - INT. ICE CORRIDOR - REBEL BASE - HOTH Alan Arnold, unit publicist for ESB: "...the unit is at work on one of the most difficult of the ice-cavern scenes. "It's the scene in which the monstrous Wampa Ice Creature thrusts its hideous claws through a cavern wall - a scene that took a very long time to set up. We knew that if it were not achieved in one take the whole thing would have to be mounted again for another try, and that would consume costly time. "But we failed to get it the first time. It just didn't work. "Kersh explained: 'In this scene we're trying to suggest more than will actually be seen. We need to use the audience's imagination as a means of giving color to our coloring book. It's no good being literal in a shot like this. The effect must be one of illusion, sleight of hand, a conjuring trick. So we're going to try again.'" 1 57 - INT. MEDICAL CENTER - REBEL BASE Webmaster commentary: Relationships in The Empire Strikes Back At the end of The Empire Strikes Back, the audience is left asking themselves, is Darth Vader truly Luke's father? Will we see Han Solo again? Similarly, the first film had people wondering, who will the princess end up with, Luke or Han? The element of romance in scenes such as the one in the medical center seem to have been written to both address the issue and to keep people guessing. Some sources indicate that Luke and Leia were not originally intended to be related, but that Luke's twin sister was in some distant part of the galaxy and would arrive at a later time as being the "other" which Yoda spoke of. With that perspective, this scene (had it not been edited down) would have become even more humorous, with Han making his arrogant remarks concerning Leia and himself, the audience knowing that Luke and the princess had just had a romantic moment of their own. And Leia's vindictive completion of their interrupted kiss makes an even better punchline than before. But somewhere along the way, as the final story evolved and was compressed and refined, it was deemed a better idea for Leia to be the lost sibling. And though the brother/sister relationship may seem a little strange overall (considering Luke had spent the whole first film enthralled with her), it is convenient for a story such as this, which borrows heavily on themes of the past, that the standard plot device of mistaken identity used in Shakespeare and other classic works, comes into play fairly well here. 2-1B, medical droid Besides removing the Bacta mask, 2-1B appears to have used a kind of sensor or other device while attending to Luke's injuries. Also, in the final cut of this scene, 2-1B is shown (through a far window) to be in the Bacta tank room again and not with the main characters. Logically, he either must have left the room at some point during the conversation (not necessarily before Artoo and Threepio's entrance, though definitely before Han and Chewie's), or one or more takes of the scene were shot entirely without the droid. Another point of interest is that of a "gelatinous red slime" which is the Bacta fluid the surgeon droids were to have filled the tank with. While the fluid Luke is enveloped in appears clear, the tank is plainly seen to have a red coloration at other times. This hints to the possible filming of the medicine's insertion with Skywalker still in the tank, as scripted. Go to Unused Footage ... INT. REBEL BASE - HOTH Jon Knoles, game creator of LucasArts' Shadow of the Empire: Jon Knoles and team knew of "a scene where Luke actually took over an auto-laser cannon and blast a wampa or two. The wampa filmed in this shot looked absolutely hilarious with a big fluffy face and metallic round eyeballs." 2 3 4 5 Because Luke is wearing his flight gear in this shot, this scene would most likely have taken place in the short time between his leaving the Echo Base medical center and entering his snowspeeder in the hangar bay. (Thanks to T'Bone for research). 79 - EXT. ICE PLAIN - HOTH Joe Johnston, Art Director-Visual Effects: "...the big thing that didn't end up in The Empire Strikes Back was the two-legged walker, but it did end up in Jedi. You get a brief glance of it in Empire, but there was a shot, a POV from one of the snowspeeders; the speeder is attacking the walker and passes right over its head. Unfortunately at the very end, we were under a deadline and were literally up all night shooting this scene. Someone didn't tighten up the backing of the painted sky, and no one noticed it. The next day in the dailies, you could see the background slip, and it slipped about eight inches half-way through the shot ... It just fell, which completely ruined the shot. "But the two-legged walker was never in the script; George had not asked for it. It was just something that I thought: Hey, wouldn't it be neat to have a little scout walker, like a two-legged thing? ... it didn't quite make it into Empire the way that it was intended to, but we saved it and used it extensively in Jedi." 6 352 - INT. CORRIDOR - CLOUD CITY - DAY - BESPIN 7 Action not seen in the film: Lobot stands at the same door which Lando Calrissian was unable to open because the code had been changed. Lobot's purpose here is yet to be uncovered. John Hollis, the actor who played "Lobot", Lando's aide: "'Originally, Lobot had quite a lot of lines to read,' Hollis revealed. 'But they had a discussion where they decided it would be better if he didn't talk, because he had been lobotomized, and he was getting messages through the computer. The dialogue was very much just answering questions put to him by Billy Dee.' Losing the lines, he said, 'didn't bother me too much.'" "'Hollis said dialogue wasn't the only thing Lobot had cut from Empire. 'A lot of death scenes were filmed,' he remembered. 'There was a scene of me being carted off by men in white masks' (stormtroopers? - Webmaster). 'But they would say, "Oh, we might need you again." There were a lot of people getting arrested, but they were very wary about showing people die.'" 7 367 - EXT. YODA'S HOUSE - DUSK - DAGOBAH The Dagobah portion of The Empire Strikes Back was originally to conceived as having a great deal more Jedi training for Luke Skywalker. But it was later felt that the scenes needed to be more concise and so several parts were compressed and combined. Director Irvin Kershner here explains how and why such changes were made. Alan Arnold, author-chronicler for the Empire production: "I had heard that we have an 'exposition' problem, so I asked Irvin Kershner what that meant exactly. "Irvin Kershner: Exposition is setting the scene for a story and explaining its background situation. Although a story has a definite plot, there are things you have to explain in order to condition an audience. But we found that we had been too explanatory; we didn't need so much exposition. So we are compressing. "Alan Arnold: How is that accomplished? "IK: We use montage techniques. We don't stop the action and say, 'Now we will tell you what the plot is about.' Instead, we'll use visual exposition because verbal information can get in the way of the action. The story has to move constantly, like a piece of music. "AA: Surely, a lot can be done in the cutting room. "IK: Yes, George is doing that right now. Parts of the script needed cutting, particularly the upcoming swamp planet scenes of Luke's meeting with Yoda. It's better to cut out parts now instead of shooting more than we need. So George took the problem away to his workbench, analyzed it, and made the compressions. "AA: Are you happy about them or do you resent having his presence looming over your shoulder? "IK: I'm happy because I agreed with the compressions." 8 371 - INT. PRISON AREA - CLOUD CITY 9 Director Irvin Kershner: "I originally filmed more shots of Solo as he is being tortured. There were flashes of electricity everywhere. But it was cut out because we were afraid it might be too intense for children. We also took out some of his screaming offscreen when Vader is talking to Lando outside the cell." 10 Go to Unused Footage Sources: 1, 8 - Once Upon a Galaxy: A Journal of the Making of Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back by Alan Arnold. New York: Ballantine Books, 1980. 5 - Star Wars: the Action Figure Archive, Chronicle Books, publisher; ®, ™, copyright © 1999 Lucasfilm Ltd. 6, 10 - Star Wars: the Annotated Screenplays by Laurent Bouzereau. New York: Ballantine Books, c1997. 2, 7 - The Star Wars Insider, Issue #33, Spring 1997. 3, 4, 9 - Behind the Magic: The Insider's Guide to Star Wars, CD-ROM, LucasArts Entertainment Co., LLC.