Brian Earl Spilner said:

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There are only a handful of movies I would ever presume to call perfect. But, this movie is one of them. (Along with Back to the Future and Fellowship of the Ring.)

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Not to derail, but I like FOTR the most of the LOTR because it takes it time and doesn't give a sheet if you've read the books or not, it's telling the story it's going to tell. Scenes like all the pre-party stuff and when they are on the river and go past those 2 giant statues, that's such an appreciation for the little details of what makes Tolkien's world so special.

Last night, we were eating pizza and I offered my wife the remote but she was too tired so I put on ESB on TNT. My daughter fan wanted to know how far we were away from a Yoda scene and I said about 2 minutes. Then did a couple of Luke's lines ahead of Luke. My wife said, "How long can you do the lines for?" I said "All three movies." She didnt believe me until I did the next 4-5 scenes, then she got that very familiar "Who is this giant nerd I've married look in her eyes."

A few years back, my wife and a pair of our friends went out for a date night to the movies. I was told they had decided to see Leonardo's "The Revenant". We walked into our theater, but immediately I realized something was weird. All of the lights were on even though it was time to start the show. Long story short, I found myself in a small crowded theater filled with just my friends and family. I was turning 40 later that month, and my wife had rented the place out to throw me a surprise party.

She brought a small selection of what she knew to be my favorite films like Jaws, Back to the Future, and a few others. Of course, my heart could lead me down only one path... it was Empire Strikes Back time. Sat there with everyone who is closest to me and allowed one of the greatest adventures of all time to wash over us. Part of me felt like I was being a bit selfish, as a flick like BttF may have a bit more universal appeal for all age ranges, plus women, but well.... it was my party. Also, who can watch ESB and not fall in love?

Take-always: the perfect film, and the perfect wife.

Your wife does sound like a keeper.

I am currently rewatching The Empire Strikes Back.

No movie is absolutely perfect, but this one is as close as it gets for me. It has been my all-time favorite for many, many years - not since its release in 1980, but probably when I first got the movie on (gasp) Beta tape in about 1984, when I was able to watch it in comparison to the recently released Return of the Jedi. The movie opens with such an awesome pace, slows down a good bit in its second act, and then finishes with a flourish and a huge question mark in its final act.

I love everything about TESB. It was not a rehash of Star Wars, and the bad guys dealt a huge blow to the good guys. Our favorite characters were more fully fleshed out. Darth Vader had just a few minutes of screen time in Star Wars, but with TESB, Lucas and Kershner gave us a lot of background on Vader that helped him to become what I believe is the greatest movie villain ever. Han Solo was a great character in Star Wars, but he seemed to be the odd guy out among the top three (at least to me). TESB made Han, well, Han. He is witty, he is sarcastic, but he is also much more engaging and important to the story. Princess Leia is never more hot in any of the movies than she is in this (slave Leia is great eye candy, true, but I liked her more in TESB from a purely visual POV). Carrie Fisher is superb in portraying a romantic tension between Leia and Han; contrast the growth of the relationship between Leia and Han in TESB and the similar character development between Padme and Anakin in Attack of the Clones. Natalie Portman may very well be a good actress, but for whatever reason, probably writing, her sudden announcement of love for Anakin did not carry the same emotional weight for that movie as did Leia blurting out "I love you!" on the carbon freezing platform.

Luke's character grew considerably in TESB as well. If there was going to be a problem with any of the characters in TESB, it was going to be Luke. He goes from not knowing what the Force is in Star Wars to all of a sudden jetting off to learn of the Force from Yoda. Had the film shown him actually mastering stuff (kinda like Rey being this bad-ass Jedi when she has no clue of that life), then I believe TESB would have never attained the status that it has among both the Star Wars movies and movies overall. He fails in the cave. He fails in lifting the X-Wing. He fails in displaying patience. He fails in belief (after dropping the X-Wing into the lake, he tells Yoda "You work the impossible", followed by Yoda telling him that his lack of belief is why he failed). And ultimately, he fails in both rescuing his friends and in confronting Darth Vader. Yet out of all of that failure, we get a sense that he has learned a lot, and we see the extent of his learning in the opening sequence of Return of the Jedi.

C-3P0 is both amusing and annoying in TESB. He also seems to be the most crapped-upon character in the movie. Pushed around, doors shut on him, ignored throughout, and ultimately blasted to smithereens only to be partially reassembled, with his head on backwards, and carried on the back of a walking carpet. He had some dialogue that has stayed with me. When I'm running late in getting somewhere and the freaking light changes to red, how often have I grumbled "how typical." And how many of us have laughed at the t-sips and their "delusions of grandeur".

Yoda was a great addition to the movie. Never once did I think I was looking at, essentially, a Muppet. Even voiced by a Muppet voice talent in Frank Oz. There is something to be said about the realness of Muppet Yoda over CGI Yoda in the prequels.

Lando Calrissian is another great addition. I remember some folks aggravated that the original movie featured no black characters, so Lando being black seems to be an answer to that. But I don't make that statement to be dismissive of the Lando character. He is integral to this movie - old friend to Han Solo who ultimately betrays Han to the Empire and Darth Vader. Redemption is a futile effort to rescue Han from Boba Fett and helping Leia and Chewie escape.

I remember statements regarding Rogue One being the first true war movie in the Star Wars series. While I believe that to be true, there have always been big battles between opposing forces throughout these movies. The first and second Death Star attacks and the Battle of Hoth come to mind. The Battle of Hoth feels like a true military engagement, with some visual ties to trench warfare in WWI mixed in with armor and aerial equipment. I want to say that the Hoth battle is the most perfect part of the movie, but it's actually where I've noticed some issues with the visual effects. When the snowspeeders finally are able to knock over one of the AT-ATs, notice in the background a second walker that is not moving, not at all. Yes, a minor point, but I think that the walker would not have been static; we should have seen its legs moving as it continued its own advance on the rebel base.

Staying on the Battle of Hoth, I still remember 12-year-old me seeing that the first time at Westchase 5 in southwest Houston. The shot of the snowspeeder racing around the legs of the AT-AT looked ... fake ... to me, at the time. Not sure why, maybe a case that as far as Star Wars was concerned, there had not been any such effects shots set against a real-world backdrop? Watching the movie now, though, I'm seeing visual effects that should define what fantastic visual effects look like. The sequence was completed with miniatures, matte paintings, and miniature pyrotechnics, and while I'm sure it was a PITA to animate the AT-ATs through stop-motion photography, it is an effect that has held up perfectly over the years. And the shot of the 3 walkers towering over retreating rebel troops (I posted it on pg. 1) remains jaw-dropping to me. I know it is a composited scene, but it just looks so real; I can see nothing that gives any hint that those huge walkers are nothing more than 18" tall models photographed on a miniature set somewhere in northern California and then composited with film of real actors fleeing across some Norwegian fjord.

Musically, TESB is the absolute best. It is John Williams' finest work, and that's saying something considering his volumes of fantastic scores. I still remember getting the 2-LP album in June 1980, and when I played side B of the first LP, the first track being "The Imperial March" and upon hearing it coming through my record player, thinking, oh ... that! And then going to a Monday Night Football game at the Dome in October 1989, Oilers versus Bengals, and the 'Dome was blasting the Imperial March during pre-game warmups in, what did they call it, the House of Pain or something like that?

The movie is also the best written of all of these movies.

I was finishing 7th grade when TESB came out. Some time in early May 1980, I remember going to Westwood Mall in southwest Houston with my family, and as we were walking around, I saw a big display in front of the B. Dalton book store of The Empire Strikes Back novelization. I happened to have some money with me at the time, so I bought it (would probably have convinced my dad to get it for me had I been penniless). I know that I read that book before seeing the movie, and I know that I read it very quickly, and I know that I was a jackass the following Monday at school when I ran my mouth about what I'd read. I don't recall if I mentioned the big reveal (I am your father), but whatever I ran my mouth about, I was clearly a huge Richard Cranium.

When the movie finally opened at the Lake Theater in Lake Jackson, I saw it repeatedly. It was summer, I wasn't doing anything else, I had money earned through mowing yards, and I had a bike to get from our house to downtown Lake Jackson easily enough. Ticket prices back then for a 12-13 year old (I turned 13 before the movie ever arrived in Lake Jackson) were no more than two and a quarter. Very cheap entertainment.

There has been a lot of discussion, mostly negative, regarding the Special Editions that came out in 1997, particularly Han shot first. Empire had some updates in the original edition of the SE that were flat out awful. When Luke leaps off the antenna to escape from his daddy, in the SE he is yelling as he falls into the ventillation shaft. Thankfully Lucas removed that garbage for a subsequent video release. There was also some scenes inserted that f'd up the pacing of the escape from Bespin once Lando pulls Luke off the weather vane on the underside of Cloud City; some of that remains in the video that I am watching now.

I've always found it interesting that, for the most part, the movies that I rate the highest came out between the years 1977 and 1984. There have been some additions from other years to that list, but with the exception of a one-two punch of Infinity War and Endgame, those additions have been few and far between. The Empire Strikes Back is the best of all of them.

Another major thing I noticed rewatching Empire for like the thousandth time: it's kind of smaller-scale than you would think it would be. The imperial walker sequence, the major action set piece, takes place in the first act, with the climax being simply the Luke/Vader duel intercut with Leia/Lando's escape, and that's it. There's no huge battle or exotic locale-just intensely personal, character driven action with huge stakes.

In this day and age of everything having to be bigger for every sequel, it's kind of refreshing to see that wasn't always the case.

Cinco Ranch Aggie said:

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Keeper she is.

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FIFY

Brian Earl Spilner said:

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Quote:

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I've always found it interesting that, for the most part, the movies that I rate the highest came out between the years 1977 and 1984.

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It's that sweet spot of nostalgia. (10-16 or so)

For me, that would be 98-04, thus my absolute love of Titanic,

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DiCaprio definitely knew how to hit that sweet spot in Titanic.