As I sat in the theater the trepid
anticipation seemed to grow with each passing minute. The Battlefront commercial (the one with the
original R2-D2 action figure - clearly a retro nostalgia commercial for those
of us who want to relive our childhood) distracted for a moment, but afterward
the reminder only made it worse.
Ever since I heard that Disney had
obtained the franchise I had been wondering how the film would open. Would we
see the magic kingdom, perhaps with stars twinkling in the background, and a
rendition of "when you wish upon a star" spilling over into the
Luckasfilm screen. In another universe perhaps that might be cute, but not in
this one, Gemini Cricket has no place in this movie. Then after many trailers,
silly enough to be annoying but not interesting enough to be distracting came
the feature presentation screen. I took a deep breath. But there was no magic
kingdom, no Tinkerbelle waving her wand no wistful strands, no sound at all.
then in the silence, as if from a dark primordial mist came the Luckasfilm
icon. Then the blue words, silent as always but seeming somehow different with
no sound coming before them. At last came the stars and the fan fair. I sighed,
we're home.
In time this new opening will seem normal
as more episodes come on line. No doubt eventually the original opening will
seem quaint, a manifest relic of the twentieth century. Rather like myself, and
a movie I liked as a child...a movie called Star Wars. It was an elegant motion
picture, for a more civilized age.
It has been thirty-nine years now since
that movie first hit theaters. In many ways it is remarkable how little has
changed since then, at least in the area of human space travel and general
culture...or the lack there of. Thirty-nine years in the other direction and it
is quite a different story. If we do that we find ourselves in a time when man
had not yet sent a single item into orbit nor flown a craft past the speed of
sound, jet propulsion was still highly experimental and the "old"
aerial combat footage Lucas used to previsualize the Deathstar assault had yet
to be shot. And it was in almost all ways more civilized.
It was a time when the modern motion
picture was just beginning to immerge - the sound track was still fairly new,
and color more novel still. Into this time came a film with full score and
vivid color and featuring a delightful heroin happily doing menial domestic
chores in ragged peasant clothes while cheerfully singing of the day her prince
would come for her. I am of course referring to Snow White, who, even before
captain Rogers
took the super soldier serum to become the first Avinger, was the first Disney
princess. Disney has thrived on princess stories ever after.
Snow White was actually a quality movie which
pretty much everybody could enjoy, many of her successors unfortunately, not so
much. however, Disney's twenty-first century renaissance did embody a serious
campaign to expand beyond the juvenile chick flick mill the company had
degenerated into. Captain Jack Sparrow and his Pirates of the Caribbean
led the charge...the first movie was ok, the rest were just plain bad. Then
they acquired Marvel and its impressive MCU - an epic weave of stories and
characters, an immensely satisfying journey I have no doubt for anyone nerdy
enough to actually know which order to watch the movies in...an achievement I
cannot personally clam at the moment. Then came the crown jewel of
entertainment, Gorge Lucas' Lucasfim and its coveted Star Wars franchise.
Gorge Lucas was not very good at female
characters. This is not really a problem as long as you do not focus on them
too much or have too many of them. The OT basically just had Leia (Mon Mothma
is in a total of one scene and aunt Brue is pretty much just a generic mom) and
after dumping the plans into R2 she was mostly just a football. Kasner, Ford
and Fischer cooked up a romance, but mostly it was up to hair, wardrobe and
John Williams to express Leia's femininity. In the PT Padme had a bit more
company; Shmi took the place of Beru but had more dialog, there was Padme's
bodyguard (whatever her name was), and I
guess the librarian, and young Brue (did she actually even say any thing?),
young Mon Mothma actually had two scenes in ROTS - unfortunately they were both cut to make
room for footage of Obi Wan and Grievous battling it out on a unicycle and
giant iguana, and then there is Shaak Ti (the only female Jedi who actually got to say something) yes, she got to
apologize on her knees just before Grievous killed her with her own lightsaber
- I don’t know Rey, bar is pretty high there - mercifully her scene was cut as
well.
Naturally when Disney took possession of
all things Star Wars it seemed like an obvious win/win, Lucasfilm would help
the magic kingdom manup it image wile uncle Walt would help the galaxy far far
away with its girl problem. Well, it sort of worked. First I would like to say
that an old wise woman was long overdo and though Maz is no Galadriel, she
works well enough. A girl droid is also a nice touch, and yes BB-8 is a girl -
I mean come on, you cannot get more yonic than a ball. As for Captain Phasma?
Well, Disney does like its villainesses, but this one...let us just call her a
work in progress. The female first order officers and the spy in Maz's castle,
ok what ever. Female stormtroopers? Ya, ya, I know, the first order is so egger
to swell their ranks they will stop at nothing...blah blah what ever. Come on,
were there really a lot girls out there that were having trouble connecting
with Star Wars because of the lack of female stormtroopers? I don’t think so.
Need this we did not...unless it is the last episode of Pinky and the Brain...Hello Nurse!
But of course, what every one spends most
of their time talking about is the new heroin. Many in fact, consider her to be
the mane protagonist, I personally think Finn beats her on points but then
being comatose at the end could be considered a TKO. In any case, I do find Rey
to be a rather attractive character despite the fact that she runs around the
galaxy in grubby sweats. It is interesting however, that the heroin who may
bring some real femininity to Star Wars is the first who has yet to put on a
dress. But then Leia and Padme needed their clothes to remind us they were
feminine, or lest try to make us think they were. Rey's femininity is a more intragale
part of her character. Oh yes, she whacks people with her stick, works on
starships and when pressed even wields a lightsaber, it is a rough world and
she is a survivor. But what is she like inside? There is certainly no closet of
neglected gowns in her boudoir, if she had a spare wrap I did not see
it. Instead she has a roughly but carefully crafted doll and a decorative
plant, wile eking out a subsistence of quarter portions on desert planet even
the huts did not want these are her treasures. By seemingly sheer force of will
she has carved a modest girl's room out of the belly of an engine of war.
Modesty is not a word you would associate with Leia or Padme, but Rey seems to
have a portion - I know, it is the spoon full of surge that makes the
omnicompetence go down...but you knew what? It works, and in a rather
delightful way. Even in a life and death situation, we get the feeling she was
bypassing the compressor not so much to keep peaces of her and the others from
ending up in three different systems as she was to get Han Solo's approval. In
short, she is a hyper feminine character in a Tomboy's body. But the most
fascinating thing about her hast to be her devotion to her family. How she is
willing to endure grinding poverty and hardship just for the memory of being
able to hope that she would see them again. It is so sad, yet delightful when
she confidently tells BB-8 "they'll be back, some day" - she does not
start singing, but still, this is a Disney scene, not a Star Wars one.
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