Ive been running aroung w/ a lot of images from THX and American Graffiti in my head since yr post the other day.
If one is making an effective political statement through the art of filmmaking, these two resonante the loudest with me.
The biggest irony / chortle I had in hearing Lucas's recent comments @ Cannes about how bad its gotten in America and how we are like a teensy weensy thread away from being a dictatorship was that Lucas, through the vertical integration of every piece of the filmmaking process except for distribution (thanks 20th Century Fox)has become a teensey weensy bit of a dictator himself.
Did anyone hear the
NPR piece about Lucas's tendencies of isolation and strained relations w/ Fox throughout the making of the Prequels? Interesting stuff.
In order for Lucas to rail against the system, he had to create an even bigger system and rule that new system that he created with an iron fist. Is Lucas more like Luke or Anakin? Democrat or Republican? Lover of Democratic Society or Totalitarian Rule? I guess I dont know.. but these were questions rattling around my mind, once I got over gushing on about how cool Yoda is.
Back to the 2 earlier Lucas Films for a moment:
THX: everyone self medicating to deny their human emotions and sexuality, everyone going to a center where they can hold on to a new shiny yellow box, which people take home, get rid of, just to go out to get the exact same new yellow box again... I feel like this stuff was a much better social / political commentary on the so-called need for mindless consumerism and the increasing role of governmental control at the expense of personal freedom than two opponents with laser swords saying "I Have a Bad Feeling about this" every 15 minutes or so
American Graffiti:
One of the most powerful Vietnam metaphors / political statements in film I have ever seen is @ the end of this film, when Paul Le Mat's character is standing over the flaming carcass of his hot rod, realizing that his whole way of life of cruising the strip , listening to Wolfman Jack , picking up girls and taunting other aspiring motor heads is about to change, along with the the rest of America (and the world for that matter) leaving the late 50's / early 60's and diving into the Vietnam era.
SW is so full of merchandising, cops / robbers, cowboys / indians, Jedi / Sith, whatever, that beyond general myths and archetypes its hard for me to take any serious political commentary from Lucas from these 6 films. Corporate greed, the crumbling of democracy, being punished for standing out amongst the crowd seem to be things Lucas railed against in his earlier films, but he was so intent on destroying the above things independently from others that he had to cretae his own system of corporate greed and dictatorship through Lucasfilm to get them.
Just my .02