Exposition - A Take on Alternatives

There was a time when the feature film conveyed a sense of permanence, as if the story you were watching had been set in stone. Indeed, of the mere hundred years or so during which the medium has existed, this has been the case for all but the last third of that period. As a child of the eighties, I have only a very small recollection of this time, and yet it is an era which remains powerfully vivid in my mind. Oftentimes the only inkling you had of an upcoming film would be the preview shown before another feature. Occasionally there would be a poster or cardboard diorama set up in the cinema three or four months in advance. On rare occasions there might be a brief article in one of the larger newspapers suggesting that filming had commenced on a sequel to one of the successful films from two or three years ago. Whatever the case, when you did eventually settle down in that mildew-scented cinema and waited for the red curtains to draw aside in their jerky fashion, it never once entered my mind that I would be seeing anything but a perfect vision. Hollywood was just like Willy Wonka's chocolate factory. The inner workings of the industry remained largely unknown and mysterious, clouding popular perception to a point where it seemed inconceivable that a film could have ended up in any state other than the way we saw it on the screen. Without any knowledge of the politics, disputes, and outright failures going on behind the scenes, films always seemed to emerge with an unearthly, somewhat eerie sense of immaculate completion.

"We are the music-makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams"

Looking back over the past twenty years, it is startling how much the situation has changed within such a short period. And the most appreciable influence behind this shift is, of course, the advent of the internet. While there has always been a subculture, made up of enthusiasts, which have made it their business to appraise themselves of all the news and inner-workings of the film industry that their circumstances would allow, the mass transferral of information afforded by the internet has seen an unprecedented increase in the amount of available material and the number of people with access to it. Time was when it actually meant something to say that you had an interest in film, the hallmarks of which were a basement or attic crammed to the brim with film cases and projection equipment. Cut to the present day, where saying that you like film is akin to expressing your interest in food or simple respiration. What was once the sole province of a dedicated subculture has become a staple of culture at large, to the point where virtually everyone these days would classify themselves as some species of film enthusiast. In fact, one might say that very little is left of the original audience, that great horde which used to include the cinema as part of their weekly or monthly entertainment, to be consumed, enjoyed, and then largely forgotten. When a film screens these days it is not met by the humble consumer, but ruthlessly dissected by a throng of self-proclaimed, self-righteous critics and technical experts – yours truly included.

No longer perceived as a kind of immaculate vision, the general attitude toward film has shifted toward a 'work-in-progress' mentality: the seamless white sheet now exposed as the patch-work conglomeration it really was all along. Indeed, with the proliferation of insider-information now blazoned on the web, the attitude toward modern films is very often determined before production even begins – the seams picked apart before the industry even has a chance to lay out the template. Increasingly, the result of this pressure seems to be a frantic attempt on the part of film-makers and studios to placate vocal consumers rather than maintain their original vision. More often than not, however, the result is a bastardised hybrid of creative concept and reactionary marketing that fails to satisfy either party. But even if we rightly identify the internet as playing a significant role in this shift, is it really the only, or indeed the original cause? By the same token, can we really blame the millions of film enthusiasts – whose curiosity perhaps outstrips their tact and diligence – for the increasing number of creatively compromised films, or does the fault really lie on the industry side?

To an extent, I think that film-makers have actually brought this situation upon themselves. On the studio side, nothing but greed can account for the recent trend toward approving sequels before an original instalment has even been tested in the market. The considerable upsurge in remakes has also led to a climate wherein films are leant to direct comparisons, and the inevitable conclusion that one or the other must necessarily be bad if the other is deemed to be good. Over-saturation is perhaps the best way to describe the current phenomenon, and its origins can be traced all the way back to the era of my idealised childhood. You see, with the advent of (relatively) affordable home-viewer technology, such as Laserdisc and VHS tapes, the general populace began to see tangible proof of an element of film-making which had always existed but, until then, generally remained within the realm of urban legend: the extended cut. The famously absent spider pit sequence in the original King Kong is one of the best known examples, but it wasn't until the early eighties that extended cuts began to be widely disseminated, triggering a fundamental shift in the attitude toward film. The infamous Caligula – released in 1979 – is a tempting candidate upon whom to pin the role of popularising alternative versions. The controversy surrounding its content certainly propelled it to a level of intense public scrutiny, but the details of its troubled production disqualifies it to some extent on a technicality. After all, it wasn't that director Tinto Brass was issuing multiple versions of his own volition, more that his Caligula was competing with a version augmented by Giancarlo Lui and Bob Guccione, as if they were entirely separate films.
 

It wasn't until the mid eighties, when cable TV stations began to show an extended version of Michael Cimino's Heaven's Gate, that the public was really exposed to the idea that a director could favour a version of the film which was substantially different from the cinema release. It was this particular example which also brought the term Director's Cut out of its original context as part of the film-making process and introduced it to the consumer vocabulary. Even so, for the most part the eighties continued under the auspice that what you saw on the screen was what you were ideally meant to get, at least until two of the biggest names in modern film-making unwittingly pioneered what has since grown into a staple of the industry. As fate would have it, 1992 saw two of the most influential science-fiction films reissued to audiences, with Ridley Scott releasing a Director's Cut of Blade Runner, and James Cameron offering a Special Edition of Aliens. The ramifications for the home-viewer were nothing short of revolutionary. Suddenly it wasn't simply a matter of whether you liked the movie or not, but which version you regarded as being superior. Films could now be comparable to themselves, creating a schism which – regardless of where you fell on the issue – denied any concept of an immaculate, definitive version. With the cinema complex still top-dog in the market, however, the issue was still largely relegated to the home-viewing enthusiast.

While these examples certainly acted as harbingers on the horizon of future possibility, they were destined to remain something of an oddity through to the late nineties. As pillars of the industry, Scott and Cameron had opened minds to the possibility that great films could exist in an alternate form which was even arguably superior. However, each had come about through a set of particular circumstances, with neither director exhibiting any desire to make it a staple in their creative repertoire. It took another pillar of the science-fiction catalogue to really set-off the boom industry in alternate versions, a dubious honour that fell to George Lucas and his 1997 theatrical release of the Star Wars trilogy in a revised Special Edition. This time there was no escaping the schism, and to complicate the issue further, this divide would have generational implications. Where Scott and Cameron had been content to allow their alternate version to stand on their own merits, Lucas took the contentious step of weighing in heavily, even overbearingly, on the issue. His intent with these re-releases was to establish a definitive version, taking advantage of technology which was not available to him at the time.
 

For those that had embraced the original Star Wars trilogy it was simply too bad – it was being put out to pasture, with the openly professed intent that they might be forgotten as a new generation grew up in the shadow of these revised iterations. The older generation had, unfortunately, fallen for an incomplete, blemished version, but now it was time to upgrade to something certifiably superior. Needless to say, many resented the implicit suggestion that they had been duped into embracing a flawed vision, and doubly so now that the unconditional love they had shown for this cash cow had put enough money in the farmer's coffer that he was at liberty to take it out the back and shoot it. A precedent had been set and a means of increasing revenue simultaneously proven, and it was not long before others took the idea and ran with it, including the unimaginatively titled release of The Exorcist: The Version You've Never Seen. With the subsequent advent the DVD format and its ability to convey data in a non-linear fashion, the market in alternate versions expanded rapidly from this point on, delivering a bastard child in the form of endless reissues and repackages.

As always, however, it only takes a few glorious triumphs for us to forgive a trying campaign of misadventure, and in the realm of alternate versions there have certainly been a few films that seem to justify the phenomenon. The 2003 release of an Alien 3 in Assembly Cut form, for instance, offers an approximation of the film we may have seen had a young David Fincher not been encumbered with a terminally ill production from the outset. As a mark of dedication to the original source material, Peter Jackson put considerable effort into an Extended Edition of each instalment in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, providing an affirmative example of how to successfully negotiate the rift between the casual and dedicated audience. Deserving the most praise of all, however, is Ridley Scott, who has recently returned to place his indelible mark on the phenomenon which he ostensibly created with a truly transformative Director's Cut of the otherwise deeply flawed Kingdom of Heaven. Since then he has delved into the depths of his back-catalogue to reissue Blade Runner in a deluxe set, delivering not only a revised Final Cut, but a staggering four other versions in a definitive sign of support for the dedicated enthusiast. As such, while we may lament the advent of alternative cuts for unleashing a marketing farce in recent years, it is certain that we would never have experienced some truly spectacular film evolutions had the phenomenon never taken root.

Ridley Scott finishes what he started with Blade Runner

A Too Big/Small Universe - The Star Wars Prequels

In the decade since the release of Episode I: The Phantom Menace, the Star Wars prequels have been the subject of much criticism, derision, and outright castigation. Even the most conscientious defenders have a hard time endorsing some of the more dubious elements, which are now immortalised alongside the acclaimed original trilogy. Indeed, the most prominent of these – the infamous character Jar Jar Binks – has entered the common lexicon as a byword for something defying all notion of good sense or sound reason. Beyond isolated elements such as this, however, there is little consensus among fans as to where and how the prequel trilogy went wrong: suffice to say that if there is no common view as to which elements are wholly detractive, it is still harder to find any agreement on those areas where positive additions were made. This has much to do with the sheer weight of expectation placed upon these three films, and one might be tempted to say that George Lucas set himself an impossible mandate the instant he re-branded the original Star Wars with the subtitle Episode IV: A New Hope back in 1981. With almost two decades having passed between this implicit promise and the period when it began to be delivered, it is hard to imagine that any film, no matter how expertly constructed, could ever hope to satisfy the lofty and divergent fantasies that an expectant audience had fostered throughout the interim. Even amidst the current industry climate of interpreting any modest reception as justification for immediately commencing production on a sequel, the Star Wars prequels seem to have erred too much on the opposite side of the equation, delivering too little too late. It is not the intent of this article to merely perpetuate the subjective argument that continues to be waged over these films, however, but rather to approach and critique them from a technical basis, and thereby attain something at least pointing toward an objective appraisal. Nitpicking and disappointment aside, the prequels still represent a deeply flawed and largely unsatisfying narrative, a large part of which stems from a single essential failure: their scope is at once too dissolute and too restricted.

A galaxy in need of scrutiny

It may seem ridiculous to suggest that a series whose opening lines promise visions of a galaxy far, far away could ever be too big in terms of scale. Like his forebears in the world of literature, such as J.R.R. Tolkien and Frank Herbert, George Lucas created an entire universe of fictional continuity in the original Star Wars and its two sequels. A term that Lucas himself has used to express this remarkable feat is 'immaculate reality', which essentially boils down to imbuing any fictional setting with intelligible hallmarks that create and maintain a sense that it has an internal logic and implied history all of its own, and thus all the appearance of being in homogeneous existence. Think of the gritty, worn look of the Millenium Falcon and the rebel ships, the off-hand reference to Obiwan's service during the Clone Wars, or the discussion concerning the Emperor's discussion to dissolve the Galactic Senate; none of these contribute to the primary narrative, but what they achieve altogether is the sense of a living, breathing universe in which the central storyline is but an isolated strand. It is this simple attention to detail, rather than lengthy scenes of pure exposition, which creates the illusion that the world we are seeing has an existence beyond the restricted scope of what the main characters experience. Where the prequel trilogy unfortunately departs from this proven formula is in a series of needless expansions and duplications.

Too Big...

Of the myriad examples one could cite, two should be sufficient to illustrate my point. For the first I draw your attention to the picture below, which shows two of the peripheral characters from Return of the Jedi. These curious creatures belong to a race called the Mon Calamari, whose resemblance to a squid reflects their aquatic origins on a world dominated by oceans, and their organic-looking spacecraft make up a significant part of the rebel fleet that attacks the second Deathstar toward the conclusion of the saga. We are given none of this information within the film itself, indeed, all we are provided with is the name of the figure on the right – Admiral Ackbar – and the fact that he is in command of the operation in question. We have no idea when this race may have joined the rebel cause, although they did not appear in either of the preceding films, nor is any explanation given as to why they did so, and this is a good thing. Those members of the audience with an inquiring mind will inevitably leave the film pleasantly engaged in musing about these matters, while casual viewers can simply discard these details without it hampering their enjoyment of the central narrative. Cast your mind forward to Attack of the Clones, the second of the prequel films, and we are introduced to an aquatic planet with another species of humanoid alien, the Kaminoans. In terms of the overall narrative, this planet and its people fulfil a fairly significant role, being the birthplace (so to speak) of the clone army whose prominent role had been implied way back in the original 1977 Star Wars. Unlike the army they produce, however, neither the Kaminoans themselves nor their watery planet are seen or heard of again. In this respect their utterly generic appearance is a perfect reflection of the arbitrary role they play within the saga. Inspiring little wonder, they are discarded as soon as their function in the narrative has been fulfilled, leaving us with the impression of a mental cul-de-sac. The universe has been expanded by an entire planet and people, and yet neither ultimately leave a compelling impression.

Mon Calamari

Kaminoans

In the interests of narrative economy, why not simply make the Mon Calamari the originators of the clone army, and thereby flesh-out an element where interest and anticipation already exist? This simple substitution would not involve changing a single thing about this part of the film in order to achieve a vastly more satisfying result. Without any additional information whatsoever, a diligent audience might reasonably infer that their appearance as a significant force in the rebellion might be an act of penance for unwittingly unleashing what proves to be a devastating force throughout the galaxy, resulting in the ascendancy of a despotic regime. Rather than two isolated appearances of different species, neither of which play another notable role within the series, a sense of continuity would thereby be maintained, provoking thought at what precisely the Mon Calamari were doing in the period between episodes II and VI. In so doing the fictional world is allowed to expand without feeling arbitrary or redundant in the process.

Naboo

Alderaan

A similar case can be made for the introduction of the planet Naboo in The Phantom Menace and its gradually lessening role in the subsequent prequels. Once again, is it necessary to invent another verdant, idyllic setting when one already existed in the form of Alderaan, having been introduced in the original film and fleetingly glimpsed in Revenge of the Sith? The fact that we are already aware of its ultimate fate in A New Hope would also add an emotional dimension, with the audience acutely aware of the fact that we are seeing a paradise destined to be callously eradicated as part of a cynical demonstration against civil disobedience. This simple substitution would also result in an entirely new depth being imbued in the scene where Darth Vader offers his implicit approval for the action, as we wonder how any man could ever been so damaged as to abet the destruction of a planet where his dearly beloved once lived. Either of these examples would have been incredibly easy to implement, and yet the reward in terms of creating pathos and compelling narrative could have been vast. It is one of the cardinal rules of writing that a good author opts to show rather than tell, and while the nature of the film medium means that showing essentially amounts to telling and vice versa, the fact that the prequel trilogy diverges from this practice nevertheless remains true. It is voyeuristic in its relentless pursuit of unnecessary scope, opting to show the audience an entire bland tapestry, whereas the original trilogy took a single strand and merely hinted, tantalisingly, at what lay beyond its fringes.

Too Small...

At the other end of the spectrum, the prequel trilogy is also guilty of committing yet another narrative faux pas. If the setting has expanded to a gratuitous extent, then the limit in terms of central players and plot elements seems to have shrunken commensurately. By this I mean the conspicuous number of recurring characters and other apparent coincidences that stretch or defy any rational belief. What are the odds, for instance, that R2-D2 would have originally been part of the crew on a starship that belonged to Luke's mother, or that his father would have personally constructed C-3PO? Not only does the latter stretch the limits of credulity, but it also leads to the ridiculous situation whereby the comic character of episodes IV through VI was created by none other than its stoic, intimidating antagonist, Darth Vader. As such, we can only scoff at the highly improbable coincidence, bemuse ourselves with this unwelcome new consideration throughout the original trilogy, and ask ourselves what it actually adds to the narrative? Obviously the desire was to capitalise upon the pre-existing attachment to the characters established in the earlier films, but not only does this detract from that original experience, it's simply lazy writing. No-one began watching Star Wars back in 1977 with an ingrained love of R2-D2 and C-3PO, or indeed Luke, Han, Chewbacca, or Princess Leia. That appeal was earned through a combination of compelling narrative and endearing character development. With a whole galaxy of humans, droids, and aliens to choose from, there is simply no reason why figures needed to be retrospectively inserted. The resulting constriction in terms of the key players simply ends up feeling contrived and artificial, detracting from that all-important sense of immaculate reality. In this respect, at least, the intention behind creating a character such as Jar Jar Binks was perfectly sound, and one suspects that perhaps George Lucas acted too reflexively in response to the immediate wave of criticism and derision. It was the execution in that instance, not the underlying idea, which was defective.

Property of Darth Vader

It is worth pointing out that not all of these character revivals were misguided, in fact many of them were absolutely crucial. A prequel trilogy virtually had to include Anakin Skywalker and the mother of his children, likewise Obiwan, Yoda, and the Emperor. Beyond these, any number of the minor cameos, such as Jabba the Hutt, Boba Fett, and Chewbacca, are perfectly reasonable and add a necessary degree of familiarity. The latter, in fact, might well have played a far more pronounced role in the prequel films without attending the same disbelief evoked by the presence of R2-D2 or C-3PO, depending, of course, on how the character was woven into the central narrative. Beyond these, too much is dealt with in a fleeting, ultimately meaningless fashion. All told, it speaks either of a committee-based development wherein any slightly good idea was thrown into the mix, or an unusual measure of timidity on part of George Lucas as a writer, with the result being that virtually no enduring character was allowed to develop or grow during the entire duration of the three prequels. Quite simply, the sheer quantity of ideas present in the prequels cannot offset the dearth of quality imagination. This is perhaps most evident in the extent to which these films rely on preconceived stereotypes.

No one could reasonably argue that the original Star Wars trilogy showed a particularly innovative or complex storyline. George Lucas himself has unashamedly acknowledged the extent to which his fictional universe relies upon some of the age-old stories and motifs that recur throughout world literature. The central strand is essentially a quest narrative, following the prodigal but unassuming hero from his humble origins through a journey of increasing magnitude until he eventually rights the myriad wrongs that predate his birth into that world. There are archetypes aplenty to be found, and it is this marriage between ancient narrative and innovative, imaginative presentation that is the root of its success. The aspiring innocent and the worldly rogue, the dark agent and his despotic master, the wise hermit and the threatened princess; we are conditioned from an early age to recognise all these figures, and thus react to them subliminally. While the prequels aren't entirely devoid of any trace of these archetypal characters, there is a definite move toward less polar stereotypes. The conniving politician, for instance, does not inspire the same visceral reaction as the despotic tyrant, nor the frustrated prodigy the same as the aspiring innocent. The polar opposition between freedom and oppression is also much easier to apprehend and transcendent in essence than the deft machinations of even the most straightforward double-cross. The shift from archetype to stereotype is thus at once a diminishing and a complicating one. Also, whereas archetypes tend to encompass things which are absolute in an attempt to make them codified and more easily apprehended, stereotypes tend more toward overt simplification, stripping away individual variation in an effort to demean and debase what they circumscribe.

More caricature than character

The picture above shows three examples of characters that illustrate this point. The one on the top-left is clearly meant to parody the back-and-forth style of live sports commentators, the one on the bottom-left the quintessential burly diner chef, and the one on the right the unscrupulous second-hand car dealer. There is nothing wrong with basing fantasy characters on stereotypes, and we see this practice used to good effect in films such as Men in Black, but insofar as Star Wars is concerned it marks a departure from the imaginative standards set by the original trilogy. In terms of stereotypes, perhaps the closest approximations in Episodes IV to VI would be the fascist overtones of the Imperial officers or the mafioso role played by Jabba the Hutt. Even so, had these figures been designed during the production of the prequels one cannot help but think that Jabba's face would have borne an overt resemblance to Marlon Brando, with Grand Moff Tarkin sporting a decidedly Hitleresque moustache. It sounds patently ridiculous, and that is essentially what the three characters above are equivalent to. Only when one reaches the limits of his imagination is he forced to fall back upon what is already intimately known, and the result is utterly generic figures who fulfil a narrative function rather than exist as fully independent characters.

Perhaps the most succinct measure of when a fantasy narrative has failed is the point where its scale has exceeded the ability of its creator's imagination, beyond which it merely reflects the known and delivers the predictable. Whether due to creative fatigue on the part of George Lucas, or through the diluting influence of excessive input and resources, there is no question that the prequel trilogy failed to emulate the impact felt in response to the original films. Even without resorting to such loaded comparisons, the saga of episodes I through to III is plagued by narrative issues that no amount of financial investment or technical innovation could right. Proof once again, if any were needed, that a good story will overcome the limitations placed upon its telling, while no amount of anticipation will redeem a bad one.