The War Of The Stars: A New Hope Grindhoused

This is a "grindhouse" version of George Lucas's Star Wars (episode 4 A New Hope)
Some of the deleted scenes, alternate takes and behind the scene footage are now back in the movie.
New music.
New special effects.
key scenes have been reorganized.

Original runtime: 124 min.
Amount of time cutted (including credits): 43 min.
Amount of time added (including some alternate takes): 16 min.
New runtime: 97 min.


Note:
To complete a "grindhouse double feature" I needed a second movie.
(First JAWS: The Sharksploitation Edit, now The War Of The Stars: A New Hope Grindhoused)
When you talk about "grindhouse double feature" Planet Terror/Death Proof comes to mind,
and what people usualy says?... "Damn, Planete Terror was fun, but Death Proof was a bore!"

Personally I like Death Proof a lot but I can understand why people felt it was boring.
I hope this edit will not bore you too much!
I took as an advice a comment on my JAWS edit who said it was "too long for mockery"
so I made the overal lenght quite short this time.

I want to thanks Puggo for letting me use his 16mm preservation work, known as The Puggo Grande.
I just zoomed and cropped it for it to have a more "Star Warsish" aspect ratio.
(so the picture quality of the Puggo Grande is better, I wanted to point out that fact.)
Only I think that quality loss helped me a lot to blend some documentary footage back in the movie.

And THAT is one of the main purpose of this edit: to bring back a lot of deleted scenes and various footage.
Does it make it a better movie? Hell no. This is a cheap version of Star Wars. Hopefully fun for the fans to watch.

In the bonus of the DVD you'll find a little slideshow video showing some of the various shots added.
Please do NOT watch this video before the edit itself!

Excellent! Well done on the release TMBTM!

Well queue up to download tonight.

Well done, TMBTM. I wish you luck with your release and I will be watching it very soon.

really excited to watch this. puggo's preservation sure was a fun watch and am looking forward to your vision

i dont know if you made this video or not but it was really ironic if you didnt and very fitting!! follow the link... you'll be pleasently surprised. "]

the jester said:

i dont know if you made this video or not but it was really ironic if you didnt and very fitting!! follow the link... you'll be pleasently surprised.

Click to expand...

No, it was not me.
But to be fair it was that same video that gaves me the idea of my JAWS edit (I gave a link to it in my old JAWS thread) Only I made the entire movie.
And when came the time to think of a second grindhouse movie Star Wars was the obvious choice
(King Kong and Dirty Harry too, but I wanted a movie as well known as JAWS)

The War Of The Stars: A New Hope Grindhoused A Review by Mollo

After the unexpected joy that is JAWS: The Sharksploitation Edit by The Man Behind The Mask, I had high expectations for his grind-house version of Star Wars called The War of the Stars.

Star Wars is ripe for satire and the possibilities are almost endless. Many others have re-worked the material for comic effect in the form of FanEdits, Fan Films and YouTube skits. The myriad of material out there has obviously influenced TMBTM and his grind-house cut because ideas are liberally borrowed and even Fan Films incorporated into the mix.

Unfortunately, I have to say that War of the Stars is an unmitigated failure. It is painful to watch with glaring inconsistencies and weak misplaced humour.

So where to begin?

The idea of replacing Death Vader's speaking voice with humorous audio clips from other movies starring James Earl Jones, is a good one. In the case of War of the Stars, the joke is not followed through because before the idea is established Vader's voice reverts to the original audio. If the joke is that Vader is a jive-talking hoodlum, then it needs to be consistent at least during the same scene. With each subsequent scene, the joke is how will Vader will play it? Reverting to the original audio so quickly, robs the joke of any punch.

War Of The Stars looks awful. If this is the desired effect then fine but it is absolutely painful on the eyes. For example the opening battle, when the storm troopers are about to invade the rebel ship, bright red fades in and out, which I assume is to suggest an alarm light. The effect looks like what it is, colour balance madness.

The white credits are missing dust and scratches while the "film stock" looks like is has been dragged across the floor!

The added blood and gore is fun but it feels a little over done and fake. I would have saved it for an important moment to shock the audience. CGI blood looks fake in multi-million dollar pictures so, in that case it is well done.

The audio is another problem. It would have been nice for clips that have no ambient sound to have had some added. For example, Luke runs down some exterior stairs with no added ambient sound, not even foot steps and then the original audio cuts in hard when he enters his room and sees his friends inside. This effect is something even a 70's porn movie would have corrected.

The added score of seventies jazz and disco funk simply does not work because the music selected is at complete odds with the action portrayed on screen. For example, The Sharksploitation Edit used the music to mirror or comment on the action with often inspired results. Here, with War of the Stars it is a distraction. The use of the original John Williams score only heightens the schism.

I have to say I could not suffer this to the end. I so wanted to like it but I could not. War of the Stars is a bombardment of grind-house effects and half-evolved ideas yet with some subtlety and moderation, it could have been a very different beast.

After Jorge review of a worklprint I knew other reviews like his should fall.
What can I say. I like my edit a lot. Not LOVE it though. But I like it enough to share it here.

I'll try to answer some of your comments later Mollo.
It's fair enough that you were the first to praise JAWS and so the first to be "officialy" disapointed by TWOTS.

I just can't let you say "borrowed ideas", it's simply not true. Influenced, surely. But I can't think of one precise idea litteraly "borrowed" from somewhere else (and if you think about something from Family Guy, I saw their Star Wars movies after 98% of this edit was done).
And sure, I use one very well known fan film. Is that not fanediting?

Congrats again, TMBTM! I just rated and reviewed it. Oh, and you made a nice cover for it. I haven't printed one in ages, but I'm tempted with this one! (even though it says 'cutted' on the back, haha. )

P.S. Of all the changes made in the edit, I'm most interested to hear what people think of the scene with Admiral Motti. That's gonna raise some eyebrows and/or drop some jaws for sure. :smile:

TMBTM said:

It's fair enough that you were the first to praise JAWS and so the first to be "officialy" disapointed by TWOTS.

Click to expand...

Yes I am disappointed with TWOTS but I still have JAWS, which is one of the greatest FanEdits ever made and I will always admire and thank you for that.

TMBTM said:

I just can't let you say "borrowed ideas", it's simply not true. Influenced, surely.

Click to expand...

Sure, influenced. Borrowed ideas are not so bad, we all do it and have always done so since the beginning.

TMBTM said:

and if you think about something from Family Guy, I saw their Star Wars movies after 98% of this edit was done).

Click to expand...

I have never seen that show except for when South Park ripped at it.

TMBTM said:

And sure, I use one very well known fan film. Is that not fanediting?

Click to expand...

Yes using other sources, Fan Films, movies, videos, ideas etc is fair game. FanEditing is just that.

I hope my negative review will not upset you too much. Maybe it went over my head, I don't know, and others will love it.

Sorry, I know it can be hard to take, I have had my fair share of awful reviews.....life goes on.

Mollo said:

I hope my negative review will not upset you too much.

Click to expand...

I'm only upset that you did not have fun watching it.
I share it to please people, not to give them headaches! :lol:
Negative reviews are part of fanedit.org, no problemo.

EDIT:
about the borrowed ideas issue.
I forgot one little line from Obi-Wan, that I did borrowed from a youtube video indeed.
But the temptation was too strong! :razz:

I took 2 nurofen after and I was fine.

Fantastic. What a great ride. The recent "Phantom Review" had gotten me all fired up about SW again, and this FE topped it. I'll be watching this over and over again. Already rated and reviewed it at the main site, but wanted to congratulate TMBTM here.

Maybe it's not everyone's cup of tea - nothing ever is, really... -, but, love it or hate it, you owe it to yourself to watch it.

I'm dying to see this, TMBTM...

Is anyone else having trouble downloading this? I keep getting error messages in German I think. Anyone know what I should do?

The error message reads: Sie sind nicht angemeldet. Das Produkt

I ran an online translator and it said: They are not announced. The product

I'm sure it butchered the translation... But I believe I'm getting that the file hasn't been announced and isn't available yet? Correct me if I'm wrong.

the message seems unfinished.
translation so far is: "You are not logged in. The product..."

what do i have to be logged into? I'm using the Jdownloader like I always do.

Same thing happened to me with the first file (the German message, which was complete), but every other file downloaded correctly. When they were done, I just clicked on the first one again and hit Start, and it worked.

I guess there are a lot of people downloading this one. Probably all it is.

nah, fanedit numbers are nothing for RS. I have heard they even have original movies, music, games and porn.
I think they are about to change their rules again.