THX-1138: The (Digitally Enhanced) Director's Cut 275
StefanJ writes "This is either a marvelous Photoshop hoax or something really . . . cool? Sacreligious? Unnecessary? Reportedly, George Lucas has given his first commercially released movie, THX1138, a digital workover, enhancing backgrounds and altering scenes for more eye-appeal. Here are some comparisons of original and altered scenes. For those who haven't seen the film: Without giving too much away, it's about a working stiff living in a repressive underground bomb-shelter society. Emotion-suppressing drugs are mandatory; people shuffle from work to home, pausing to buy consumer goods along the way. (The goods aren't used for anything; you just feed them into a disposal unit after you get home. Making them keeps people busy . . .) If the drugs don't work, you can vent your spleen in a confession booth manned by a really bad A.I. It's really bleak, and sometimes ugly, but worth seeing. I hope the enhancements don't add too much color: The drab, sterile, white-on-white environment of the underground city is an important mood-setter. Consume more; be happy!"
Excellent, but I'm waiting for ... (Score:5, Interesting)
There are THX fans? (Score:3, Interesting)
No Hoax (Score:5, Interesting)
I hate director's cuts unless… (Score:3, Interesting)
Brave New World? (Score:2, Interesting)
Lucas has lost it... (Score:2, Interesting)
The LoTR movies prove that special effects and good directing can coexist in a movie. The Star Wars prequals prove that you can sell movies and merchandise on special effects alone... I guess this is historical fact to game players; look at how many games sold well on eye candy alone.
Re:Did do like his buddy Stevie (Score:2, Interesting)
So What? (Score:2, Interesting)
Poor George... (Score:2, Interesting)
Can someone please force him to either make his new movies good or his old movies old?
We should have all seen GL for what he was with the Ewoks, but we were fooled anyway. The guy was watching too much scifi when he wanted to be directing the Smurfs.
Re:Brave New World? (Score:3, Interesting)
THX-1138 is also one of a depressingly few science fiction movies that isn't watered-down drivel with some special effects thrown in. I highly recommend it.
Best scene in movie... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Relation to THX sound? Old version? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Brave New World? (Score:3, Interesting)
It's Lucas's old phone number (Score:3, Interesting)
References Here [lucasfan.com] and
here [indyweek.com]
I don't know if it's true or not, but it's at least plausible... if you want to try to track it down some more, just Google for "thx-1138 phone number".
It shows up in a few other places, such as American Graffiti (the car driven by Harrison Ford has the plate number THX 138), and the film "Dark Star" by John Carpenter (one of Lucas's classmates), one of the toilet tanks is labeled "THX 1138" (make what you will of that - Carpenter ain't talking.)
Rumor has it that it shows up (in one form or another) in every movie that Lucas has directed.
PARANOIA game returning to print (Score:5, Interesting)
Given that Lucas's THX-1138 was an obvious and pivotal influence on the paper roleplaying game PARANOIA, it is perhaps on-topic to mention that the game of a darkly humorous future is returning to print this August in a new edition from Mongoose Publishing [mongoosepublishing.com], as previously covered on Slashdot [slashdot.org].
The new PARANOIA XP edition emphasizes the Alpha Complex sort-of economy and a new consumerism very much in tune with THX-1138. You can follow the development of the game on the PARANOIA development blog [costik.com].
One small adjustment is all that's required (Score:2, Interesting)
I hope they don't reduce the impact. I was blown away by THX1138 when it came out. Saw it on the tube recently and figured that the ONLY thing that needed to be done was to replace the shots of tractor-feed pages with video displays. That does need to be done. Everything else is fine. A brilliant work.