Lost Star Wars Footage Found On LaserDisc 157
drxenos writes "A LaserDisc purchased on eBay was found to contain raw footage from Star Wars VI: Return of the Jedi. From the article: 'The origin of the LaserDisc isn't entirely clear, but it was purchased for $699 off eBay, apparently once used to demonstrate Lucasfilm's EditDroid station — one of the first digital film editing systems sold nearly 30 years ago. Ironically, George Lucas himself never used EditDroid to make a movie; the Star Wars clips were loaded simply to show off its capabilities to prospective buyers.'"
Some more star wars footage? (Score:3)
May the force be with us all...
Re:Some more star wars footage? (Score:4, Funny)
May the force be with us all...
Sometimes I think the kids of the 1970s are going to go to their graves moaning and bitching about Star Wars.
You seriously can't make this shit up.
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I have found the the 2nd and 3rd generation views more about it then those of us who were in the theater when it first ran.,
OTOH, their are movie far older that get quoted all the time.
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Re:Some more star wars footage? (Score:5, Insightful)
He'll get at least $7000 if he sells it to a collector, or even to Lucas or Disney so they can take it off the market. I bet if it went to a collectors auction, it could go for x10 that. Yeah, sure, he paid too much for it... NOT
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It's a collectors piece, Some people are collectors.
Do you say the same things about people who collect paintings?
If you bought it for 7000, it will probably be worth 20K in 10 years, if not sooner.
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Re:Some more star wars footage? (Score:5, Informative)
You seriously think Lucasfilm (now Disney) doesn't have in their archives ALL possible footage pertaining to Star Wars ?
If George Lucas is to be believed, then no they do not. The original, unaltered footage which was released on the LaserDisc format was damaged irreparably when they were making one of the special releases in the 80's. I don't recall the whole story but supposedly they were cleaning up the original filmstock and in the process damaged it. Suspiciously the only portions to be damaged in such a fashion are scenes such as the "Han vs. Greedo Mos Eisley Shootout" scene.
The originals allegedly had shown Han clearly firing first, in contradiction to Lucas's claims, but the VHS versions were far too low resolution to serve as a final word on the matter. With the loss of the originals, the matter was never fully resolved.
So you can say that "nobody cares" about having original, unaltered footage from one of the most popular and successful sci-fi franchises of all time. And you can even believe that if you choose, but it doesn't make you right.
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I have all the releases on VHS and laserdisc up to the "Special" Editions. The scene goes like this:
Greedo: "I've been looking forward to this for a long time."
Han: "Yeah, I'll bet you have!"
(BLAM - smoke rises, Greedo's face hits the table)
That's the way it
Ewoks getting Force-choked? (Score:1)
We can only hope...
Re:Ewoks getting Force-choked? (Score:4, Funny)
Nope, it was the original sequence in which Greedo and Han shoot simultaneously.
Re: Ewoks getting Force-choked? (Score:3)
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(as the physicists silently wept in the background)
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Second best to Leia pr0n!!!
footage (Score:5, Informative)
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Please mod parent up!!!
Re:footage (Score:5, Funny)
Re:footage (Score:5, Insightful)
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But you identified yourself, anyway.
Fail?
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Re:footage (Score:5, Funny)
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Too tempting...
http://youtu.be/acg4b3H3t-8 [youtu.be]
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You forgot your apostrophe for "it is". ;)
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Do or do not! There is no try!
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I don't remember him yelling that line, but it would be hilarious if he had.
Check it for lost Doctor Who episodes (Score:5, Funny)
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The BBC is still looking.
They are still looking for the George Orwell radio shows too. I think the scripts are out there, but the recordings seem to have vanished in a memory hole somewhere.
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The lost Doctor Who episodes have been found 14 years ago, in 2079.
JarJar (Score:3, Funny)
Re:JarJar (Score:5, Funny)
If by cameo, you mean "dies in a fire" then I'd agree.
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I'd pay to see the Emperor force lightning JarJar. In my mind I am picturing something like don't taze me bro but it keeps going until JarJar is a smoldering cinder.
If that happened, I would make sure that the Rebellion would grant a medal for heroism in the midst of life threatening danger to the Emperor. Seriously, you would need to have some serious balls in order to take on Jar Jar like that. I mean, he (meaning Jar jar) is only the most feared sentient being in the entire galaxy.
Then again, I suppose the Emperor owes Jar Jar a favor for establishing the empire in the first place. That is most definitely a Sith Master.
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The problem with JarJar is the same problem with every single character in the prequels. The writing was horrid.
The films is pretty much the worst work of any of the main actors. Imagine judging Natalie Portman by that work alone?
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Imagine judging Natalie Portman by that work alone?
I have, as I've not seen her in any other role nor will I ever do so. I will avoid said movies.
Painfully obligatory joke (Score:5, Funny)
It turns out these *are* the EditDroids we're looking for!
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*golf clap*
I saw this back in the 80s (Score:5, Funny)
The Mon Calamari battleships shoot the Death Star first.
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So yet another version (Score:4, Insightful)
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everyone will have to buy.
Nobody has to buy any version.
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everyone will have to buy.
Nobody has to buy any version.
Riiiiiight.
Nobody has to be here still giving a shit about this either.
And yet here we are, in the year 2013, still talking about a fucking movie from the 1970's that someone found "unreleased" footage barely worth the cutting room floor, as if someone just unearthed an iPhone from an 2,000-year old tomb.
But did Han shoot first? (Score:2)
And why would have stepped ON Jabba's tail instead of over it?
Re:But did Han shoot first? (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, can answer the second question quite easily -- When they were filming the original film, they hadn't decided that Jabba would be a giant space slug yet, and used a human stand-in. The idea was that when they decided what he'd be, they could edit the alien in during post production.
They included a copy of the original footage on a LucasArts bundle CD of the early LA StarWars games that I picked up some time around 1997, or so... along with film interview with Lucas explaining it. I still have the CD somewhere, probably in storage at my parents' place.
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Lucas is a huge liar. He continually says he "meant" for certain things to happen. The truth is the stand-in WAS Jabba, and everyone realized it looked stupid, and they removed the scene. It also kills the film's pacing, Jabba repeats everything Greedo just said. It also kills the big reveal in ROTJ.
They added it because Lucas had useable footage for the SE, and figured why the hell not. Anything to make more money.
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I take that that he meant the story to turn into a turgid, cheap soap opera.
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Exactly. If that scene had been included, then Jabba's character development would've been very different, and consequently the Jabba we saw in RoTJ would've been different. You can't restore it and have it fit the story that developed without it.
Digital? (Score:2)
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From Wikipedia:
Once the entire movie had been edited, an Edit Decision List of marked frames was turned over to a film laboratory where the actual pieces of film were spliced together in the correct order.
So the raw footage was placed across multiple laserdiscs, the editor would then go through and decide how the movie was cut, then they would take the edit list and send it over to the film labs where they would splice the actual film together following the edits they made in EditDroid
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It's a digital disk, read by a LASER.
LD had many feature that weren't brought over to DVD/Blu-Ray disks.
I miss the seamless changing between directors cut, standard release, and Edited for TV versions of movies.
I don't miss the low quality or Disk Changing.
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It's a digital disk, read by a LASER.
No, LaserDisc was analog [wikipedia.org].
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Where are you getting your information from?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LaserDisc#DVD [wikipedia.org]
LaserDisc is analog. Something doesn't become digital simply because it's read with a laser. Look at laser turntables.
http://www.elpj.com/ [elpj.com]
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It wasn't used for final production. You edited the scenes together with this and the microcomputer that ran the whole thing would print out an edit sheet with start and end frames that was used to splice the 35mm film together for the final cut. It's a digital system in the fact that it uses a computer (an old Sun Unix box) to play the scenes from the laserdiscs in whatever order you edit them.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EditDroid [wikipedia.org]
Re:Digital? (No, but CAV or CLV is the real???) (Score:3)
If it's CAV format laserdisc then this is a real find!
The Real Story (Score:4, Insightful)
I think we're all missing the real news here, folks:
Somebody paid almost $700 for a fucking LaserDisc!!!
mind == blown.
Re:The Real Story (Score:4, Interesting)
This is not a new phenomena. There was an anime OVA called To-Y that, on the open market, usually went for around $700. It was only printed once and didn't sell well, but has a strong cult following.
Yes, I own one. Mine has been autographed by key animator Yuzo Sato, and as such I have no idea how much it will sell for after I die (since it will only be pried out of my cold dead hands).
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I never said it was new, I implied that it's mind-blowing somebody would pay 7 Benjamins for a damn LaserDisc. That's nuts, bro.
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People have paid nearly a million for a stamp [wikipedia.org].
When it comes to crazy spending, this doesn't even cause the needle to twitch.
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People have paid nearly a million for a stamp [wikipedia.org].
When it comes to crazy spending, this doesn't even cause the needle to twitch.
Maybe I'm just weird, but I don't think I'll ever understand dropping that kind of moolah on anything you can't eat, play, or fuck.
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Um. LaserDiscs exist to be played.
That said, rare sometimes just happens. I own a few "rare" CDs. I bought them new, when they were still in their first pressing, for regular retail prices. They are special to me only because I like the music on them, not because they have any particular monetary value associated with them.
Normally the way I find out that they're "rare" is w
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My guess is it will put a grandchild through the first year of college.
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Someone paid nearly 10 million dollar for a really old painting!
mind == blown.
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Someone paid nearly 10 million dollar for a really old painting!
mind == blown.
Right???
Art is a fucked up industry; it's not about the content, it's about being able to brag to your rich buddies about how you went and dropped the GDP of a few small nations on a hunk of oil and canvas.
Personally, I'm perfectly happy with the $20 prints you can buy at the local poster store ($60 framed and matted). If I want to see 200 year old oil on canvas, I'll visit a damn museum.
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Somebody paid almost $700 for a fucking LaserDisc!!!
Somebody paid $700 for lost RoTJ footage - if it were on 70mm or D1 it still wouldn't have made much difference.
Cycle Trooper Losing his Helmet (Score:2)
I don't recall if I saw this scene in the theater, during "Jedi's" initial run, or in preview clips shown on TV, but:
There's a scene in Return of the Jedi in which Luke goes mano a mano with a storm trooper riding one of those cycles used to zip around Endor.
Luke knocks the guy's helmet off, revealing a dark haired guy with a rather skinny face.
I do know that this brief reveal was cut out of the sky cycle chase as it was shown on the Laserdisc.
Could it be on this new find?
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here's a scene in Return of the Jedi in which Luke goes mano a mano with a storm trooper riding one of those cycles used to zip around Endor.
Luke knocks the guy's helmet off, revealing a dark haired guy with a rather skinny face.
Yeah, and there's that scene in ANH where he throws the grappling hook twice... except it didn't happen.
I don't recall if I saw this scene
You can probably stop right there. Human memory is ridiculously unreliable.
I used to have a perfect example of this from my own life, but I've forgotten it.
Ooh What Could That Be (Score:2)
I could just RTFA but I'm contractually obliged to bring this up whenever the subject of Star Wars material is broached.
Cutting room floor footage (Score:5, Interesting)
In the fall of 1982 I saw a pre-release version of Return of the Jedi. Our high school had some connections to Lucas. An announcement was made that the front office had tickets available to a LucasFilm prescreening of "Twice Upon a Time" (I still have the large blue tickets saved away somewhere). They had booked a large theater in San Francisco for the screening. At showtime a person walked out and regretfully informed the full house that Twice Upon a Time wasn't to be shown, so instead they brought Return of the Jedi (wild cheers erupted).
Some of the special effects weren't finished, and some scenes had only rough editing. I remember several of the scenes were trimmed down quite drastically in the release version. The dance scene in Jabba's palace was really, really (really!) long. At the end of the movie we were all given a questionnaire to fill out on how we felt about various scenes.
All in all, a very cool experience for someone who grew up during the original releases of episodes 4 through 6.
They weren't lost (Score:2)
They had to be discarded. In the clips they kept referring to it as Episode III.
"Lost" footage? (Score:1)
Well? (Score:1)
Who actually shot first?
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shouldn't have sold it then(repossessing).
would be easy to argue that whoever has it doesn't have any broadcast rights to it of course.
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It has been known about for a while so if they were going to act I'd imagine they already would have, which is surprising. They could sell this stuff as part of the extras on yet another re-release, and there could potentially be some things they wouldn't want released (a lot of shots of Carrie Fisher in that bikini had to be dropped because of wardrobe malfunctions).
Re:Content Control (Score:1)
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The coke part is certainly true, and most amusingly obvious in her glassy-eyed stare in the Star Wars Holiday Special. But the gang bang thing sounds like a Chinese whisper rumour based on the fact she did technically "feature" in a porn film [cracked.com], but just talks in it and doesn't get naked or anything.
Re:Content Control (Score:4, Funny)
Video proof or it never happened.
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Video proof or it never happened.
If only there was an unreleased laser disc ...
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Re:Content Control (Score:5, Informative)
Since it was not a part of the released film, it could be argued that it was never copyrighted. Of course the argument would cost millions...
Er... what? The act of creating something - no matter what you do with it - assigns copyrights to the person who or group that creates it. If you run out with your smartphone, right now, and shoot some never-plan-to-"release it" footage, you own the copyright on what you create. Period.
You're probably confusing that basic fact with the question of whether or not the person who creates the work registers that work with the US Copyright Office. Registering the work allows you to go after an infringer in federal court, and to seek damages beyond the normal value of the work. If you don't register the work, you still own the copyright, and can use the courts to stop someone else from infringing on it, and you can sue them for what you'd normally have charged them for that use, if they'd asked you first. No punitive damages.
Federal venue for infringement or not, you make something, you own the copyrights. If you assign those rights to someone else, they own the copyrights. But someone who finds some media that contains the work? That doesn't convey copyrights.
Re:Content Control (Score:5, Informative)
Until 1989, either a copyright notice or registration within 5 years was required, something which may apply in this case. My understanding is that the 1989 change in law also brought pre-1978 works which lacked a notice under copyright.
As Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] puts it "Until the Berne Convention Implementation Act of 1988, the lack of a proper copyright notice would place an otherwise copyrightable work into the public domain, although for works published between January 1, 1978 and February 28, 1989, this could be prevented by registering the work with the Library of Congress within five years of publication."
No doubt, an IP lawyer will pop up and clarify things, but the GP may be correct in thinking this may not be copyrighted. I doubt a copy of this work was registered, and it may lack a notice.
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Prior to 1978, in the US, a copyright notice was required to claim copyright. Mere creation was not sufficient. That doesn't apply to a work created circa 1983.
In a work print or other special pressing, copyright information is likely to be overlaid on the video.
The date matters (Score:2)
Er... what? The act of creating something - no matter what you do with it - assigns copyrights to the person who or group that creates it. If you run out with your smartphone, right now, and shoot some never-plan-to-"release it" footage, you own the copyright on what you create. Period.
That's true for works created today but the US did join the Berne Convention until 1989. Works created before this time, including Return of the Jedi, needed to be registered or at least be published with a copyright notice [cornell.edu]. This material was not published, at least not in a conventional sense.
Re:Content Control (Score:4, Informative)
It's my understanding that copyright is bestowed at the moment a work is created, whether it is officially filed or not.
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Since it was not a part of the released film, it could be argued that it was never copyrighted. Of course the argument would cost millions...
It could be argued but you'd be laughed out of court.
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I'd pay to see him in court arguing that he owns the rights to Star Wars.
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Re:Content Control (Score:4, Funny)
Well, they can try, but...
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I think you're unclear on what the term "lost" means.
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I'd pay to watch that. What of it?
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