From the box blurb: "The short that began it all – George Lucas’ student film Electronic Labyrinth THX1138 4EB. Shot in 1967, the film portrays a futuristic world in which a man races for freedom while being tracked by eleborate surveillance systems."

Just got this 15 minutes of greatness recently and I’ve been rolling it constantly. Think THX 1138 raw. It’s the best film short I’ve ever seen. See? Smut ain’t all about porn, baby. This is a brilliant glimpse into Lucas’ dawning cinematic vision later developed through THX 1138 and realized in Star Wars, a true renegade film maker. What I found most intriguing was the proto Death Star setting and feel, but more stark, cold, hollow, robotic computer controlled. The only warmth is with the hero who realizes nobody is watching the monitors, the threat is only implied, so he defies. It even has a psychedelic feel, so I suspect Lucas was eye dropping some of that powerful Socal orange sunshine. Seriously great and influential even if unseen by many.


http://cinema-tv.usc.edu/Archives/lucas/thx.html
http://www.lucasfan.com/store/

it was shot in 1867?

After several daze of watching this off and on, there are way too many fucking numbers floating aound in my head. I almost feel like that guy in Pi.

I'm currently doing the sci-fi thing because am writing a sci-fi script with this guy whose a total nutter. I remember really enjoying THX1138 when I first watched it but I have some serious issues with Lucas and on a second viewing, I couldn't stand it. I respect some of his stuff- but as disappointing as this may be for some of you to believe- I have never considered Star Wars as anything but a children's popcorn flick.
Smutmutant: I highly recomend you check out a flick called Primer by Shane Carruth.

Lucas' has totally lost it, letting computers do all the work now. Everything in the Star Wars batch besides Star Wars, Empire and the last one were all lame. I don't agree with you on the first one, but Return was definately the beginning of the total slide into the muppet show and the rest were gimmicky garbage with so-so casting i.e. whoever played Annakin couldn't act to save his life. btw, I'll look into that flick you suggested.

Yeah Star Wars, as much as I love a lot of it, a lot of it gave me the shits.

That Christian guy who played Annakin, what a deluded knob. He clearly thinks he can act, and what is with all the crappy love story acting and the rebel without a clue on motorbikes angst acting bullshit. The last three movies even the actors looked like they were cgi at times. I think next time everything will be cgi, even the actors.

Natalie Portman though, she is tops. Great acting even working with a script cornier than a corn field and managing to look hot too. Liam Nielson, Ewan McGregor, that black guy, and all the dodgy Aussie actors in the last three at best put in passable performances.

Lucas describes Star Wars as "a soap opera in space" which says a lot. And he made them all for kids. Which says more.

I'm mostly talking about the last three, but the first 3 also were pretty similar in their problems, at least they had to make sets and props though.



Still, I'd blow my pants over Star Wars before 90%+ of other sci-fi films.


O, and Jar Jar Binks, he can fuck right off.