Star Wars vs. that other movie

Lots of folks are being clever with today's date, and associating it with Star Wars. (May the 4th = May the fourth be with you: get it?)

When Star Wars made it to theaters in 1977, I was 12. I went, got so bored I barely made it to the end of the movie. A few weeks before or after, a movie called "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" came out, and I loved it. It was a powerful story, far superior to Star Wars.

To this day, I don't get why, of those two movies, one became iconic and the other is barely remembered. I have never seen another Star Wars movie since, although I may sit down and watch them since my boys are about old enough to get into them. Hopefully, I'll find them more interesting than I did the first time.

I'm sure that Star Wars is more popular because of the effects, the use of music, the bad guy you love to hate, the light sabers, and the talking robots who seem human. Sadly, the thing that is missing from Star Wars is the human-ness.

Give me this mashed potato scene from Close Encounters any day. Dreyfuss' character breaks down and says he has a dream, and has to follow it. His family watches him, wonders what has happened to him, and, knowing their thoughts, he says "I'm still Dad." There's more genuineness in that scene than in all of Star Wars.

Comments

Squiggy45 said…

I'm betting it has to do with two things: (1) SW had sequels, serving to maintain the public's attention and interest. (2) There were many more after-premiere-marketing possibilities with SW than CE.

July 30, 2012 at 11:34 PM

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