The analogue strikes back: Star Wars, star authenticity, and cinematic anachronism

ABSTRACT

As if responding to the widespread condemnation of George Lucas’s ‘CGI-heavy’ prequel Star Wars trilogy, J.J Abrams’s 2015 ‘reboot’ The Force Awakens displays an extreme reliance upon star presence and authentic practical effects, to an extent that produces significant textual effects at a variety of levels. We here show how the film is premised upon and preoccupied with the authentic and authenticating presence of the main stars of the first wave of Star Wars productions (1977-83). However, on this outing we also expand what traditionally counts as a star ‘actor’ beyond the likes of Carrie Fisher and Harrison Ford courtesy of actor-network theory and recent ‘media archaeology’ trends. Indeed, Abrams proclaimed that his Star Wars film would hark back to a more ‘authentic’ aesthetic, by employing Panavision cameras and vintage Kodak stock, among other things, to capture images of the legacy stars, and other practical and animatronic effects. Consideration of these non-human ‘actors’ here helps us to re-perceive the role of ‘zombie media’ forms that move into composition with human stars to enhance the marketing and enjoyment of an authentic Star Wars experience.

KEYWORDS:

• Star Wars
• Harrison Ford
• Carrie Fisher
• Mark Hamill
• Analogue Technology
• Kodak Film
• Panavision Cameras
• Actor-network-theory

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. More specifically, Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope (1977), Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back (1980), and Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi (1983).

2. Comprising Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (1999), Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones (2002), and Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith (2005).

3. It is relevant to mention here that a controversy erupted during the release of The Force Awakens over the marked deemphasizing of John Boyega’s image in the China-market advertising for the film, a move decried as racist. Whatever the local cultural reasons for Boyega’s demotion, however, we would note (along the lines of the analysis being made here) that the film text in and of itself already positions Finn as less substantial in numerous ways than the film’s other main characters, a fact again seemingly symptomatic of the film’s own a priori racial problematics.

4. Admittedly, Obama’s image was burnished considerably from mid-2016, both in nostalgic retrospect of his closing 8 year term of service and in positive contrast to the widely reviled candidates to replace him, as suggested by his rising approval ratings. However, at the time of the release of The Force Awakens late in 2015, the negative kind of perception described here still had a stronger currency.

5. This transition from Solo to Finn – as a patriarchal hand-off – could also simultaneously be read as paralleling the shift between author-fathers Lucas and Abrams.

6. These parallel lines are often conceptualised in geological terms, as formulating sedimented layers that form one atop another. As with real-world geology and topologies, recent ruptures and shifts can result in hidden layers becoming re-exposed, revealing otherwise hidden folds ‘of time and materiality,’ which become opened up for renewed attention and discoveries (Parikka 2012, p. 3).

7. There are competing canon and conspiracy theories within fan communitites as to why Chewbacca did or did not receive a medal. Beyond discussions of Wookie traditions and Rebel racism, several real world explanations seem most convincing. The most likely of these being that because Leia presents the medals, the shorter 1.55 metre Carrie Fisher simply couldn’t reach up around the neck of the 2.18 metre tall Peter Mayhew in his Chewbacca costume (see Libbey 2016).

8. At the 50th Academy Awards in 1978, A New Hope won Oscars for Visual Effects and for Sound, among many others; while the sound designer also received a Special Achievement Award for his creation of the film’s non-human voices, and members of the visual effects team shared the Academy’s Scientific and Engineering Award for their development of the Dykstraflex camera and the photographic motion control systems used in the production of the film.

9. Which is compounded in star magazine paratexts such as a photo spread in the June 2015 Vanity Fair by the famous stills photographer Annie Leibovitz, who brought her own star photography body and nonhuman camera-machine to index the legacy cast sitting inside their analogue set for another paratextual media release (see Handy 2015).

10. Admittedly, however, a CGI of Fisher-as-Leia is briefly employed in a passing scene in a standalone side-line film, 2016’s Rogue One: A Star Wars Story – but not in the main series narrative of the franchise.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

David H. Fleming

David H. Fleming is a Senior Lecturer in Film and Media in the Communications, Media and Culture division at the University of Stirling, Scotland.

Adam Knee

Adam Knee is Dean of the Faculty of Fine Arts, Media & Creative Industries at Lasalle College of the Arts, Singapore.