Apparently it’s Friday, specifically December 27, 2019. Doesn’t feel like a Friday. Feels more like a blurring of times, like 23:30 in the morning, or like some cross between Sunturday and Wedhursday. I know that this is chiefly because of Christmas, but there is also a fair bit of blame to put on Star Wars.
Forty-two years ago, my mom took me to see the original film and yesterday I drove myself to see the last one. That I thought more about that night with my mother than I did the new movie might tell you something, but really, the last Star Wars is fine.
True, I’m not a child anymore who longs for a lightsabre. I’m an adult who yearned for a blaster to shoot some of these characters to stop them talking. For a film series famous for its visuals, it’s astonishing how much we have to be told, such as the fact that there are so many hours before something happens. Er, okay. No earthly way the characters could know that, and they then ignore it except when they remember to tell us again.
It’s when they’re being “funny”, though, that’s when I rooted for the Dark Side.
We are also told again and again that the Dark Side is more fun, basically, but all we actually see are some hellishly uncomfortable-looking seats and no snacks.
I do have a very strong visual memory of being in the cinema to see that first Star Wars film. It’s a stronger visual memory than I have of yesterday’s movie, but I only have flashes of most of them. I don’t mean I’ve forgotten the films, though whenever Episode II or III comes on the TV I cannot be sure I’ve seen them. But I remember leaving a press preview of Episode I with an editor. I remember getting into my seat late for Return of the Jedi in 1983 which meant the first thing I saw of that film was the Death Star. And the first thing I feel is oh, we’ve seen all this before, then.
If I could talk to myself that day, I’d tell me that this is nothing, you just wait for The Force Awakens, kid.
Presumably younger me would then ask how long he had to wait, but I don’t think he’d be that fussed when I told him.
He’d be more interested in whether I turned out to be the man he hoped. But then I could dodge that one easily because little me didn’t think ahead much anyway.