AFICIONADO REVIEW: "STAR WARS BEGINS"

Complete at last! Jambe Davdar's STAR WARS BEGINS documentary

Rising star UK filmmaker and STAR WARS fan Jambe Davdar has finally completed his epic trio of behind the scenes commentary/ documentaries on the classic Original Trilogy movies. First there was the acclaimed BUILDING EMPIRE, then the equally successful RETURNING TO JEDI, and now, after four years hard work and research, STAR WARS BEGINS, built around my all-time favourite original STAR WARS movie, brings the information and entertainment cycle to a satisfying closure, bristling with great material that will delight fans of all ages everywhere, ranging from cut scenes (several of which have been painstakingly restored to the best quality possible-check out Luke's original introduction and his later scenes at Anchorhead with Biggs), behind the scenes photos, missing scene reconstructions (including some marvellous work on bringing to life the full sequence involving Harrison Ford and Declan Mulholland as Jabba the Hutt, a reconstruction of the original version of the STAR WARS title crawl from 1976 with Joe Johnston's STAR WARS logo, a look at Larry Cuba's innovative early computer graphics for the Death Star schematics, plus fine use of a MARVEL comic book to bring to life a cut scene used in the 1978 HOLIDAY SPECIAL), cleaned up audio and restored music, comparisons between the films many audio versions, a running info text and a few new surprises. Its worth its weight in gold just for the treasure trove of audio commentaries alone, which often brings to life the sheer difficulties the actors and technicians faced in the classic films ultimate realisation, and featuring nicely selected contributions from such rare notables as Sir Alec Guinness, Phil Brown, script/continuity person Ann Skinner, costume designer John Mollo, Harrison Ford, John Dykstra, and even one of the trumpet players from the 1977 London Symphony Orchestra who lent his expert abilities to the films unforgettable opening title sequences!

Here's the trailer for the exciting project: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSMHMOf-DPk

We all have our own individual and deserving lists of what we want to see on any kind of STAR WARS related documentary, but I think you'll find that STAR WARS BEGINS, despite what I felt were a few little niggly omissions towards its final quarter (which I'm sure will be added to any future revised versions of the project), admirably captures all the best behind the scenes/deleted footage material currently available, and proves to be a well structured, highly enjoyable trip of nostalgia and information on the original 1977 film that makes it essential viewing when its fully released next month. You can see that a lot of time, energy, talent and love have gone into making this a special treat for fans that's not only a worthy continuance of Davdar's previous fine work but additionally acts as an effective and separately enjoyable work to the likes of other fan documentary projects like Garrett Gilchrist's few years back, and of a similar vein, DELETED MAGIC. If it hasn't already done so, STAR WARS BEGINS will surely attract the notice of a few LUCASFILM related people out there who will be impressed with Jambe's endeavours, finding that it acts as a very appetising starter to the main course of Blu-Ray releases out in September.

STAR WARS AFICIONADO RATING: 4.5 out of 5

To find out more about STAR WARS BEGINS, check out the link: http://buildingempire.blogspot.com/
and at TWITTER on: @jamieswb
To see BUILDING EMPIRE, RETURNING TO JEDI, and early sections of STAR WARS BEGINS on YOUTUBE, head to this link: http://www.youtube.com/user/jambedavdar