Tuesday 6 October 2020

AN 'EMPIRE' AT 40: FROM THE ENEMY'S VANTAGE POINT!

Image: Kurtz/Joiner Archive.

The trusted leader of the Walkers ground battle on Hoth against the Rebels, General Veers knows that it won't be long before the enemy force attacking them will fall to overwhelming opposition.

Costume reference photo of Julian Glover in his battle command outfit.



On a minimalist set - literally a futuristic back wall, with a drop down periscope of sorts - built at Elstree, actor Julian Glover, having won the part of Veers thanks to his neighbour in TESB producer Robert Watts, would deliver the majority of his battle scenes dialogue perfectly, even if the popular actor had no clue what he was actually talking about in the context of the film. Though one line, "Target the main generator", would hilariously use-up sixteen takes before Glover remembered it properly!


UK actors Paul Jericho and Ian Liston played the Walker cockpit pilots at Elstree.

Costume reference test images taken between filming. 




The forward cockpit shot angles were filmed separately with an unknown performer as General Veers, most likely in the UK, as one ILM storyboard would indicate in July 1979.

Regular background artist Chris Parsons would cameo as a Snowtrooper alongside Veers in the film's first viewing of that Stormtrooper type.


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