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| A universe takes shape in STAR WARS: THE BLUEPRINTS - out now from TITAN BOOKS. |
STAR
WARS: THE BLUEPRINTS
Compiled
and written by J.W. Rinzler
Preface
by Norman Reynolds
Foreword
by Gavin Bocquet
Published
in the UK by TITAN BOOKS
Reviewed by Scott Weller
Finally available
to UK readers, and at an affordable price, from those kind people at TITAN
BOOKS, J. W. Rinzler’s love-letter to the dedicated talents of our home-grown
STAR WARS design talents, STAR WARS: THE BLUEPRINTS, delivers much for delighted
readers to savour, proving a visual treat for both dedicated STAR WARS behind
the scenes buffs and film historians in general.
Lavishly composed
and printed, it’s a wonderful tribute and timeline to the evolving production
history of STAR WARS and its true building block genesis into a series of epic,
groundbreaking motion pictures, whilst also being a worthy and very dignified companion
to Rinzler’s equally epic trilogy of Classic Saga Making of books.
Like Indiana Jones
with the Holy Grail, Rinzler has his creative grip on most of the best
surviving archived material-meticulously designed work- from the original
films, and also a choice selection from the later Prequels. Its 250 blueprints
are backed up with 500 rare photos (a good third of which have never been seen
before) consolidating what must be the greatest assemblage, and most immaculate
printing yet, of such important behind the scenes artwork.
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| The beginnings of a movie design legend. All images: © LUCASFILM LIMITED. |
Around the
blueprints (all brilliantly re-photographed by the LightSource company), ten of
which are revealed in lovely gatefold spreads, plus the colour and B/W images
inside a lovely design package from Kate Benezra, Rinzler charts the vital
warts-and-all genesis of the behind the scenes creative aspects-how a universe
of fantasy and imagination became so real on the celluloid and digital screen.
From a small start
at Lee Studios, London in late 1975, as backers TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX
deliberately dithered about the original films initial budget with writer/director
George Lucas and showed little enthusiasm to get it made whatsoever, the
project was pushed on at the time only by the young film-maker’s stubborn belief
that young people wanted to see a new type of film entertainment, and from his profits
linked to AMERICAN GRAFFITI that were now starting to trickle through. His
chosen UK designers were soon starting to get stuck in with the project, at
first known as THE STAR WARS, primarily with John Barry and Set Decorator, later
director, Roger Christian getting caught up the most in Lucas’s imagination and
possibilities for the fantasy film, and the tricks and construction process they
would expertly need to keep the film in budget at the same time-generating some
tricks old, some new and revolutionary, like the buying-in of used scrap aircraft
parts in 1975 by Christian.
But its the immense
and impressive work of John Barry that finally gets the recognition it deserves
in BLUEPRINTS, part of a fine building tribute to him seen throughout Rinzler’s
behind the scenes tomes these last seven or eight years. A quiet, unassuming
man who was dedicated to his art and profession, Barry worked very well with
Lucas in bringing the first Ralph McQuarrie and Joe Johnson illustrations and
concepts from the US to life for filming at Elstree and Shepperton Studios, and
creating his own equally important new sets (the book has some great unpublished
finds linked to Barry’s black and white art, especially for Tatooine- there’s a
terrific rare 1976 illustration showing the planned, but eventually abandoned
for time and money, Tunisian filming for a Jawa village sequence- a location eventually used in EPISODE I).
Created from Barry
and co.’s original schematic layouts upwards, via crucial, well-thought out design
skills and decision-making, an emerging universe of the important and now
iconic technology, droids and weapons would come to practically built fruition,
as well as floor plans of sets and layouts linked to environments for evocative
travel and battle scenes (Classic Trilogy standouts from the UK team are
showcased by THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK- some amazing art shows the route of the Imperial
Walker’s battle advance towards the Rebel Base and its vital power generators,
as well as a full breakdown of the Base’s interior (including three hangars)-
even if most of it was never built for the screen, the thought behind the work
lends ever more credibility to the overall fantasy environs and the way they
should ultimately look on camera).
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| Collecting spare parts in 1975, then Oscars in 1978! |
The original 1977
released film provides the most fascinating genesis story within BLUEPRINTS, with
its barely three months of pre-production work showing incredible draftsmanship
and dedication on display by the UK design and construction crews- a fraught
but ultimately rewarding time for all concerned, uniquely adding to the “used
universe” requirements of Lucas that went beyond anything seen in previous
sci-fi and fantasy films, and proved the benchmark for things to come. As well
as fighting FOX and the inexorable vagaries of time, Lucas and his designers
would also face the often bewildered disdain and mocking of a small fraction of
the UK filming crew, despite their variety of movie-making experience, based at
Elstree during the middle of 1976 (The book
particularly, subtly, shows very little love from the designers towards the
films British Special Effects expert, John Stears).
More landmark highlights
across the first three films include the two design challenges of the Millennium Falcon- the classic we know
today and the original that changed shape due to it’s looking too similar to
the Eagle Transporter from 1975’s SPACE: 1999 TV series (though sadly, there’s
very little on the resurrected Falcon prop
with its use in JEDI- the deleted sandstorm scene does get a page and a layout
as to the placing of the vehicles for the sequence), EMPIRE’s immense Rebel Base hangar (so big the
newly built STAR WARS stage was still too small to accommodate it!) and
Bespin’s Carbon Freezing Chamber, JEDI’s Jabba the Hutt Throne Room (built off
the floor to accomodate monster puppeteers) and his personal Sail Barge, and
the Emperor’s doom-laden Throne Room interior.
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| The UK design team takes shape in 1975/76. |
We also get to see
some of the other things created for the original films that ultimately ended
up on the cutting room floor, like the little seen background electronic pool
table in STAR WARS Anchorhead scenes with Luke and Biggs, and intriguing plans
for the revolving area for Luke’s Landspeeder within the Lars Homestead garage.
Outside of the UK,
the book also includes the earliest surviving US work of ILM’s visual icon Joe
Johnston, as well as some of Steve Gawley’s rarely seen blueprints for the
Rebel X and Y-wing fighters that would become on and off important reference
work for the model builders at ILM, and the set builders in the UK.
With such an
intense period of filming that the original film had, set changes due to budget
cuts, studio size limitation or creative considerations would prove an occasional
necessity, and BLUEPRINTS charts some of those developments- like Ben Kenobi’s
original desert dwelling home before it was reimagined and had to be reduced in
size for a smaller soundstage. There’s also the last minute set designs and
construction that would occur, like the extra corridor built for the Rebel
Blockade Runner’s opening battle, or the Imperial Star Destroyer laser cannon
room seen in STAR WARS- a tiny set that was added late in filming and done at
Elstree by Gary Kurtz and a second unit literally a day or so after Lucas
departed for the US. Then there are one or two sets that would be ingeniously
reused and given new set decorating dressings (like a lot of those created for
the original Death Star interiors).
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| A terrific spread for the "Rebel Starfighter", later known as the Rebel Blockade Runner, in STAR WARS. |
The book affords
us the opportunity to get to see old designs in new ways-to notice details we’d
never seen before, like the red lion/dragon hybrid logo on Luke’s T-65 flyer
from STAR WARS, or that film’s fourth created Landspeeder- a homage to
Kubrick’s 2001- outside the Mos Eisley Cantina in Tunisia.
By 1979, and the
success of the original film, Norman Reynolds takes over from the departed
Barry, adding his own stamp to the universe but carrying on in the best
traditions of his friend and workmate, He also creates his own selection of new
sets for EMPIRE and JEDI, too, beyond the conceptual work coming in States-side
from McQuarrie and Johnson- most notably EMPIRE’s Art Deco look of Bespin and a lot of Imperial themed sets for JEDI,
most notably the immense and dramatically structured Throne Room, for the its climactic
duel between Luke, Vader and the Emperor (linked to this latter set is an
intriguing 1981 look at the Throne Room before
its ultimate realisation- when it was originally going to be located in an
underground lava cave, overlooking a huge lava lake- I was aware of the
original idea for this but didn’t know just how close it came to becoming
realized the following year).
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| Blueprints to the last-minute built, now iconic, STAR WARS Rebel Blockade Runner corridor. |
With exterior sets
and props often needed on location, especially for JEDI, Reynolds and the UK
craftsmen had to carefully and methodically plan the way their work was to
appear and be constructed- beautiful illustration examples include the
placements of the Endor Bunker in the California Redwoods in April/May 1982 and
for the earlier immense and never to be matched Sail Barge and Skiff built at
Buttercup Valley in Yuma, Arizona. These are must-see-to-be-believed drawings.
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| A look at the Classic Trilogy Millennium Falcon. |
Presumably lost
from the archives, there’s a few noticeable design absences- no plans for the
Lars Homestead Kitchen from STAR WARS, nor EMPIRE’s Medical Frigate. And nothing
for the deleted scene of Luke’s building his lightsaber in the Tatooine cave
from JEDI-adding further to that sequences filming mystery aura. More than
compensating for these losses, however, are several excellent other rarities,
like EMPIRE’s “interior dimensional door” conceptualized for Vader’s talking to
the Emperor, and, also from that film, a blueprint for Boba Fett in the Slave One cockpit.
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| The original blueprints for R2-D2. |
Profiles of the
key design technicians who worked on the film (like Art Director Les Dilley, Set Dresser
Harry Lange, and supreme draftsmen Fred Hole and all-rounder Reg Bean) are absorbing
reads, alongside some nice anecdotes- not just of their time on STAR WARS but
other illustrious, now landmark movies they worked on pre and post Lucas’s
odyssey. Undoubtedly, Roger Christian and Norman Reynolds make the biggest contributions
to the book, though, alongside Rinzler’s genuinely extraordinary ability to discover
amazing new behind the scenes information after all this time- like how Kenny
Baker originally quit plans to inhabit Artoo Detoo in the pre-production stage
of STAR WARS, and how fellow small person Deep Roy, who went on to play Yoda
for a walking scene in EMPIRE, was planned as his replacement. Only one slight
error in the book can be found- for the JEDI Imperial Shuttle in the Death Star hangar bay, Rinzler
accidentally selects an image from THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: SPECIAL EDITION
instead. Oops!
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| The superb Sail Barge. |
Onto 1996 and the
UK’s Leavesden Studios-the new home to the STAR WARS universe- where we see
Gavin Bocquet, with his prior work experience on RETURN OF THE JEDI, beginning
his nine-year reign as an accomplished Production Designer on the new, highly
anticipated Prequels, again an admirable choice and successor to Reynolds as he
had been to Barry, making his mark on modern movie history with a just as dedicated
old/new team.
Some things may
change with the progress of time, but the new Trilogy’s set design and
construction schedules remained as fast and intense as before, with the development
of digital technology by ILM in the movie saga’s intervening gap years proving
crucial to Lucas’s filming abilities, often requiring only half completed sets
being built for stage filming rather than full ones - a necessary cost cutting
exercise for such expensive and pioneering projects in the late nineties, though
all are no less well executed in their blueprints genesis, as seen in this book. It’s a fusion of two forms of
artistry that would set new precedents for film-making techniques in the
digital age.
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| The Battle of Hoth. |
Impressive wonders
from Bocquet and his teams STAR WARS mindset include EPISODE I’s Jedi Temple, the
Mos Espa spaceport (filmed in Tunisia- an old location which ultimately proved
a lucky charm for Lucas and co. during 1997 filming there), and the Theed
Hangar of Naboo-the biggest set constructed for the movie, for the exciting
finale battle, plus lots of space vehicles and weaponry.
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| Life on Tatooine. |
Alongside the
fresh sets there’s also the challenge with EPISODEs II and III of starting to
visually “bridge” the two STAR WARS universes together, with impressive, built
from scratch set recreations, like the Lars Homestead (seen in EPISODE II), and
the Alderaanian Star Cruiser, later Blockade Runner, for EPISODE III-true
standouts. Sadly, despite the advertising blurb accompanying the book, there’s
no blueprints for General Grievous ship’s bridge, home to the opening EPISODE
III duel between the Droid leader and the Jedi, but there are some corridor
plans for the vessel. Again, a minor niggle.
And so, a six-film
saga would be seemingly complete by 2005. But now, as Lucas passes the creative
torch to Kathleen Kennedy and J.J. Abrams, the Skywalker dynasty of adventure
and romantic heroism looks set to continue anew. Can we expect STAR WARS:
BLUEPRINTS II by 2020?
AFICIONADO
RATING: With a nostalgic preface by Norman Reynolds and a foreword by Gavin
Bocquet, the two men who most importantly shepherded the practically made
visual look of the saga, STAR WARS: THE BLUEPRINTS’ 336 immense and beautiful pages
will make you re-appreciate the entire saga’s amazing design work, and its full
and diverse range of talented imaginators- so good that, in many places, it’ll
make you go “Wow!” all over again!
4.5 out of 5
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