George Lucas originally wanted to make a Flash Gordon film but couldn't secure the rights and decided to do his own thing with Star Wars: A New Hope, which was a really troubled production, going through tons of rewrites and various on-set crap. Many of the actors didn't like the script, including Alec Guiness (Obi-Wan Kenobi), and Harrison Ford (Han Solo), who told Lucas, "You can type this shit, but you can't say it!" When the film finally released, it was a smash success critically and financially, in the former case with critics (and of course so-called "fans") today considering it one of the greatest films of all time, but is that actually objectively the case?
A New Hope opens with the iconic quote, "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...", followed by the series logo falling into space and signature opening crawl, retroactively titling the film as Episode IV in the later-named Skywalker Saga. The Rebel Alliance has acquired the plans to the Galactic Empire's weapon of mass destruction, the Death Star (an event covered in spinoff film Rogue One), with the Empire sending one of its Star Destroyers after the culprit, Princess Leia of Alderaan, in a slow pursuit above the desert planet Tatooine (inspired by Arrakis from the Dune franchise), where they could have just vaporized her ship, ending the Original Trilogy then and there.
Leia's ship is captured, with the Empire's chief enforcer, Darth Vader, arresting the passengers, although the princess luckily gave her trusty droid R2-D2 the stolen Death Star plans, with C-3PO joining him, their escape pod getting a free pass since there were no biological lifeforms aboard. The droids land on Tatooine, with Artoo and Threepio separating since the former intends to take the plans to Obi-Wan Kenobi, who thought it would be cute to adopt "Ben" as his new first name while keeping his real surname in hiding, accounting for one of the dumbest cinematic plot twists ever.
Moisture farmers Owen and Beru Lars, uncle and aunt to Luke Skywalker, eventually buy the droids, but Artoo is still hellbent on getting to Obi-Wan. Luke gives chase and eventually meets Old Ben, who reveals his backstory, says that Darth Vader betrayed and murdered Luke's father, and gives the farm boy his dad's old Jedi lightsaber, wanting to train him in the ancient order. The Lars farm is then torched by the Empire, with Luke, Obi-Wan, and the droids going to Mos Eisley to find passage to Alderaan, Princess Leia's home planet, meeting Han Solo and his furry friend Chewbacca.
When asked about the Millennium Falcon's speed, Han boasts that it made the Kessell Run in less than twelve parsecs, with parsec actually being a measure of distance, although one could chalk this dialogue up to Han being an idiot. After a few scuffles, everyone gets off of Tatooine en route to Alderaan, although the Death Star, unfortunately, tested its might on the planet. One big question that has yet to be resolved is how long the Death Star was hovering above Alderaan before it destroyed it: a few minutes, an hour, several hours? If the latter two, there would have been plenty of time for the planet's citizens to get the hell off, and that Alderaan didn't have a freaking moon, and the Death Star was in plain sight really makes one wonder why no one suspected foul play.
After encountering the asteroid field that was once Alderaan, the Millennium Falcon is tractor-beamed aboard the Death Star, Luke and Han killing and stealing the uniforms of stormtroopers that search the ship, Chewy posing as a prisoner, Threepio and Artoo doing technical stuff, and Obi-Wan using his Force abilities to move around the moonbase and help the Rebel cause. Leia is rescued, Obi-Wan fights Vader, and the Millennium Falcon hightails it out of the Death Star, albeit not without resistance in a weird battle with TIE fighters afterward, but the mention afterward of a tracking device being put on the ship really makes said scuffle unnecessary in retrospect.
There are some misunderstood elements of the film such as the oft-lampooned stormtroopers being terrible shots: they're deliberately crappy at shooting, since it's part of Vader's plan to make the good guys feel comfortable and eventually lure the Empire to the Rebel base on Yavin IV. The subsequent battle in that system sort of feels unnecessary since the Death Star could have easily just blown up the planet the moon was orbiting, which would very likely throw everything out of whack, suffocate the Rebels on their base, or whatever. I don't know how that space crap works.
That the Rebels on Yavin IV, Leia included, sit pretty on the moon up to the point where the Death Star is about to destroy it also another major dumb element of the film, with both sides of the war showing equal stupidity throughout the franchise. I know so-called "fans" pretend the entries of the Original Trilogy are infallible and whine about the hypothetical inferiority of the Prequel and Sequel Trilogies, but the Family Guy spoofs I think brilliantly pointed out their myriad flaws. The same could apply to video games, since I've played tons of alleged "masterpieces" that turned out to be really freaking horrible.
John Williams' soundtrack, however, has always rocked throughout the series, with the opening crawl music borrowing elements from Paul Dukas' The Sorcerer's Apprentice and Tchaikovsky's Marche slave. The Mars movement of Gustav Holst's The Planets suite is a major influence in the soundtrack as well, especially during the Battle of Yavin IV. The acting, however, is sort of a mixed bag, with Obi-Wan sort of sounding like the sarcastic Raphael from The Simpsons (but I don't think Toshiro Mifune, whom Lucas originally wanted to play Kenobi, would have been any better), but then again, the dialogue is really frequently dumb.
The visual effects have still aged well, aside from the hairstyles clearly showing that the film was shot in the 1970s, Lucas' digital remastery making them age even better. However, some of the stuff that would have looked really cool back then I think looks sort of asinine today, with Vader looking kind of derpy (though his body size is still menacing), his head looking like a cross between a Nazi soldier helmet with a mask having an expression with a mouth going, "Durrrrrrr." I know fans and critics complain about how non-CG effects are vastly superior, but I'm not nitpicky in that regard and mostly can't tell the difference.
Regardless, A New Hope is definitely a bucket-list film, as it's the Star Wars film that started it all, with its great soundtrack, visual effects, endearing cast, and plenty of good moments. While it is indeed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant," critics and fans seem to really confuse that with "masterpiece," and Episode IV indeed has ton of issues and "hateable" elements like the off acting, the questionable plot decisions, and of course the moronic plot twist of Obi-Wan Kenobi and Ben Kenobi being one and the same. George Lucas definitely showed his amateurity as a filmmaker then, and while I know it would be an incredibly unpopular opinion (though I have a ton), I would personally consider it to be the low point of the Skywalker Saga. There, I said it.
| The Good | The Bad |
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| The Bottom Line | |
| Bucket-list, but very, very far from a "masterpiece." | |
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