"It is a dark time for the Rebellion. Although the Death Star has been destroyed, Imperial troops have driven the Rebel forces from their hidden base and pursued them across the galaxy. Evading the dreaded Imperial Starfleet, a group of freedom fighters led by Luke Skywalker has established a new secret base on the remote ice world of Hoth. The evil lord Darth Vader, obsessed with finding young Skywalker, has dispatched thousands of remote probes into the far reaches of space..."
It has now been 30 years since Star Wars fans read that opening crawl for the first time. Thirty years since we first heard John Williams' "Imperial March," watched a rebel base get destroyed by an army of AT-ATs, met Yoda, Boba Fett, and Lando Calrissian, found out what the odds of successfully navigating an asteroid field were, heard Harrison Ford's most famous ad-lib, and watched Luke Skywalker go from a Death Star-destroying hero to a Wampa-clobbered, Jedi-in-training who loses a hand and finds out that Darth Vader is his father just 10 minutes before the movie's end credits rolled.
May 21, 1980 was the day The Empire Strikes Back was released in theaters, and is still considered by many fans today to be one of the rare sequels that was even better than the original film. Which is particularly impressive, considering that Star Wars was a cultural phenomenon when it was released in 1977.
A special anniversary screening of Empire was held at the Arclight Cinema in Los Angeles last night as part of Lucasfilm's year-long Empire Gives Back initiative, which will be holding screenings of the movie for various charities throughout the year (unfortunately, there doesn't appear to be any events planned for us New York-area fans). Last night's screening, which raised over $40,000 for the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, was attended by Empire stars Harrison Ford, Billy Dee Williams, Peter Mayhew (no relation!), the prequel trilogy's Obi-Wan, Ewan McGregor, as well as several of the voice actors from the Clone Wars animated series. Other attendees included Jon Favreau and Christopher Nolan.
Harrison Ford spoke highly of the film, “It was the only Star Wars movie I paid to see,” he told Wired. “I enjoyed it that much and went back to see it more than once.”
Ford also participated in a Q&A session with the audience, where he shared some well-known anecdotes about how Han Solo's infamous "I know" line came about, as well as how he arrived on the Norweigan Hoth set in a snowplow and filmed all of the outdoor scenes just steps away from the hotel due to the severe weather conditions.
He also praised his Wookie co-star, Peter Mayhew (who celebrated his 66th birthday yesterday), calling him "the hardest working man in show business at the time," since he not only had to spend long hours in that Chewbacca costume, he actually didn't fit in the Millenium Falcon cockpit set.
On why Empire Strikes Back is still so popular after 30 years, Ford answered in typical fashion, "I don't know that I understood it very well, and I don't know that I understand it yet. The invention of it is obvious; even after 30 years, the originality of it was very striking for the time. The mythology of it is what it works as much as anything else, and I think George tapped into a psychic vein that made the whole thing work."
It certainly did work, I think that's one thing all Star Wars fans can agree on.
Even if I don't get to see an anniversary screening of Empire (come on, Lucasfilm, show us some love!), I was lucky enough to have gotten to see it in theaters first time around in 1980, when I was only 6 years old. I first saw Star Wars when I was 3, and had been obsessed with it ever since, so much so that when there was a Darth Vader appearance at our local mall, I not only believed my dad when he told me Vader's TIE fighter was in the parking lot, I claimed for weeks afterwards that I had actually seen the damn thing out there.
Empire was probably a little much for a 6-year-old, especially one who was so freaked out by Darth Vader that I wouldn't keep his action figure in my room with me at night. Let's face it, the only other live-action movie I'd seen other than Star Wars by 1980 had starred The Muppets. The good guys don't lose limbs or get beaten by the bad guys in movies you see when you're just out of kindergarten.
But that is definitely what made Empire so memorable, even 30 years later. I still remember being stunned when Darth Vader told Luke "I am your father," and spending the next three years refusing to believe it was true. We had no internet to give away the entire script to the next film years in advance, so we didn't get to find out what happened next until we actually got to see the next movie (which thanks to a surprise from my mom, I got to see on opening day in 1983).
It's something movies can't really get away with now, and it's a shame that's been lost.
As much as people these days like to complain how the prequel trilogy 'destroyed' their childhood, I find looking back on Empire Strikes Back now that my childhood memories of Star Wars are still very much intact. And while I'm definitely feeling a little old now that two of my favorite movies have celebrated 30th anniversaries (and when Jedi gets there I'll officially feel older than Yoda), I'm glad I got to see them in the theater the first time around.
Happy Anniversary, Empire! And may the Force continue to be with it for the next 30 years.
Thu, May 20, 2010 
