The Crowd Strikes Back with another Movie Classic

Published Oct-18-14

Breakthrough:
The creative force is with them - Star Wars fans come together to create a crowdsourced version of "The Empire Strikes Back".

Company:
Star Wars Uncut, United States

The Story:

The crowd has once again revealed its ultra-creative side by remaking a shot-for-shot version of "The Empire Strikes Back", the second movie in the original Star Wars trilogy. The crowdsourced cut was created by more than 400 film fans who each contributed a 15-second clip.

They cover a range of cinematic styles including live action, good animation, deliberately bad animation and scenes that have been re-imagined with children and animals. For example, in part of the famous scene where Darth Vader tells Luke Skywalker that he is his father, their roles have been taken by two cats in costume. No doubt they are feline the force.

The flick is the sequel to the Emmy-winning "Star Wars Uncut", a crowdsourced version of the original film that starred Harrison Ford, Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher. The Uncut project was conceived by web developer Casey Pugh who wanted to combine fan enthusiasm and the internet to create a mash-up version of the movie classic. As with blockbuster film making, such was its success that a sequel was inevitable.

Do or Do Not. There is no Try

The fan’s take of Empire adopted the same approach as Uncut and was also helmed by Pugh. He sliced the film into 480 x 15-second clips and fans were free to interpret them in any way they saw fit.

There were more than 2,000 submissions and every scene was covered. A team of 20 judges selected their favorites to make the final cut. The panel was made up of Uncut super users, Star Wars devotees and film experts.

Feel the Force of Fan Creativity

The crowdsourced movie has a delightful homemade feel to it and is a testament to the talent, skills, humor, passion and imagination of the crowd of devoted fans.

“One of the best examples of fan creativity I've seen for a long time is the Empire Strikes Uncut,” said Mary Franklin, Lucasfilm Senior Events and Fan Relations Lead, in an introduction to the fan-made film. “It is so many pieces of great movie making all done by fans.”

On The Star Wars Uncut website, viewers can also see fan-made scenes that didn’t make it into the final version.

Return of the Jedi

At the time of writing this article, the team behind Uncut doesn’t know if there will be a crowdsourced version of "Return of the Jedi". Meanwhile, millions of fans can go to the official StarWars.com site and YouTube to see this unique take on a piece of film history.

To watch "The Empire Strikes Back Uncut", visit:

http://www.starwars.com/esbuncut

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