Thursday, January 03, 2002

An open letter to George Lucas:

Dear Mr. Lucas,
It's come to my attention that the members of the band 'N Sync will have a cameo, albeit brief, in the upcoming Star Wars movie "Attack of the Clones". As reader(s) of this blog will note, up until now I've been fairly quiet on the subject of the Star Wars trilogies and it's recent descent into the frothy sewer of pop-cultural swill, however, at this point, I feel I must step forward and say a few words on the subject.
First, after many years of hoping and praying and crossing our fingers in hopes of the Star Wars prequels, the long-suffering fans, nay, disciples, of your original movies were treated to the ultimate slap-in-the-face letdown that was "The Phantoom Menace". Jar-jar binks...what the HELL were you thinking...how could you have sat there, in your darkened screening room, watching the dailys from that film and smiled and patted yourself on the back on a job well done and not realize what kind of crap you were preparing to foist upon an unsuspecting public, a public that worshipped you like a god? It wasn't bad enough that you tainted an otherwise good movie, "Return of the Jedi", with those stupid ewok shenanigans, which, by the way, we forgave you for...grudgingly, because we refused to accept our Hero could do wrong. No...you decided to push the envelope a little further. While I and my contemporaries will always remember "Star Wars" as a watershed event, a cherished part of our childhood, the children whose first exposure to the trilogy was your latest installment will simply file it away in their heads along with such fare as "Batman and Robin", "Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me" and the like, if they recall it at all.
I don't blame you for all this, not completely...you're older now, you have a family and children and perhaps you've just lost your hunger to make movies. I think that years of dabbling in your other endeavors, ILM's effects dept., merchandising, the various production companies and toy companies and videogame lines...all of these are well and good but in the process, I think you've lost that spark, that driving, burning, eat-at-your-guts NEED to put your blood and sweat and tears onto the canvas of the silver screen. I understand.
I imagine if Van Gogh (whom I'm not really comparing you to, that would be a stretch, however good "Star Wars" and "American Graffiti" may have been) had made a billion dollars from his first painting, the rest of his work probably would have been crap. Also, it's pretty much a given that most great artists, not all, but most, peak in their early twenties, this is true for physicists, musicians, pretty much any media. Orson Welles was 21, I think, when he made Citizen Kane, for instance...what was he doing when he was fifty? Making lame Nostradamus documentaries and lending his voice to the animated non-classic "Transformers: The Movie". Do you see where I'm going with this? I think the best thing you could do at this point would be to just distance yourself as much as possible from the next two movies and go play golf somewhere until you're ready for the old-folks' home. One last thing, it's been said before but I'll say it again, kill the hell out of Jar-jar, that would go a long way towards redeeming yourself of your horrible misdeeds. Better yet, leave him out of future pictures entirely, him and the rest of the Gungin race and let's just pretend it never happened.
Sincerely,
Patrick Welch Jar, Jar, Jar: 'N Sync's "Clones" Cameo

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