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The
Great Wait
'Phantom'
anticipation: A week before the opening, devotees literally camp-out through
the night for tickets!!
'Star
Wars' fans forced to choose between their job and their movie!
May 13, 1999
NEW YORK (CNN) -- At 3 p.m. EDT
on Wednesday afternoon --
Tens of thousands of the legions
of Star Wars followers mobbed movie theaters -- a week before the film's
premiere -- as advance tickets went on sale for "Star Wars, Episode I:
The Phantom Menace."
For millions of 'Star Wars' devotees,
Wednesday's workday collides head-on with the premiere of the much-awaited
prequel "Episode One: The Phantom Menace." They are forced to choose between
their job and their movie but it seems that it is one of the easiest decisions
they are going to make.
A die-hard named Wistock and
his "Star Wars" pals saw the premiere of the four-minute John Williams
"The Duel of the Fates" music video for "The Phantom Menace." After
seeing the video's shots from the film, Wistock and friends were teary-eyed.
And that was simply a music
video. What attracts people to this story?
Last November, fans paid full
ticket price just to watch the film's 2-minute trailer. They slept
through the 3-hr. Meet Joe Black, then watched the trailer again.
Wistock was able to take his son
to see the first trailer of "The Phantom Menace" last year. It was
a moment he won't forget. "I watched him," Wistock says. "He
was on the edge of his seat. He was smiling and his eyes were really
wide. I just got goose bumps. I kept the tickets because that's
one of my favorite 'Star Wars' memories."
There should be many more such
moments waiting -- in that galaxy far, far away.
Ticket sellers have geared up
for the moment by adding staff and equipment. MovieFone, which sells
tickets by telephone and on the Internet, says it's boosted its Web capacity
to handle 10 times more customers than normally access the service online.
The company also says it's increased its telephone capacity by 30 percent.
Loews, Mann Theatres and Edwards
Cinemas are among the theater operators selling in advance by telephone
or at the box office at most theaters.And as ticket outlets have braced
for the anticipated assault, die-hard "Star Wars" fans have prepared for
the premiere by literally camping out for tickets!!
We sent CNN Interactive film writer
and reviewer Paul Tatara out onto the street -- a little pavement-pounding
keeps him humble, you know -- to meet some of the fans who've been lined
up in front of Manhattan's Ziegfeld Theater for weeks, waiting for the
big day.
The
Star Wars Phenomenon
Commentary
and Street Interviews!!
By Film Writer Paul Tatara
Big news, everybody! Did
you hear they're coming out with a new "Star Wars" movie?! Unless
you're an especially sheltered zygote in the early stages of conception,
I know for sure as I'm sitting here that you've heard about "The Phantom
Menace" so many times. In fact, that you've had to shift over to
the other side of your cerebellum for a supply of unused brain cells.
George Lucas' return to the director's
chair for another installment of his deified space opera has so fully infiltrated
every nook and cranny of the space experience, you'd think that Obi-Wan
Kenobi is expected to blurt out a secret cure for cancer when the movie
opens on May 19. If only.
It's far more likely that a ton
of goofy-looking creatures will be driving super-fast space vehicles, the
power of the Force will be solemnly intoned several times over, there'll
be lots of fighting and, eventually, there'll be a huge explosion.
It'll be a load of fun, I'm sure (and I really mean that.)
It'll also look extremely expensive.Then
everybody will see it again, because they're expected to, and then they'll
buy a couple hundred dollars' worth of toys because they're expected to.
And then they'll go see it again and again. And then they'll buy
bedsheets. And a backpack. And then, God forbid, somebody out
there will sell 'em a Chewbacca burger.
"Titanic"-mania was small
potatoes in comparison. That movie only goosed the country to a level
of obsession that hadn't been seen since we had to save our used cooking
oil and old newspapers to help defeat the Nazis. And "Titanic" actually
had to be released before everybody got carried away with the message.
At the time, I mockingly wrote that the movie had become a religion.
But "Star Wars," with its flowing
robes, "thought-provoking philosophy," and multiple gospels is the real
religion, the kind of myth-soaked narrative that can serve any profound
purpose you'd like it to serve, no matter how little it actually has to
do with our day-to-day existence.
Clive Revill says he got a lot
of recognition for a little work as the sinister Emperor Palpatine,
also known simply as the Emperor, in "The Empire Strikes Back." "That,
in fact, was the shortest job I've ever done in my life on a major motion
picture, and that is the reason I get piles of mail from all over Europe
-- and sometimes from all over the world -- of people asking for photographs
of the gentleman who did the voice of Emperor Palpatine," he reveals.
Starlight
Express
You can tell why I was a tad apprehensive
as I headed over to The Ziegfeld Theater here in Manhattan to talk to a
group of "Star Wars" enthusiasts who've been hanging out for a couple of
weeks now, waiting to buy tickets to see "The Phantom Menace."
They're pretty excited to see
the movie. And they'd better be, too, because they've got seven days
to go before it opens. I'm
happy to report that all of the Waiters (the only accurate name for them)
are very nice people, and most even display a welcome, self-deprecating
sense of humor when it comes to the obvious question, "Why?"
"Throughout the whole summer,
I'm planning to see it once a week, actually. I'm getting a job this
summer, so I'll have money..."
"It's totally different on the
small screen as opposed to being larger-than-life on the big screen, so
it's probably worth seeing a good seven or eight times."
"It's more than a movie, it's
a phenomenon."
"There are a lot of people who
don't understand why," says Frank, 28, "and I think I'm one of them at
times. Like right now, when I need some sleep." Frank, who's
a funny guy, definitely looks tired, but, realistically speaking, it's
probably more of a boredom situation that's got him down. It's not
like he's been sprawled out on the sidewalk for two straight weeks, trying
desperately to hold his bladder.
Kevin, a 25-year-old video conference
administrator, explains to me that there are 250 people involved in this
project, and they hunker down in front of the theater on West 54th Street
in shifts. A couple hours here, a couple hours there. Kevin
himself has put in about two hours a day for the past two weeks and seems
none the worse for wear.
He also hips me to a very important,
seldom referred-to fact about the Wait. This is also a charity situation.They're
earning money for the Starlight Children's Foundation, a program dedicated
to fulfilling wishes for seriously ill children. Each Waiter wears
a badge with a different child's story on it, and a mention of what Starlight
has done for the child in order to brighten his or her life.
The group has a sponsor, and dollars
are earned for Starlight by waiting in line. That's
a real nice, unexpected gesture, and it's an admirable way to give meaning
to a collective hunker-down that otherwise seems rather ... well ... meaningless.
(Waiters also earn points that will guarantee them free admission to the
film's first showing, at 12:01 a.m. on May 19.)
Approaching
Nirvana
I explain to some of the gang
that I can understand lingering overnight for something like a rock concert.
I've slept on the cold, hard, Birmingham ground for Bruce Springsteen before,
but only because he was gonna be playing a show and then leaving.And the
show would be unique to the moment, on the particular night that I got
to see it.
If you watch "The Phantom Menace"
on May 19 of this year or on August 4, 2007, Liam Neeson isn't likely to
surprise you with an unexpected, rollicking cover of "Mountain of Love."
It's the same movie every time you watch it, so why wait on the sidewalk
for a month?! Aha! They knew I would ask them that.
Of course, a lot of them just
answer with smirks and eye-rolling. These are the people who basically
view the whole thing as an especially grueling lark, if that's not a contradiction
in terms. The others just want to experience the movie with a group
of like-minded people, the chosen ones who'll show the proper amount of
enthusiasm when Lucas unveils the seamlessly integrated digital lightsabers
and the like.
Not that it matters, but this
isn't a good enough answer for me. You'll be able to watch this particular
film with a whoopin', hollerin' hoard of obsessives for the first 10 weeks
that it's out, if not longer.
I lean a bit more toward the explanation
that Robert, a 26-year-old college student (who's studying Shakespeare
while he sits in line) gives me. "Most of the story," he says, "is
based on Greek mythology and Zen Buddhism." Time-honored story forms,
he seems to feel, are what people lock onto. So
they wait. Feel the Force.
Ready,
Set, Glow!
It's
almost here. But if you can't wait, here's a look at the new episode
in
the Star Wars saga
Time Magazine
By Richard Corliss
May 13, 1999
A short time from now, in a galleria
not far from you...the creatures will assemble in a movie-plex queue so
long it might seem computer-generated.
Guys as tall as Wookiees with
Ewok-size children in their backpacks. Teenage girls dreaming they
can be Queen Amidala, if only they had her Faberge-egg earrings.
The Anakin-young and the Yoda-old, the dutiful moms and the punks with
their Han Solo 'tudes--all the children of Star Wars will be waiting for
magic to strike in '99, as it did in '77.
What was, will be. On May
19, Star Wars: Episode 1--The Phantom Menace opens on more than 2,500 screens.
Moviemakers like their pictures to have "want-see" (tradespeak for marketable
elements), but who doesn't want to see George Lucas' first of three prequels
to the most popular trilogy ever filmed?
Last November fans paid full ticket
price to watch the film's 2-min. trailer, slept through the 3-hr. Meet
Joe Black, then watched the trailer again. People get on the Internet and
debate for hours the meaning of a raised eyebrow they saw in the new movie's
trailer. Internet rogues have mined many details from the script,
invented the rest and splashed it on their websites.
Every magazine but the New England
Journal of Medicine has already put the movie on its cover. At midnight
on May 3, kids will drag their parents, or vice versa, to Toys "R" Us and
fill their shopping carts with Star Wars action figures. Want-see?
Just try keeping them away.
Think that, and think again.
You needn't be Return of the Jedi's evil Emperor, pregnant with prescience,
to foresee smiles of delicious anticipation as the 20th Century Fox fanfare
blares, the Lucasfilm logo fades and the sacred text appears: "A long time
ago, in a galaxy far, far away..."
You needn't be a Hollywood
accountant, mopey about this year's stagnant box office and praying for
a Titanic-size hit, to forehear the cheers that will surely erupt halfway
through the film when the Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson) casts
his laser stare on nine-year-old Anakin Skywalker (Jake Lloyd) and intones,
"May the Force be with you."
Star
Wars Scalpers Go Online!!
Many
auctions include photos
of
first-day tickets
Time Magazine
By Nathaniel Wice
May 14, 1999
MovieFone relaunched its site
earlier this week, boasting in a press release on Tuesday that it was "Just
in Time for Release of Star Wars: Episode 1." But ready it was not.
The next day -- one week before
opening -- advance "Phantom Menace" tickets went on sale at 3 p.m. EDT.
Both the MovieFone web site and 777-FILM phone system promptly buckled
under the crush of fanatics. MovieFone put out another press release
Wednesday blaming local phone companies for phone errors that greeted callers
with the un-Force-like recording "all circuits are busy."
Lucas and Fox had planned to ban
advance sales to prevent scalping but relented, to the relief of companies
like MovieFone (in the process of being acquired by America Online).
In the end, buyers -- electronic and live -- were limited to 12 tickets
each, plenty to fuel homegrown scalping schemes like the more than 200
auctions that have gone up on eBay alone. Many include photos of
the actual tickets, with one seller starting bids for the first screening
in New York at $200.
Despite that run-up, most first-day
tickets seem to be trading in the two figures, with prices sharply lower
for fans willing to trek to outlying suburbs. With just one day left
of bidding, the Moorestown Mall in Cherry Hill, N.J., hadn't even cracked
$10 as of Friday morning.
And then when it's over, we'll
all begin the long, delicious wait for 2002, when Episode II comes out.
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