A Day Long Remembered: 40 Years of Star Wars

I was six in the spring of 1977. My parents were newly divorced and my mom and I had moved back to our old neighborhood to rent the house literally right next door to the one we had owned as a family of three just a year earlier.

I knew most of the kids from before, so making friends hadn't been a problem. But there was a bit of transition as my mom and I tried to forge a new life for ourselves that didn't include my father.

We both found comfort in movies, usually after errands on Saturday afternoons. I can remember seeing Rocky, Silver Streak and Dino De Laurentiis' King Kong on those days the previous winter, soaking up all the wonderful images and characters, forgetting the word "divorce" ever existed, at least for a couple of hours every weekend.

A new movie from American Graffiti director George Lucas was being teased by 20th Century Fox for release just before Memorial Day weekend of that year. It was a science-fiction adventure billed as "the story of boy, a girl and a universe a billion years in the making." It promised space battles, robots, aliens and a terrifying black-clad villain. It was simply called Star Wars (no episode reference or subtitle back then) and I made my mom take me that first Saturday of opening weekend.

From that pulse-pounding, ear-shattering opening scene where the mammoth Star Destroyer fills the screen as it pursues the tiny Blockade Runner, I was instantly hooked on the story of the farmboy son of a fallen Jedi Knight who fulfills his destiny and joins the fight against the evil Empire.

For the next two hours, I stared wide-eyed at the screen before me, captivated by one glorious scene after another, all enhanced by John Williams' magnificent, thundering score. It was the day I fell in love with the power of pure cinema and never looked back.

Star Wars officially opened on 32 screens May 25, 1977 to rave reviews and lines wrapped around the theaters. Audiences returned in droves for repeat viewings and over the next 13 weeks the number of theaters grew to over 1,000 with the gross reaching nearly $120 million, the most ever in that short a span.

The film held the top spot at the box office not just for the rest of the year but into early 1978 as well, with more than 60 theaters exhibiting it continuously for over a year. By the end of its initial theatrical run, Star Wars had grossed over $220 million, eclipsing 1975's Jaws as the highest-grossing film of all time.

To call Star Wars a cultural phenomenon would be a gross understatement. You really had to be alive at that time to experience just how popular the film was. I mean the brand and its characters were everywhere that summer: magazines, books, T-shirts, pins, you name it. Everyone (except my wife) had seen the film and wanted to talk about it.

And that was just the beginning. By early 1978 we started getting the toys from Kenner, TV specials (the Star Wars Holiday Special featuring Bea Arthur and Art Carney, anyone?), bedsheets, alarm clocks, the list went on. Seriously, from the summer of 1977 through the release of Return of the Jedi in 1983, Star Wars was one big, omnipresent blanket that never lost its comfort or appeal.

Star Wars has built quite a legacy over the last 40 years: eight feature films (with at least three more on the way), a handful of television incarnations, theme-park rides, comic books, novels and any other merchandise they could slap a Wookie or Ewok on. It's a culture that's past down from generation to generation, something to share with our kids, and later our kids' kids.

For me, in addition to igniting my life-long passion for cinema, Star Wars will always remind me of my childhood and those years when it was just my mom and me. A time that could have been fraught with despair and insecurity, but instead was filled with awe and wonder. I don't remember worrying about anything back then, mainly because my mom saw to it that movies like Star Wars were always there to make sure I had better things on my mind.

Quick Blu Review: Streets of Fire

Walter Hill's Streets of Fire had all the makings of a hit in the summer of 1984: big-time action, a rugged hero (Michael Paré), a beautiful damsel in distress (Diane Lane), a menacing bad guy (Willem Dafoe) and an MTV-ready soundtrack. It also had the misfortune of opening on the same day as Star Trek III: The Search for Spock and a week before both Gremlins and the original Ghostbusters.

Promptly bounced out of theaters by the competition and quickly forgotten, the self-described "Rock & Roll Fable" has always held a special place in my heart. I actually saw it in the theater opening weekend as a 13-year-old and always loved its infectious music and undeniable style. Over the years more and more people have discovered its charms on home video and through revival screenings, elevating one of the more costlier and misunderstood flops of the '80s to revered cult status.

Set in "another time and place," a neon-infused '50s-meets-'80s city with no name, Fire tells the story of Tom Cody (Paré), a former soldier who returns home at the behest of his sister Reva (Deborah Van Valkenburgh) to rescue former flame Ellen Aim (Lane), an on-the-rise rock singer who has been kidnapped by local thug Raven Shadduck (Dafoe) and his motorcycle gang the Bombers.

Cody is willing to help, for a price, and recruits Ellen's smarmy manager Billy Fish (Rick Moranis) and a down-on-her-luck drifter (Amy Madigan) to help. But freeing Ellen is the easy part, as the group is pursued by first the cops and eventually Shadduck, looking for a final, winner-take-all confrontation with Cody.

In between the action we get a lot of music and video-type set-ups, obviously meant to push the soundtrack, a growing trend at that time. The songs more or less drive the story, which is simple, concise and quickly paced. You know what you're getting for the most part with the film, but you wouldn't want it any other way.

Finally released on Blu-ray this week by Shout! Factory and sporting a new 2K scan, this is the best Streets of Fire has looked on any home-video format. Presented in its native 1.85:1 aspect ratio, all those great visuals now fill the screen like never before. Colors are bright and deep, while natural film grain is maintained throughout. There are a couple of discernible blemishes on the print, but they disappear quickly and don't take away from the presentation. Overall, a very nice transfer and light years ahead of Universal's 1998 DVD.

Both The DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and 2.0 tracks are fully immersive and sound great at minimal levels.

Extras are loaded on a second disc and include music videos, five vintage featurettes and two feature-length documentaries, one from 2013, the other new to this set, that give fans an definitive, in-depth history of the film from concept to release.

Streets of Fire is a hard film to categorize - part Western, musical and gang picture all rolled into one - and maybe that's why it initially failed to connect with audiences in a crowded summer field 33 years ago.

Fortunately, new generations get a chance to experience a worthwhile film that was solely conceived to do nothing more than transport and entertain. Exactly the reason we go to the movies.

Quick Blu Review: Rumble Fish

Director Francis Ford Coppola seemed to have the Midas touch in 1970s: The Godfather, The Conversation, The Godfather Part II and Apocalypse Now. Four films, 33 Oscar nominations, 11 wins, including two for Best Picture.

Each is considered a masterpiece of American cinema and established Coppola as one of the greatest filmmakers of all time before his 41st birthday.

Unfortunately the '80s weren't as kind to the venerable auteur as a combination of mounting debt, ego and a changing cinematic landscape set the Oscar winner on an inauspicious path most of the decade, dabbling in musicals, coming-of-age tales and a Back To The Future-like time-travel fantasy. 1983's Rumble Fish was one those films.

Based on S.E. Hinton's 1975 novel (Coppola also directed the 1983 adaptation of Hinton's The Outsiders) Rumble Fish focuses on the relationship between teenage hood Rusty James (Matt Dillon) and his former gang leader brother Motorcycle Boy (Mickey Rourke).

While Rusty James craves the gangster lifestyle and matching his brother's almost-mythical reputation, Motorcycle Boy covets a quieter, more transcendental existence. Unfortunately, a local lawman (William Smith) is unwilling to forgive Motorcycle Boy's past transgressions and sets the film on course for a noirish finale.

The plot is really that simple. Along the way we get a gang fight here and there, an intimate moment or two between Rusty James and his girlfriend (Diane Lane) and a confrontation between the brothers and their old man (Dennis Hopper). The whole film seems kinds of cartoonish, complete with unengaging dialog and one-dimensional characters. The running time is a svelte 94 minutes but it frankly seems like another hour has been added.

The one bright side is Coppola's use of black-and-white photography, adding a gritty starkness to the Tulsa, Oklahoma exteriors and populating each shot with unconventional camera angles for a noir-like quality. Coppola appropriately called it his "art film for teenagers."

Newly restored in 4k, Criteron's recent Blu-ray release looks absolutely suburb. Presented in its native 1.85:1 aspect ratio, the black-and-white imagery just pops off the screen. Details are tight and crisp and that Tulsa grittiness has never looked more menacing.

The 2.0 surround DTS Master Audio track sounds great and both dialog and Stewart Copeland's score are clear and robust at minimal levels.

As usual with Criterion, the disc features a bevy of extras and highlights include a Coppola commentary, an alternate remastered 5.1 audio track, new interviews with Coppola, Hinton, Dillon and Lane and the music video for the Stan Ridgeway/Stewart Copeland single "Don't Box Me In," a song I forgot all about and actually remember liking when in was in heavy rotation on MTV some 34 years ago.

Rumble Fish is not Coppola's finest hour, but it does feature some nice visuals and reminds us that truly great directors always seem to crave taking risks, making the films that speak to them, whether audiences embrace them or not.