Page 49 - Star Wars Insider #181

CINEMATIC FORCES
with an acknowledgment that
the air battles were photographed
by members of the USAF and
German Luftwaffe, and the Oscar
award-winning sound recording of
Thomas Moulton bridges the studio
and documentary footage so that
the viewer never questions what is
authentic and what is not.
Johnson drew on Twelve
O’Clock High as an example of
what he wanted in the opening
battle scene of The Last Jedi, just as
George Lucas had used the fi ghter
plane sequence in the British
fi lm The Dam Busters (1955) to
pre-visualize the Death Star trench
run in Star Wars: A New Hope.
Johnson’s efforts began with the
design of the Resistance’s MG-100
StarFortress SF-17 heavy bombers,
which were modeled on the Boeing
B-17 Flying Fortresses deployed
by the U.S. Army in World War
II and seen in Twelve O’Clock
High. Both craft have a spherical
cannon located on the bottom of
the fuselage, and Johnson’s shots
of Paige Tico spinning in the belly
turret of the Cobalt Hammer and
firing at TIEs mirror those of B-17
gunners releasing their rounds on
Luftwaffe fighter planes in Twelve
O’Clock High.
Johnson also sought to conjure
up the same camaraderie between
the Resistance pilots that was front
and center with the USAF airmen
in Twelve O’Clock High. Poe, Paige
Tico, bombardier Nix Jerd, A-wing
wingleader Tallie Lintra, and a host
of other pilots and personnel work
together as a well-oiled team, and
The Last Jedi establishes their
characters quickly and effi ciently
through close-ups and their cockpit
banter. Although Paige appears on
screen for less than a minute, it’s
a testament to Johnson’s abilities
that her sacrifice resonates with
a powerful emotional punch to
the gut that forces the audience
to experience the same loss that
her sister, Rose, also feels. Echoing
Twelve O’Clock High, The Last Jedi
mourns the demise of even minor
characters, stressing that the glories
of war are bitter ones, couched in
sorrow and death.
03
03 / The casino
on Canto Bight
was modeled
on the glamor
of Monte Carlo .
managing vineyards and orchards
To in the south of France. But when a
number of wealthy vacationers are
robbed of their jewels, the French
Catch police are convinced that the Cat
is back to his old tricks, and come
snooping around Robie’s villa.
a Thief 26-year-old Grace Kelly enters
the story as Frances Stevens, the
Director: Alfred Hitchcock beautiful, spoiled daughter of a rich
(PARAMOUNT PICTURES 1955) widow who owns an assortment of
diamond jewelry. She soon turns
up the heat on the handsome,
ens of iniquity have always older Robie, and as the attraction
been a staple of Star Wars between them mounts, so do the
D films, from the Mos Eisley questions. One doesn’t know until
cantina and Jabba’s palace to the the film’s end if Robie has actually
Outlander nightclub and Maz given up his life of crime, or if he’s
Kanata’s castle. Johnson creates exploiting his relationship with
another such den in The Last Jedi’s Frances for a chance to steal her
Canto Bight, but one in which mother’s precious stones.
the seediness is far better hidden. The French Riviera as pictured
Speaking to Empire, Johnson in To Catch a Thief gave Johnson
explained how he strove to capture a visual template for the location
the “romantic scale and grandeur” of Rose and Finn’s fi rst adventure,
of the French Riviera that Alfred where their relationship begins to
Hitchcock brought to the screen so grow. Johnson imagined Canto
deliciously in To Catch a Thief. Bight as the Monte Carlo of the
In this thriller, written by John Star Wars universe—a coastal
Michael Hayes and based on David city replete with fi ve-star hotels,
Dodge’s novel, Cary Grant plays gorgeous beaches, and classy
John Robie, an American expatriate casinos. Croatia’s walled city of
who has long since retired from Dubrovnik, on the shores of the
his postwar career as a jewel thief. Adriatic Sea, radiated the 1950s
Once widely known as “the Cat” charm and romance Johnson
for his abilities to prowl on rooftops wanted for Canto Bight. Only the
and sneak into rooms unnoticed, richest of the rich gamble and party
Robie now devotes his time to here, and their number includes
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