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The Screenwriters

For the first of only two times in the six films, Lucas allowed outside hands to write from his original story, with separate credit going to legendary noir and science fiction author/screenwriter Leigh Brackett (her final screenplay, she turned in her draft before passing away from cancer in early 1978) and Lawrence Kasdan (his first, soon to be followed by Raiders of the Lost Ark and later, Return of the Jedi). From what I can gather (which isn’t easy as the script exists in only two places with no allowances to be copied or checked out) a lot of changes were made between what she submitted and what wound up on screen, but the feel of the film to be is already palpatine... er, palpable (Yes, that will be my one and only attempt at any SW-related humor, verbal or otherwise). Between her credit for this and on Altman’s The Long Goodbye in 1973, her writing was used as the springboard for two of the more distinguished films from that decade that managed to cover her dual genres of interest.

The Feel

Empire Strikes Back doesn’t have a beginning, middle or end, precisely, which is perhaps what makes it appealing to my tastes. It starts and stops in the middle of action and doesn’t build to the demolition of a Death Star (or the introduction of furry forest critters to accomplish this task). It features matter-of-fact heroism (Han riding off into the endless driving snowstorms of Hoth to rescue Luke), matter-of-fact entanglements (Han and Leia’s true feelings for each other bubble up quite naturally) and matter-of-fact earth-shattering revelations (Yoda’s tossed-off line “No. There is another” in response to the claim that Luke is the last Jedi and um, oh yeah, that issue of paternity I referred to earlier).

Star Wars and Return of the Jedi build to great spectacles of destruction and contain many thrilling chase sequences but Empire’s most notable chase sequence - the pursuit through the asteroid field - occurs at the midway point and seems to be there mostly to set up the film’s best visual joke, the revelation that the Millennium Falcon hasn’t quite landed in the cave its crew thought it had. And yet, I hesitate to credit it entirely with an existential feeling of despair and helplessness. Rather, it seems to owe as much to the sci-fi as to the hardboiled noir that both Kasdan and Brackett dabbled in (he with his directorial debut Body Heat, she with the classic The Big Sleep, among others). The film is as much about characters and attitude as it is about plot, and although it certainly has a lot of the latter, the why of what happens seems almost arbitrary alongside the effect these incidents have on the characters.

The Locales

Although it isn’t precisely a one-third, one-third, one-third split, the film seems roughly to spend an equal amount of time on the ice planet of Hoth, the swampy Dagobah (or the asteroid field) and the luxurious Cloud City. These may not be the most memorable or aesthetically pleasing of the series’ locations (I am a sucker for the lush green forests of Endor) but there is a common theme in the film that unites them: that of a hidden malignancy or threat that rests just under the surface. The asteroid cave revealed to be the mouth of a space worm is the most obvious but consider the traitorous actions of Lando in betraying his guests, Luke’s capture and near death at the claws of the wampa before escaping and making his way to the even worse prospect of freezing to death, and Luke’s descent into the swamps on Dagobah, where his vision of Vader presages their meeting, Vader’s revelation, and Luke’s loss of his hand. More importantly, after the coming together of the various heroes and heroines in the first film, Empire goes out of its way to keep them apart, or in the case of C-3PO’s separation from R2-D2: separate, and in parts.

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