No link because I found the image on twitter.
I’ll just leave this here, where George Lucas explicitly confirms the rebels were the communist Vietnamese and the Empire is america: https://youtu.be/Nxl3IoHKQ8c?t=56
And he explicitly corrects the interviewer when they attempt to call them the “English Empire” instead.
George Lucas almost directed Apocalypse Now during the Vietnam war. John Milius wanted to film on location in South Vietnam.
Lucas brings up the American Revolutionary War (he said something about “hayseeds in coonskin hats”) as a parallel to the Vietnam War, probably to smooth over the discomfort the lib interviewer has with characterizing the modern and 60’s US as the evil empire. So I don’t think that’s a correction, more like an insistence on continuing the parallel.
Side note, that turn of phrase was a masterful way to prevent/delay the interviewer from dismissing the viet kong as “terrorists.” Lucas is extremely sharp. I definitely couldn’t have directed the conversation as effectively.
Yeah he’s absolutely trying to make sure there that it is explicitly understood that is the American empire not just an “evil” empire that you can swap to anyone else.
Didn’t a lot of early CPV propaganda use the same American Revolution imagery in an appeal to the west?
Georgie-boy is cooler than most people would admit
But also why is the camera constantly moving in that show? its supposed to be just an interview with the standard shots. why does the camera constantly swivel around them and why does it keep cutting to a cam thats directly behind a fuckin floodlight
Wasn’t Lucas also the directer who said that even soviet filmmakers had more freedom of expression than he did?
IIRC he said they had greater freedom in what they could make because they weren’t pushed to produce as much profit as possible like he was, even if they needed to steer clear of censors. It makes a lot of sense, he is from the era where the soviet filmmakers were putting out some excellent films. And obv because capitalism kills art.
