Hollywood has no new ideas or actors?

[megoscott]

But c'mon...if they could make a young Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher and Mark Hamill for all new Original Star Wars movies....I'd watch.

But only if he can bring Irvin Kershner back to life to direct.

[Sandman9580]

Everyone is scoffing at the idea now but it really doesn't sound that stupid to me at all.

With the way technology is moving, I bet there will be a day when there is the ability to place a deceased actor in a movie long after he/she is gone.

They can do that now. It just seems sort of distasteful. And it gets into this murky area of what an actor "owns" of himself. Here's an example from Zemeckis again: when he went to direct Back to the Future Part 2, Crispin Glover (George McFly from the first movie) decided not to be in the film. So Zemeckis got another actor, made him up to look like Glover, put him upside down (as if he was in some kind of traction) and then had the actor impersonate Glover's voice. Glover filed a grievance with the Actor's Guild, and they made a rule to prevent anything like that from ever happening again.

If George Lucas wants to bring Humphrey Bogart back to life, good.

If George Lucas is writing the dialogue and directing the performance, bad.

Hey, misa lookin' at you, Ani! We'll always have Tatooine.

[LonnieFisher]

Totally bad idea.

[SeattleEd]

Just rumor folks. Wired has confirmed it.

Is Star Wars creator George Lucas planning to digitally reanimate dead movie stars and insert them into a CGI film of his own devising? Uh, no.

The “I cast dead people” scenario that’s making the rounds on the web is not true, according to Lucasfilm spokesman Josh Kushins. “This rumor is completely false,” he told Wired.com in an e-mail Monday.

The wild rumor, which was picked up by news outlets around the web, started after Mel Smith, who directed Lucas’ Radioland Murders script back in 1994, was quoted in London tabloid The Daily Mail.

“[Lucas has] been buying up the film rights to dead movie stars,” Smith reportedly told the paper, “in the hope of using computer trickery to put them all together in a movie, so you’d have Orson Welles and Barbara Stanwyck appear alongside today’s stars.”

Still, it got us thinking: If you could bring back a Hollywood talent from the grave and put him or her in a scene from the Star Wars saga, who would you resuscitate and why? Comment below.

[kennermike]

I want George Lucas to make a CGI film about ED!

[SeattleEd]

^^^I don't think it would pass the MPAA rating board.

[kennermike]

^^^I don't think it would pass the MPAA rating board.

[Meule]

Rumours or not, this is the dumbest thing I've ever heard
Some CGI artist will never be able to copy the performance of a real actor. The look in their eyes, the tone of their voice, ... it's all fake, so why even bother?

[ctc]

>it's all fake, so why even bother?

Name recognition without the premium cost or uppity actors to deal with. Which is why I think this sort of thing is inevitable. (Heck; how many nerds are losing fluid over the “young Flynn” in the new Tron?) Pushbutton movie.... kinda like what autotune has done to music.

Thing is, you don’t HAVE to make it perfect.... just climb out of the uncanny valley enough that folks won’t care. And one day they WILL make it so’s it’s impossible to tell what’s real and what isn’t, even if it’s ‘cos they’d seeded the public conscious with enough CGI that the inadequacies aren’t a problem. Sorta like all the stupid plot points that folks accept.... and will actually complain about if they’re NOT present.... because that’s how they’ve seen it done for so long.

And as the years go by and vectors get refined and reused the necessary little tweaks will all get added. Eventually they’ll completely construct actors altogether. (I’m waiting for the first computer simulated scandal.... THEN you’ll know we’ve truly achieved complete computer run entertainment.)

Don C.

[Meule]

>it's all fake, so why even bother?

Name recognition without the premium cost or uppity actors to deal with. Which is why I think this sort of thing is inevitable. (Heck; how many nerds are losing fluid over the “young Flynn” in the new Tron?) Pushbutton movie.... kinda like what autotune has done to music.

That sounds good on paper maybe, but no one is gonna fool me with a horror movie with a CGI Vincent Price for instance. No matter how hard you try you can't mimic what he did on screen. And he's part of the reason I watch those movies in the first place. If it's not really him, but some CGI crap I'm not even gonna bother cause I'll be let down anyway. You may fool some people, but even most those will decline the second time around because it is not real.

[ODBJBG]

I think this is a great idea actually. I don't think it's ever going to get to the outrageous points you guys have put it to here. I do think though, used sparringly, as it has been for years and years (even before CGI) it can help add to someone's legacy in that sense. There are so many wonderful applications this could be used for.

People who have died have been reused in films for generations through a variety of means. The advancement of CGI will only allow these tributes to the people be performed better and a clearer vision of what the director wanted. Plus, no doubt that likeness rights would be paid to the families. So nobody is graverobbing here.

[babycyclops]

Let me get this straight, so even after Jar Jar is dead they'll be able to put him in more Star Wars films!?!?

[Meule]

Let me get this straight, so even after Jar Jar is dead they'll be able to put him in more Star Wars films!?!?

Frightening idea, isn't it

[saildog]

really this is not exaclty anything new. I seem to recall a "little film" called Forrest gump which had a goof meet Kennedy and LBJ - both long dead before the film was shot, ...

Your post reminded me that even before that, there was the Paula Abdul Diet Coke commercial with Gene Kelly, Cary Grant, and Grouch Marx.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVI0eyz6Jbc

[Brazoo]

The more I see, hear and read about George Lucas, the more I think Star Wars and Empire were flukes or that someone else was constantly telling him "No!"

I don't want to create a huge debate, I'm not personally invested in any particular side here - and I'm not pretending to know what really happened - but I personally haven't liked anything he's done since one person in particular has left Lucas's camp, and found this article very interesting:

The Secret History of Star Wars

Be warned - it's long.