On the evening of May 25th at the Cannes Film Festival George Lucasthe father of Star Wars and the friend of Steven Spielberg and Francis Ford Coppola, with whom he revolutionized Hollywood in the seventies, will receive the Palme d’honneur. His name is in the history of cinema, Star Wars it’s not just a saga, it’s a seed planted in 1977 that continues to bear fruit, even after the sale of Lucasfilm to Disney in 2012.
George Lucas obsessed with racing cars
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And to think that the father of Yoda, Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi didn’t have cinema and science fiction in mind in high school, but cars. During a meeting with the public in Cannes you spoke about yours passion for motors. «I was obsessed with cars – he says – I did some racing on small circuits and in parking lots. I loved speed and racing cars. I had also worked in a garage. For a while I thought about becoming a pilot. Then, a week before finishing high school, I got involved in a bad one accident, and I ended up in the hospital. There I realized that I wasn’t cut out to become a pilot. I then decided to focus on photography. Then I discovered cinema. At that point I thought I was done with cars, but instead I felt the call of the track. Years later I made some celebrity races – continues George Lucas – My family stopped me, terrified that I might die in an accident, and my conscience as a divorced father with three children (one natural and two adopted)”.
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George Lucas from American Graffiti to Star Wars
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At that point Lucas turned to cinema. He met Coppola and made his first film, American Graffiti with Ron Howard (the future director of Rush about Niki Lauda and James Hunt), a tiny film that no one believed in and which achieved great success. «American Graffiti had done so well because it was appreciated by kids – says Lucas, also among the producers of the Indiana Jones saga – I then decided to direct my Flash Gordon aimed at children, with lightsabers, C3-PO and the Ewoks. I’m amazed that people aged 5 to 90 have loved it all over the world.” This is the extraordinary effect of the “galaxy far, far away”.
