Light & Magic – Review
1 Season, 6 Episodes (~60 min/each), TV-14
Documentary series
**NOTE: this post will be updated with audio once we actually have the chance to talk about it. Until then, enjoy this brief look at my thoughts. Stay tuned.**
Synopsis:
LIGHT & MAGIC is a six-part series that tells the story of Industrial Light & Magic, the special effects company George Lucas founded to make Star Wars. Through personal interviews and never-before-seen footage, director Lawrence Kasdan pulls back the curtain on ILM’s most iconic effects, while delving into the fascinating backstories of the artists and innovators who created them.
What’s great about George Lucas, Star Wars, and now ILM is the fact they can be continually reapproached and looked at from a new perspective, or by a new generation.
In 1977, no one knew what they were doing, if it could be done, or how to do it even if it could be done.
Kids today (man, am I old, lol…) have been spoiled by the availability and relative ease of CGI, but it wasn’t always like that, kiddoes. There was a time between Ray Harryhausen (Google him) and point-and-click fake people when a man came from NorCal and said, “I want to do THIS.”
And since no one knew how, they learned.
Across six episodes, we see those frantic days pre-Star Wars as Lucas assembles a team to create, from scratch, the look and feel of the movie he wanted.
From finding out the origin of the name “Industrial Light & Magic” (though not even without some dissent as to WHO originally came up with it, lol), to its evolution through Lucas’ six Star Wars films, the outside, non-Star Wars projects undertaken to keep the company busy (and together) between Star Wars films, all the way up to now: as in Disney Star Wars on Disney+.
And we end with the ultimate manifestation of George Lucas’ vision for filmmaking: the Volume.
To be fair, if you’ve ever seen a Star Wars documentary before, you’ve probably seen some of this material already, but it’s the incredible depth of the series that is truly impressive. From film to film, era to era, we see not the development of Star Wars, but how that development drove ILM to the position it finds itself now: the go-to visual effects destination.
A really interesting series for those who are more than Star Wars junkies, but who appreciate the process and development aspects of visual effects, or those who simply want to gain a deeper appreciation for what filmmakers have now in terms of how they got here.
All episodes of Light & Magic are now available to stream exclusively on Disney+, and features appearances by George Lucas, Marsha Lucas, John Dykstra, Phil tippett, and countless others who made ILM possible and with it, Star Wars.
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