Why David Lynch turned down Return of the Jedi!

Why David Lynch turned down Return of the Jedi!

There's a bit of little-known Star Wars trivia that George Lucas once asked David Lynch to direct the third movie in the trilogy, Return of the Jedi, but I don't think we've ever heard Lynch himself describe his meeting and why he turned it down in quite this way. Until now, in the video below.

At a seminar last month at New York's Russian Tea Room, sponsored by the Hudson Union Society, the director of Eraserhead and Mulholland Drive talked about the James Bond-like arrangements he had to make to meet with Lucas, how he reacted when he saw a Wookiee for the first time and why Lucas shouldn't be driving a Ferrari.

The mind reels when imagining what Jedi might have been like under Lynch's direction. Like Dune meets Blue Velvet, with Darth Vader sucking on oxygen and saying, "Don't you f--king look at me!!" Instead of Ewoks, a bunch of mutant dwarves living in log cabins in a town like Twin Peaks?

We'd actually buy that. Would you?

As it turns out, little-known director Richard Marquand wound up directing Jedi, giving us the movie we've all grown up with, but a chance to make film history vanished with Lynch.

(Thanks to JoBlo.com for the heads-up.)


Source: Sci-Fi Wire

David Lynch movies get on all of my nerves. I've tried him and he's just not a match with me. I'm fine with Return of the Jedi as it is.

Was it because he was already an established filmmaker? Not only that, but one who wanted to make his own films and not some poorly written arse gravy about teddy bears in the woods?

While it's true that Lynch had already made two features, Eraserhead and The Elephant Man (the latter I consider his best film), I'm not sure how established that made him. After all, he did next direct a sci-fi alien world flick (Dune), which I defend more than most do, and it was a huge bomb. Return of the Jedi is a super movie, and I can say this because I'm an expert on two people's "arse gravy", my own and Lynch's.

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C'mon mark, Jedi isn't super. We like it, it's fun but I don't think you can't compare the kiddy romp that is RotJ with Dune (which I have no time for, but still).

When was the last time you watched "the kiddy romp"?

I'd say 12 to 18 months ago. I bought the dvd release that had the proper version and Lucas' new 'cocked it up' version. Obviously, the cocked it up version doesn't make the film worse overall, it's just none of the added bits add anything positive to it. Most are annoying and, possibly the only Lucas crime that even comes close to Guido shooting first, he changed the music at the end. Sacrilege!

Real simple here. You have one artist (George Lucas) trying to hire another to paint a picture for him just like he wants it.

David Lynch is not a commercial artist. He cannot generically fabricate someone else’s vision. David can only create his own vision. If I wanted to hire David Lynch as a director, I would just give him a budget and say “go make a movie”. He must be free.

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Well even if he turned down Return of the Jedi, the movie turned out pretty good and I liked it a lot even if the special effects were not that good as compared to now, of course because of the time it was made in!

The effects are still great, even though I consider Jedi to be the weakest of the three original films. Too bad better effects couldn't save the complete pieces of garbage A Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones. Revenge of the Sith is quite a bit better than those flicks, but still pretty bad.

Meanwhile, I love videos of David Lynch. He is just such a quirky and interesting person to me, and I admire his dedication to his personal vision.

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Interesting interview, but i don't really like David Lynch's films. Watched both "Eraserhead" and "Mullholland Drive" completely through and I just don't care for it. Maybe he's just way too out there, but sometimes i feel it's a bit pretentious to make sick surreal stuff like that and claim that when someone doesn't understand it, they're either too stupid to realize it or they don't have an imagination to think outside the box.
It's good that he didn't touch "Return of the JEdi" It is my favorite movie of the original trilogy, and i can't imagine it being any different.
good interview though. interesting

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Take a look at The Elephant Man and/or The Straight Story.