The Magic of Movies - Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Part Five

Back on Dagobah, Artoo has been left out in the rain; I justify this from a filmic perspective in that it lets us very gradually get into the little green dude’s house in the most mystery-inducing way, as we see the house initially from his perspective – it’s warm, it’s inviting, and it’s mysterious. From a practical in-universe perspective, this is the only way Luke managed to prevent another big, stupid argument. Luke returns to his old whiny ways here, demanding to see Yoda right now, but it makes a little more sense here; Luke is a practical guy, when you get right down to it.

The scene shifts on a dime; this is the kind of thing that really appeals to me, as the scene shifts immediately from goofy comedy to total seriousness. Like so many movie scenes like this, the shift is accompanied by the music shifting – the Force theme gently guiding us through this moment of wonder as Yoda, and god help me, does it always work on me – for indeed, we and Luke figure it out – talks to Obi-Wan. The puppetry for Yoda also shifts – his eyes narrow, his stance changes. What I admire most about the puppetry is the control they have over his mouth and how it expresses emotion (see especially when he’s thumping Luke with his stick). 

Yoda’s dialogue is mostly fairly non-specific in its philosophy; his central idea is that a good person focuses on the here-and-now as opposed to the future, or abstract concepts of heroism; Obi-Wan retorts, essentially, that this is the nature of being young. This is an aspect that fascinates me; I find myself thinking of Yoda’s ideas more as I get older, with some of the specific lines floating through my head, but I also know the movie is a goofy children’s film and that it’s possible the philosophy is so generic as to be meaningless (the way the anti-fascism can come off a bit trite).

On the meteor, some absolutely bitchin’ TIE Fighters with a cool double-bulb design are bombing the meteor, giving us another throwback to old WWII films; I feel like this movie relies much less on these kind of throwbacks than the first one did, but it’s still capable of pulling this kind of thing out. The little parasite thing is a great design – certainly, it still scares the shit out of me – and I really do love Han gradually working out what’s actually happening to him (particularly him shooting the ground to make one final check). By the way, this is our current Bad Feeling About This.

One of the funny things about iconic fiction is how the iconic moments are always shorter and simpler than you remember them, but weirdly enough, I keep being surprised at how long plotlines are in this movie. I didn’t remember the cave sequence being anywhere near as long as it turns out to be in this movie, mainly because it’s broken up into so many pieces and cut up between Luke on Dagobah.

Meanwhile, on Dagobah (which Luke is on), Yoda imparts his wisdom. In a way, this scene is partly why I wanted to do this whole project. On the one hand, much of what Yoda says is generic wisdom; on the other, it seems a lot of people didn’t learn it, and specifically, it’s something I’ve come around to (more accurately, back around to) after a long time. I’m actually struck by every single one of his points. Firstly, that anger is addictive. This is obvious; social media algorithms thrive on enraging its audience, getting you addicted to the high of moral superiority. Its parent, sensationalist television, did the same thing; newspapers before that. Hunter S Thompson described the superficial pleasures of the politics junkie all too effectively.

The second: that the Dark Side is easier and more seductive, but ultimately weaker than the Light. At the risk of being as generic as I’m accusing Star Wars of being, one can think of the Light Side as a creative energy (this is essentially what Yoda says), and it’s well known that it’s easier to destroy things than to build them. Creative energy is ultimately more fulfilling, more rewarding, more psychologically healing than destruction. And people who act in anger are often acting to make themselves feel tough as opposed to actually accomplishing a task; this is the seductive nature of it.

Yoda observes that the best decisions are made when at peace, and just based on my personal experience I’m inclined to agree; the summoning of creative spirit has been an action that has led to my better decisions, even on a basic pragmatic level, which requires getting past anger or shame to somewhere more central to myself. Which, again, sounds just as generic – even woo-woo – as Star Wars, but there it is.

The really interesting part is that Yoda immediately gets irritated when Luke begins to ask why he can’t do something and shuts down the lesson. This is something that always used to bother me, but I get it now – more on this later.

Luke begins to sense something strange, and Yoda explains it’s a place strong with the Dark Side (“What’s in there?” / “Only what you take with you.”). He goes in; the film stutters, using that fake slo-mo effect where they filmed at 24 frames per second and simply slowed down how it plays – useful for conveying the eerie feeling of a vision, though personally I find it ugly. Luke’s vision is of fighting Darth Vader, cutting off his head, only to reveal that Vader’s face is his own. I never fully got that as a kid, but I think I understand now. Obviously, there’s the level that Vader is Luke’s own flesh and blood (oh, sorry, spoilers).

But the vision is also asking: what is Luke’s motivation? Is it to end the suffering of others or to kill Vader? Peace for the innocent or bloody satisfaction? If it’s the latter, then he’s Vader, making decisions based upon anger. People tend to take offence at the idea that imitating one’s enemies makes them like their enemy, but I think it’s useful to help one calibrate one’s actual motivation. In any situation, no matter how morally justified, the chance that you are the bad guy is higher than zero. This is also a part of the philosophy of Star Trek.

Vader deals with the bounty hunters he’s hired to get the Rebels. This strikes me as a reasonable tactic – expanding beyond the Empire. His finger wag as he says “No disintegrations!” is very funny to me; paternalistic and implying this has happened enough that he has to be clear. The asteroid field turned out to be pointless in terms of the escape, having bought them a moment of reprieve and nothing else; Han’s plan is fun and ballsy, directly moving towards the ship and hiding on them (love the detail of the bridge officers ducking as the Falcon flies over them – I almost do it sympathetically).

Also love the detail that the Admiral gambles on an apology.

The imagery of Luke/s training is so good – the frontflip earlier was a cool detail, and now we have him using the Force to do an extremely minor trick. Lots of people have remarked upon how funny it is that Luke’s epic training with Yoda lasts, what, a week? But it doesn’t matter, because the idea of his training is conveyed cinematically so well, inbetween the Big Moments (also, there’s the willingness to get silly, like Yoda’s screech and face as he falls off Luke).

The sequence of Luke’s ship sinking may be my favourite scene in the original trilogy. The initial sinking is great – we cut to just the tip of the wing, with the majority of it having sunk long before it got our attention, really emphasising the hopelessness of the situation (“Always with you it cannot be done.”). I even love a shot we get of Luke and Artoo standing with it in the background. Yoda is annoyed by Luke’s pessimism and is firm: do or do not. There is no try. This is something I definitely needed time to come around on; I remember being a kid and finding that line frustrating, because how do you do things without trying?

A few years ago, I took singing lessons, and my teacher told me to work out was 10/10 effort and what was 1/10 and aim for 5/10, and I found my singing improved enormously. I recognized that, when trying too hard, I was aiming for things outside my comfort zone and that I wasn’t completely confident on. Similarly, I’ve seen many posts from workers who said they used to try their best at work, found they got no results, basically gave up and put in minimum effort, and found they were respected and rewarded far beyond what they ever achieved.

The lesson I’ve concluded from this is that if something is hard, it’s not worth doing. I know that sounds ridiculous and whiny, but so much grief is avoided when you recognize that the reason something is hard is because you’re simply not equipped in some way to do it – if the situation isn’t impossible entirely for reasons outside of your control, then it’s a lack of information on your part or there’s something else you need to get out of the way first. I believe Yoda’s point here is the reverse of that – Luke already knows how to do what he needs to do, he just needs to admit that to himself and stop overthinking.

This is also simply cinematically beautiful. Luke reaches out with his hand. The music is gentle but firm as the ship starts to rise. A close-up on Yoda as we feel the awe at this together. Back to Luke, trying so hard. Over to Artoo, jiggling and beeping. Back to the ship, sinking back down. The music falls back down with it. Extreme closeup of Yoda shaking his head. The last tip of the ship sinks back down. Back to Luke, humiliated.  A wide of Yoda sighing as Luke sits in front of him. Tony Zhou of Every Frame A Painting described this as a great example of using editing to really draw out the emotion of a scene, as opposed to more modern day films that slam through it much faster and less intensely.

Yoda describes the Force to Luke, and I really love this shot in particular. As the Force Theme gently guides us through, Yoda looks about himself, waving his arms as he describes the magic he’s seeing. I can imagine a more complex shot using, perhaps, CG (or, in an earlier film, animation – think the original Pete’s Dragon) to convey the Force moving through the air, but that doesn’t feel appropriate here, does it? It feels right that all we have to go on is Yoda’s face and voice – something cinematically simple to convey something apparently universal. Yoda is arguing against materialism; that Luke should look past the rational building blocks of the world and to something immaterial and spiritual.

Luke walks off in a huff, and we get the most Star Wars moment in the trilogy, when Yoda lifts the ship out of the swamp to show Luke the precise level of impossible he’s dealing with. Now, to riff on Cypher in The Matrix, I know the movie is not real. I know that’s just a puppet, and a prop, and a prop with a little person in it, and a set with a fog machine and a guy in a costume. But as the ship rises out of the water, and the music conveys assertive clarity followed by triumph, and Mark Hammil slaps his hand on the ship, I believe in Star Wars.
One of the most influential shows on my development is The Simpsons, and one of its points that I have found to be consistently true throughout my whole life is that reality is almost always boring. The answers to mysteries are always disappointingly average. Amelia Earheart died out in the Pacific. The Bermuda Triangle is just a shipping lane. And the work you have to do to get anything done is always tedious and will take four times as long as you think. But as Fox Mulder put it: I want to believe. I want to see magic happen. And every once in a while, a ship is magically pulled out of the swamp.