Saw 'Triumph of the Will' last night. Lucas completely ripped it off.

[Boogie]

The overture at the beginning is what Lucas stylized his intro music after. Also the scene when Hitler and two other Nazis are walking to a podium in Nuremberg stadium, they are surrounded by soldiers in block formations and all you can see are these three figure walking through them from a long distance camera angle. Lucas has used that imagery several times in his movies, the awards ceremony at the end of Episode IV and also a scene when he shows stormtroopers lining up for the emperor on the Death Star in Episode IV. At the beginning of 'Triumph of the Will' my GF turns to me and comments about the German soldier's helmets, "They look like Darth Vader". The propaganda that Leni Riefenstahl used in her movie is very stunning and still stirs controversy to this day. Not defending Riefenstahl but what if I picked out some foreign film that I'm sure most of my audience hasn't seen and merely picked it apart for content for my own film.

[Beelzebud]

1. Lucas has said as much in interviews.

The original idea for Darth Vader and the imperial army are lifted straight from Nazi Germany.

He also uses many film techniques that Akira Kurosawa did, such as the screen wipe (or page turn), and many of the iconic camera angles.

Another fun fact about Star Wars. The driods R2-D2 and C3PO were lifted from the 2 main characters of Kurosawa's The Hidden Fortress.

[Bassic]

17. Right down to the noise that the Tie Fighters make. nt

[bunkerbuster1]

2. Others have noticed...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars_Episode_IV:_A_New_Hope

http://alum.hampshire.edu/~jbfF95/swtotw.htm

und so weiter...

[Boogie]

5. Blast! I thought I had made a groundbreaking discovery.

;-)

[Rabrrrrrr]

3. Lucas has never been secretive about borrowing from Riefenstahl

or from the many other directors/films he admired.

Not a big secret that he borrowed.

[Beelzebud]

As Terry Gilliam often says: "We're all borrowers." :)

[wicket]

12. Yup - happens all the time with film :)

See Quentin Tarantino et al.

[Orrex]

4. Well, Lucas didn't write the score

Talk to John Williams, who also owes a heavy stylistic debt to Wagner, while we're at it.

And imagery is borrowed all the time and most often without attribution. Lucas, whatever else can be said of his myriad failings as a director, is hardly alone in this regard.

[Boogie]

8. I suppose you are correct.

It was strange seeing all this stuff in a Nazi propagnda film and realizing that it didn't originate with Lucas himself. I mean the imagery is almost exact.

[Bassic]

18. It is the same for music.

Every musician, and every composer is influenced by others.

[muriel_volestrangler]

21. I think the basic 'Star Wars' theme borrows from 2 films:

"Lawrence of Arabia" (although slightly faster) and "Born Free".

[driver8]

6. I saw that movie in college in one of my classes.

What an amazing piece of Propoganda.

The sight of Hitler walking through that enormous crowd is absolutely incredible. Very powerful images, for sure.

[kineneb]

7. and musical themes were lifted from Carl Orff

so much of the Star Wars music sounds like it is straight out of Carmina Burana. I think I remember hearing Lucas mention he was listening to the music when he was doing some of the scenes.

[YOY]

9. and 'Conan the Barbarian' borrowed fom Eisenstein's 'Alexander Nevsky'

a Stalin era Soviet propoganda film. Numerous others have borrowed from Eisenstein's 'Battleship Potemkin'...which was more straight Bolshevik than Stalinist.

Watch 'Birth of a Nation' I am sure many folks have borrowed from it as well.

You only need to worry when the director doesn't hone up to it and it's blatantly obvious. As stated by others, Mr. Lucas is and always has been open with his sources of influence.

[htuttle]

14. The 'Odessa steps' sequence in Potemkin has been borrowed so often...

...that now it's often parodied as an inside joke to film buffs.

[YOY]

20. I like the Zucker Brothers' "Naked Gun" parody m'self

and loathe "The Untouchables" remake's use of it.

So borrowed it's trite and parody is deservedly so!

[FormerDittoHead]

10. The attack on the death star was a straight copy of "The Dam Busters" and "The Bridges at Toko Ri"..

Star Wars was VERY derivitive in many ways, but that's why it works.

As to my subject, the story is that he went to England to shoot principle photography (this is for the first film) but before he went, he spliced together scenes from those two movies and told John Dykstra to "make that, but with space ships"...

But the similiarites between that and the attack on the dams in "The Dam Busters" are unmistakable, however, the attack on the battle station remains one of the best 15 minutes in cinema. Period.

Oh, and speaking of copying stuff, if you didn't see the similarity between Darth Vader and Doctor Doom you're blind.

[Ian David]

11. Most State Trooper uniforms are based on the Nazi SS design. n/t

[MADem]

13. Well, of course he did. He was going for that visceral reaction, and it worked. NT

[Little Wing]

15. It's a Western with Far Eastern 'religion' and a smack of WW2 fighther-cam footage

and a decent dose of Samurai legend

[MilesColtrane]

16. Check out the finale of Erich Korngold's score to "Kings Row".

Very Star Warian...
Not saying that William's plagiarized but there's a couple of things in there that make you go hmmm.

[TlalocW]

19. He also borrow heavily from Japanese samurai culture

Vader's helmet for instance. Han Solo's laser gun was a modified German soldier handgun. Etc.

I took theater appreciation for an easy class in college, and I remember the professor telling us that everything is based on something else. You go see a movie today and "pull its strings, and you'll make the big toe of, 'Citizen Kane,' move." was his... weird... analogy.

TlalocW

[emulatorloo]

22. I think the correct term is "HOMAGE" -- Lucas is paying homage to "Triumph of the Will"

hoping that smart viewers like you will pick up the clues.

Thereby adding another layer of meaning to his film (Wow, these guys are JUST LIKE THE NAZIs!)

[walldude]

23. Man you will never find anything new about Star Wars

that hasn't been dissected a thousand times over. Believe me. As far as Triumph of The Will is concerned, while the content is shit as we all know Riefenstahl created techniques that have since become de facto standards in film making. Being a jew it kind of creeps me out to watch TOTW but I have watched it and it's part of my DVD collection just as a history lesson and a lesson in manipulation through brilliant film making techniques.