Empire Strikes Back…
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Excalibur
doktordaoud — 9 years ago(July 25, 2016 11:02 PM)
Anyone else notice the 'Empire / Star Wars' artistic reference in the scene of Lancelot in the forest?
When Lancelot awakes in his dream he sees a knight confronting him to fight who happens to look exactly like him. Lancelot bests him the fight, he opens the 'other' Lancelot / knight's helmet and sees nothing, likely a metaphor for him fighting his internal demons of lust for Lady Guieniviere.
In 'The Empire Strikes Back', Luke enters the forest and is confronted by Darth Vader approaching him with lightsaber drawn for battle. They fight and Luke wins and Darth's head hits the ground cracking open his helmet. Who do we see under Darth's helmet? Luke's face, probably as a metaphor for Luke fighting his internal conflicts and referencing that Darth is his father.
Also the green gel lighting of the swords in many scenes seems to be influenced by the illumination of the lightsabers.
One theoretical reach (please bear with with me, ha): the incestuous lust that's implied between Luke & Leia parallels Arthur and Morgana. Though of course the Arthurian tales were centuries before Star Wars, it's possible George Lucas was influenced by this tale so it's a reverse influence in this case. But yeah still a reach. So if you think I'm tripping you may be 100% correct, I accept that. But it's possible when you think of it
All of these references were well-done inspirations that fit the story. I would not call them stealing or copying at all, very artistic in it's interpretation. I give Boorman, Respo and anyone else involved in the making of Excalibur and the possibly inspired / referenced scenes much credit. Well-done either way. -
crockett_john — 9 years ago(August 30, 2016 09:06 PM)
That's an interesting thought. I hadn't considered the Empire Strikes Back connection, but it is a very similar scene.
I was thinking of Star Wars during the combat scenes. They all seem slow and painfully orchestrated, similar to Obi-Wan and Darth Vader fighting.
I blame autocorrect.
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