Happy 30th Birthday, Star Wars!

Star Wars
On May 25, 1977, Star Wars was released, and pop culture history was born. I remember going to see it with my Aunt Zenia, and because we missed the first 10 minutes or so we stayed and watched the next showing. I’ve seen the film and its sequels many times, and having grown up with the phenomena it sort of makes sense that I don’t experience the new trilogy in quite the same way as the old. I still contend that it just sucks compared to the original, though. ;-p

Anyway, I’m sure I’ll be adding more stuff to this post as I find it today, but for now I’ll start with an excellent feature called Star Wars Rewired: Interviews, Galleries and More that has a plethora of Star Wars-related articles. If you’re up to it, check out all of the Star Wars posts I’ve made on the blog as well as the del.icio.us bookmarks I’ve tagged as Star Wars (many of which will overlap). Finally, the official film site relaunched today, with a lot of new features:

One of the hallmarks of the new site is a feature that invites fans to remix video and music clips from all six Star Wars movies, as well as add in their own homemade videos. They’ll then be able to share them on the Star Wars site with other fans, as well as embed them in their blogs or profiles on social-networking sites.

Additionally, StarWars.com … will be adding a library of hundreds of Star Wars-related video clips. These include official documentary-style videos, selections from the Star Wars Fan Movie Festival over the years, and user-generated videos inspired by Star Wars like the Chad Vader: Day Shift Manager Web sitcom.

I’ll have to head over there and check things out…

Dutch Oven Mitt

Check out Dutch Oven Mitt, an “Aesthetic Apparatus Deviant Sex Act Fabricator.” The only reason I labeled this as NSFW is because the word “sex” is on the site; otherwise it’s harmless fun. May your prudish work firewall not prevent you from experiencing it… 😉

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Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson to Direct Tintin Trilogy

Tintin and Snowy/Film reports that Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson are planning to direct a trilogy based on the Tintin comics. Done right, this could really be cool. In case you’ve never heard of Tintin,

Tintin and Snowy (original French language names: Tintin et Milou), a journalist and his canine companion, are a pair of adventurers who travel around the world in The Adventures of Tintin, a series of comic books drawn and written by the Belgian cartoonist Georges Remi, better known as Hergé. The series is one of the most popular comic book series in Europe, especially in Belgium, France, and Germany.

I remember gleefully borrowing and reading all of the comics from the library when I was a kid, so I’m holding out hope that this will be done right by Spielberg and Jackson…

Dr. Strangelove Dr. Strangelove

The Morning News interviews artist Kristan Horton, creator of the unusual project Dr. Strangelove Dr. Strangelove:

In Dr. Strangelove Dr. Strangelove, Kristan Horton imitates the satirical movie Dr. Strangelove and creates a new world for the film—silverware become an airplane, plastic and coffee grounds become the sky. The connections between Kubrick’s film and Horton’s photographs demonstrate the power of familiar sights, sounds, ideas, and objects to change the way we look at cultural icons.

The Greatest Foreign Films Of All Time

Guardian Unlimited presents the greatest foreign films of all time:

In March, we asked you to let us know what the best ever non-English films were. We’ve totted up the thousands of votes you cast to present your definitive top 40. But what did our film writers think of your choices? Here’s your chart, and their verdicts.

I love lists like this, but unfortunately it compels me to add to my already overloaded Netflix queue…