"Too Much Star Wars"

"Too Much Star Wars"

Not so long ago . . . A Young STAR WARS "Geek", with a humongous collection of STAR WARS toys, goes to sleep one night . . . Only to be awakened by an army of LIVING toys! Action Figures!  Space Ships! Imperial Walkers! Darth Vader!  Laser Blasts!  Explosions! Surely it's all just an over-hyped, over-merchandized, STAR WARS induced dream . . . . . . or is it?

Not so long ago . . . A Young STAR WARS "Geek", with a humongous collection of STAR WARS toys, goes to sleep one night . . . Only to be awakened by an army of LIVING toys! Action Figures!  Space Ships! Imperial Walkers! Darth Vader!  Laser Blasts!  Explosions! Surely it's all just an over-hyped, over-merchandized, STAR WARS induced dream . . . . . . or is it?

>>>  THE BACKGROUND  <<< In the summer of 1982, three High School "STAR WARS Geeks" unleash the awesome power of a Super-8 film camera during a long weekend!  After a month of tedious editing & "digital" Special Effects (meaning done by hand - aka digits), they create a cinematic masterpiece of Action Figure animation! >>>  THE "STARS"  <<< BILL MacALLISTER (aka Yoda-Mac) - Cameraman (I don't think you can call it Cinematographer when it's Super-8 film), Yoda Stand-in, Animator, and Co-Director ADAM SCHULTZ (aka Chew-Adam) - Camerman, The Boy, Animator, and Co-Director PAUL LEPPEK - (aka Paul Leppek) - Atari Computer Graphics Genius, and Pyrotechnics Maniac (boom!) THE TOYS - The true stars of the film!  Bill and Adam's HUGE collection. (which they both still have to this very day.)

With the music timed out as best we could, we scripted how long each animation shot would need to be, and counted the frames as we exposed them.  It was tedious work.

When the film was finally developed and edited, we set to work hand-drawing laser beams.  Each frame of the laser fire had to be drawn out, and most frames had more than one blaster firing.

When it was all done, we showed it around school, and to Rusty Miller, 12-year-old author of "The Jedi Master's Quiz Book".  He liked it and was kind enough to send it to his Lucasfilm contact. We were thrilled!

We scripted out the story based on some of the music and sound effects. All the Boy's scenes were shot in my bedroom over the weekend.  Only a few of the shots had both live actors & animation.

We were featured in our local Florida newspaper, interviewed on a late night talk show, and later, in Denver, we won a "Homey" award from the local film show "Home Movies".

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