George Lucas's 1988 speech about altering films
 

In March 1988 George Lucas, Spielberg, Jimmy Stewart and others were disgusted by Ted Turner's idea of colorizing black and white classics and saying that films are art and art shouldn't be modified as they went to congress and thus after the speech the American Film Institute and NFR was born.

""My name is George Lucas. I am a writer, director, and producer of motion pictures and Chairman of the Board of Lucasfilm Ltd., a multi-faceted entertainment corporation.

I am not here today as a writer-director, or as a producer, or as the chairman of a corporation. I've come as a citizen of what I believe to be a great society that is in need of a moral anchor to help define and protect its intellectual and cultural heritage. It is not being protected.

The destruction of our film heritage, which is the focus of concern today, is only the tip of the iceberg. American law does not protect our painters, sculptors, recording artists, authors, or filmmakers from having their lifework distorted, and their reputation ruined. If something is not done now to clearly state the moral rights of artists, current and future technologies will alter, mutilate, and destroy for future generations the subtle human truths and highest human feeling that talented individuals within our society have created.

A copyright is held in trust by its owner until it ultimately reverts to public domain. American works of art belong to the American public; they are part of our cultural history.

People who alter or destroy works of art and our cultural heritage for profit or as an exercise of power are barbarians, and if the laws of the United States continue to condone this behavior, history will surely classify us as a barbaric society. The preservation of our cultural heritage may not seem to be as politically sensitive an issue as "when life begins" or "when it should be appropriately terminated," but it is important because it goes to the heart of what sets mankind apart. Creative expression is at the core of our humanness. Art is a distinctly human endeavor. We must have respect for it if we are to have any respect for the human race.

These current defacements are just the beginning. Today, engineers with their computers can add color to black-and-white movies, change the soundtrack, speed up the pace, and add or subtract material to the philosophical tastes of the copyright holder. Tommorrow, more advanced technology will be able to replace actors with "fresher faces," or alter dialogue and change the movement of the actor's lips to match. It will soon be possible to create a new "original" negative with whatever changes or alterations the copyright holder of the moment desires. The copyright holders, so far, have not been completely diligent in preserving the original negatives of films they control. In order to reconstruct old negatives, many archivists have had to go to Eastern bloc countries where American films have been better preserved.

In the future it will become even easier for old negatives to become lost and be "replaced" by new altered negatives. This would be a great loss to our society. Our cultural history must not be allowed to be rewritten.

There is nothing to stop American films, records, books, and paintings from being sold to a foreign entity or egotistical gangsters and having them change our cultural heritage to suit their personal taste.

I accuse the companies and groups, who say that American law is sufficient, of misleading the Congress and the People for their own economic self-interest.

I accuse the corporations, who oppose the moral rights of the artist, of being dishonest and insensitive to American cultural heritage and of being interested only in their quarterly bottom line, and not in the long-term interest of the Nation.

The public's interest is ultimately dominant over all other interests. And the proof of that is that even a copyright law only permits the creators and their estate a limited amount of time to enjoy the economic fruits of that work.

There are those who say American law is sufficient. That's an outrage! It's not sufficient! If it were sufficient, why would I be here? Why would John Houston have been so studiously ignored when he protested the colorization of "The Maltese Falcon?" Why are films cut up and butchered?

Attention should be paid to this question of our soul, and not simply to accounting procedures. Attention should be paid to the interest of those who are yet unborn, who should be able to see this generation as it saw itself, and the past generation as it saw itself.

I hope you have the courage to lead America in acknowledging the importance of American art to the human race, and accord the proper protection for the creators of that art--as it is accorded them in much of the rest of the world communities."

Those words are so true. Unless George wants to alter his own films and then he an do whatever he wants

What was the point of this post? Ive never seen this speech but I just kept thinking about that episode of South Park where they do this.

People who complain about colorization don't have to have to like it, just understand its for those who wanna see what said-media could have looked like colored. Im sure we'd all love to see what classics would have been like in color. Its a natural curiosity. It doesn't mean we're gonna replace originals.

Everything else like the changing faces thing is over exaggeration. New "original" negatives is never gonna happen. Even if by some ridiculous circumstances it did, original copies will always exist somewhere in the world.

Sure may may alter his films all his he wants but he has no right to replace the original versions, I mean every director/artist should acknowledge the existence of the original versions of their films. Terry Gilliam, Ridley Scott, Steven Spielberg and so much other artists have acknowledgement for the existence of their originals and other cuts

The point of this thread is that for the last years since the actual 97 SE were released he has been torturing, butchering, burying the original films nonstop and not giving us the original cuts. I refused to buy the Blu-ray boxset in protest in 2011 until the original cuts are included as I care about film preservation but unfortunately my mom bought me the BD set for my birthday 2 years ago as I had to see what more crappy changes Lucas has done to the OT with an unacceptable one being "Noooo...Noooooo" at the climax of Jedi where Vader says that.

Then when I heard the news in 2012 that he is retiring and leaving his company to have someone else in charge being Kathleen Kennedy and Disney now the proud owner of Lucasfilm, I was excited with joy as he is finally gone and away from company so he won't do anymore damage to the original films anymore.

I was thinking that Fox-Lucasfilm-Disney should join forces together on a deal to unearth the original unedited, untampered and unraped versions of the OT SW films out of the Lucasfilm vaults and do quality scans, wash and unique film restorations to make them look as good as ever on HD for Blu-ray and they can make a s het load of money from fans and people who care about film preservation

George Lucas would probably justify altering Star Wars because they are his own movies. Although it was a lot of other people's work that went into them that he is altering.

I'd be fine with whatever crazy changes he made as long as the originals were released with them. The CGI effects are distracting and stick out in movies from the 70's and early 80's. I remember when a special effects guy was shilling that the changes were "seamless" in a TV special. No they weren't.

First I gotta say Im not a big Star Wars fan. Just never got into it. Ive seen the original movies but it was a very long time ago so I don't know what changes have been made. I wouldn't be able to spot them.

Now when people refer to original cuts do they mean the first theatrical release or the version of the movie before it went into edits FOR it's theatrical release? Meaning every single thing that was filmed but had to be fit for time.

I think alot of movies have unreleased cuts that would make said movies much longer. I would love to see them but its not just SW.

Unless they're literally butchering story and characters into something else, I think people overreact to updates in general.

Obviously, you are unaware of the Han Shot First controversy. Seeing Harrison Ford's head, with no emotion what so ever, digitally move out of the way makes me laugh every time.

Ha, thats pretty interesting. I looked up the videos on youtube.

I guess it still works though...Greedo wants to shoot him. Lucas wanted both to fire. The version where its 2 shots being heard is better than the digital head moving version.

Still him saying that was always his intention doesn't seem so.

I'm just glad I'm not a Star Wars fan.

I used to love Star Wars...until LucA$$ altered the films that I loved and made the horrendous prequels. Not knocking those that love those films, but I hate them with a passion! I sold off my huge collection of memorabilia as I no longer had a desire to continue collecting. I hope Disney and Abrams do the new movies justice.