News culture It’s the work of a genius! Here’s the trick that was used to make filming this Star Wars movie more peaceful

Culture news This is the work of a genius! Here’s the trick that was used to make filming this Star Wars movie more peaceful

Star Wars is a monument of cinema. It is also one of the most famous sagas. With the first 6 original films, more than 9 billion in box office revenue was generated. The feature film series is therefore in second place among the most profitable sagas of the seventh art. In the 80s, given the enormous success of the first two Star Wars, the announcement of the 3rd feature film called Return of the Jedi caused a lot of noise.

In 1981, fans could therefore be tempted to discover the filming locations by any means possible to obtain exclusive information. Aware of this problem, the project team was concerned about possible overflows as well as potential leaks (if a person outside the production revealed, for example, the plot of the film). Howard Kazanjian, producer of Star Wars Episode VI finally had an idea to make filming more peaceful.

Watch Star Wars, Episode VI: Return of the Jedi on Canal+

The solution was simple but formidable. To hide the production, a false working title was used. This is how Blue Harvest was born, a so-called horror film with its own tagline “Horror beyond imagination”. Name taken from the novel Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett published in 1929 which notably inspired great films like A Fistful of Dollars by Sergio Leone.

Imagine what would have happened if we had said, “We’re making the next movie in the Star Wars trilogy”?

To make the ruse work, Blue Harvest was used on a whole bunch of products. “ When we shot Return of the Jedi in the United States, we called the film Blue Harvest. Camera boards, invoices, hotel reservations, sheets, production reports, team caps and t-shirts all had the Blue Harvest name on them says production supervisor Jim Bloom in a bonus disc of the 2004 Star Wars Trilogy DVD set. When a visitor asked “what are you photographing” and we responded Blue Harvest , he moved on. Can you imagine what would have happened if we had said, “We’re making the next movie in the Star Wars trilogy”? » explains Jim Bloom.

A technique that was finally unmasked

This strategy was notably used in California for the scenes which take place in the forest of Endor or in particular in Arizona. However, this technique was not foolproof. Doubt began to arise when Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher were spotted together at a local Del Norte County restaurant. And even worse since big fans ended up discovering the pot aux roses. Indeed, because of the typography of Blue Harvest which was the same as for Star Wars, around sixty fans refused to leave before obtaining autographs and photos.