A Disturbance in the Force
Steve Kozak & Jeremy Coon / United States / 2023 / 86 min
A wildly entertaining deep dive into the Star Wars film everone tried to forget, but which refused to die and has grown to become the ultimate cult favourite: The Star Wars Holiday Special.
Calling all Star Wars fans! You probably already know that a long time ago in a distant galaxy, a special Star Wars film was made, about which the film’s creator and director George Lucas has said that if he had the time and a hammer, he would find all copies of the film and destroy them. The story is that in 1978, Lucas was persuaded to milk the astronomical success of the first Star Wars film ‘A New Hope’. So it was decided to make a TV version of the film’s universe for CBS – a Holiday Special – with all the Star Wars stars, but without Lucas as director. The only problem is that it ended up being so unbelievably terrible that Lucas and everyone else involved wanted to erode it completely. Through archival footage, clips from the film and fresh interviews with members of the production team – and with a host of Star Wars fans such as Seth Green, Kevin Smith and Weird Al Yankovic – the entertaining and absurd story of the failed sci-fi musical unravels.