Mos Eisley Spaceport

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You will never find a more retched hive of scum and villainy… and deleted scenes.

THE ORIGINAL JABBA

1639In the original script of Episode IV, Jabba the Hutt and Han Solo were supposed to have a confrontation in Docking Bay 94. This scene was filmed but dropped for the theatrical version. Later on, it was restored and updated for the Special Edition, complete with a digital Jabba.

The scene was originally shot with a Jabba stand-in named Declan Mulholland in a funky fur vest. According to several interviews, George Lucas is quoted as saying he had always intended to matte in or layer a puppet/stop-motion creature of some sort over the actor during post-production. (Sadly, Declan Mulholland, who was a popular character actor in the UK, passed away in July of 1999.)

Fans were delighted to finally see the scene included in the Special Edition using digital technology to overlay the original stand-in with the Jabba we all know and love…sort of. He was a little “thinner” and looked a bit different to most people’s eyes. Many people complained about the substandard visuals and Jabba was updated yet again in a later video release.

Take a look at the scene in the Marvel Comics adaptation. I guess George Lucas and his crew had never actually gotten around to designing the final creature version of Jabba, so when it came time to draw the comic, the artists had no visuals to refer to. It looks like they (or George) selected a random alien from the cantina (who you can see very well in the alternate cantina footage from the Lost Cut) and used him as Jabba for the comic.

In an IGN interview with Gary Kurtz, the Producer shed a little more light on the reasons this scene was originally deleted:

IGNFF: I’ve heard different stories. One was that it was never intended to be in the film, that it was just a let’s see if we can do this, and replace it later. The other school of thought was, it was always supposed to be there.

KURTZ: Well, the original idea was that it was supposed to be there. It is in the script … but it was a guy, a human being, this sort of fat guy… looked a bit like Sydney Greenstreet… and the scene is pretty much, I mean dialogue wise, it’s exactly what you see in the Special Edition. But it was a person that was there, and we had technical difficulties with that scene. We shot it over three times for camera problems, focus problems, and film stock problem, and then abandoned it because we ran out of time. We just said, “Well, the bulk of the information that comes across in that scene, about Jabba threatening Han Solo and wanting his money and all of that, we could get across in the scene in the Cantina, with Greedo.” It’s basically the same kind of information. So we just added some bits to the Greedo scene to make it a little bit longer that gets across that information, and then jettisoned that other scene. This all happened while we were shooting. It wasn’t done in the cutting room.

IGNFF: So it was made at the time of shooting, that the decision was basically made that that scene would be excised.

KURTZ: Yes, because of the focus problems, and it was slightly redundant anyway because some of the information was already in the Greedo scene – so why not make all the information in the Greedo scene and eliminate the Jabba scene altogether? That’s what happened.

151 152 153 154 155 156 157 Declan Mulholland

Click to downloadClip of the Original Jabba scene from the documentary From Star Wars to Jedi.
Click to downloadFan made clip of the Original Jabba scene re-edited together by JediSluggo and Brad.
Click to downloadFan made clip of the Original Jabba scene re-edited by Garrett Gilchrist.

Fan-Assembled:

LOST CUT BITS

The Lost Cut of Star Wars was a rough assembly of the film that very few people have seen. It contains many scenes and shots left out of the final film and the special editions that followed. The included bits here are from the Lost Cut. You can read more about in in the Star Wars Insider magazine, Issue #41.

The Mos Eisley overlook is technically more of a “Behind the Scenes” shot and nothing to get excited about, but why not include it here. It’s the original shot of Luke, Ben and the droids looking over the cliff at Mos Eisley Spaceport. Obviously, the spaceport was to be added in later.

The little guy is NOT Flash Gordon, although I suspect that’s where he got his moniker. While the stormtroopers are searching the city for the droids, this little guy known as “Flash” can be seen running underneath the legs of a tall creature. He runs right at the camera and escapes the tall guy. This quick  shot can also be seen in the Star Wars Holiday Special from 1978 in the sequence called “Life on Tatooine.” You’ll also see a few other shots in that sequence including stormtroopers, Mos Eisley citizens, and more.

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Click to download “Life on Tatooine” from the Star Wars Holiday Special

 

GARINDAN & THE STORMTROOPERS

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The picture included here is not technically a “cut scene” but more of an alternate angle.

It’s a still photograph from the scene in the film where Garindan tells the stormtroopers to head over to docking bay 94 to find those elusive droids they’re looking for.

In the final  film, you only see a close-up of this shot but here’s how it probably looked on the set while they were filming it.

 

SELLING THE LANDSPEEDER

3132We all know that Luke sold his landspeeder after striking the deal with Han in the cantina, but we never really saw the whole deal go down. In the film, we only catch the tail end of the sale where a frustrated Luke gives in and complains about the XP-38’s being more in demand.

There are some images that seem to imply that an extended version of this scene may have been filmed. While there may have been some early dialogue written, this seems to have been removed from the script.

In production notes from a meeting on January of 1976, it was decided that the “Speeder Dealer” would only be seen in a long shot from across the street.

The photos included give us a better look at the ugly alien and speeder dealer  named Wioslea who buys Luke’s speeder.According to the book Star Wars Chronicles, she runs a used speeder lot called “Spaceport Speeders.”

176 177 178 Selling the Speeder 179

 

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