Something that I hinted at in my post about Harmy and the Despecialized Editions was that the reason each and every Star Wars re-release negates the last one is due to a massive rumor that's circulated on the web ever since the web was invented for rumor circulation.
It's the rumor that George Lucas, or whoever gave the final say in the matter, voted that Lucasfilm permanently alter the original 1977, 1980, and 1983 theatrical cut negative film reels into the digital representation that became the 1997 Special Editions, thus permanently erasing the original cuts and removing them from history forever. FOR THOSE WHO DO NOT KNOW, a "negative" of a film is the name for a photographic film that will give images which have their colors inverted, after development. This inversion means that the complementary color is used. A second process (usually called making a print) is used to obtain any number of photos, which can also be in different sizes.
Let's think about this. Each original movie was shot on 35 mm film. The film reels had to then be translated and copied onto thousands of VHS tapes, LaserDiscs, Beta tapes and God only knows what other formats and sold those ways. The original film reels were no doubt stored somewhere on Lucasfilm's premises, or at the very least, the ILM or Skywalker Sound studios. Now, to take that film and decide "I would like to make an audio and visual upgrade for people to see" is a grand idea, and to go about that is very simple. You would hopefully take the original negative of the film, translate it into a digital format, and do all of your editing and other post-production fun to the digital recreation of it. However, you would then, again "hopefully", leave the original negative alone on its original 35 mm film reel and re-store it someplace safe in case of digital memory loss.
The rumor basically dictates that once Lucasfilm translated the original negatives of Star Wars, Empire and Jedi into digital format for the impending '97 Special Editions, they destroyed the film reels that contained the negatives and thereby proclaimed that the new editions would be the stand-in editions for the films themselves, not just Special Edition copies. By destroying said film reels, the '97 copies of the original negatives with the newly enhanced audio and visuals have become the de facto film editions of the original trilogy.
Alright, so first of all, I believe that to be a bold-faced lie, but let's take a step back and play both sides here. Let's first play the side of the people who don't believe that rumor and think it's false. It would be absolutely against any and all moral code to destroy the original negatives of Star Wars, Empire and Jedi, or to permanently alter them. Original negatives exist for the sole purpose of remaining as a back-up or a go-to unless post-production isn't going well and the producers wish to start over again. Permanently destroying them effectively erases the basic template you have to work off of and makes it very risky in case the file or film reel you're working on gets lost or damaged. If George Lucas wanted to destroy the original negatives, he'd have to go through a lot of Lucasfilm Ltd.'s top executives to get clearance I'm sure, regardless of himself being the CEO or Chairman of the Board. Preserving the original negatives acts a safe, "restore point" for all post-production endeavors. If the movie's out and people have seen it, it serves as the central focal point on which their love or hate of the film resides. Either way, it's a pretty goddamn big important piece to the process of movie making.
Speaking of people George would have to go through in order to achieve the destruction of the negatives, I remembered 20th Century Fox. Yeah, how could we get the company that owns the distribution rights to the original trilogy? The way it's set up is thus: 20th Century Fox owns all of DISTRIBUTION RIGHTS, not the rights to the film...those are two different things. Fox owns Star Wars for the rest of time in what was a unique contract, but only owns Empire and Jedi until the year 2020. I'm very sure 20th Century Fox would object heavily to the destruction or permanent alteration to the original negatives. Releasing the original theatrical cuts on Blu-ray/DVD would be like printing your own money.
Now let's play the other side, and say IF George Lucas did in fact permanently alter or just destroy the original negatives entirely, there is no doubt in my mind he will go down as the most hated man not in just the Star Wars sense, but also from a filmmaking standpoint. You cannot responsibly destroy the film reels you shot your movie on without having a damn-well decent ethical reason for doing so, and in reference to Star Wars I don't know what that ethical reason could possibly be. Not only is that a completely irresponsible thing to do, but to your fans and possibly the cast/crew, it's totally an insult to the work you've done together, especially if you take out the work model builders and stop-motion animators did in favor of "CGI enhancements". It's also disrespectful to the art of filmmaking. The very foundation on which the creativity of filmmaking is founded is held in place by the belief that once you make something, you will want it to stand forever and have millions upon millions of people, generation after generation, view your work. Obviously, 35 mm cellophane film will not withstand the test of time, but many thousands of old 35 mm prints have been transferred seamlessly and without any alterations to digital files and stored on giant, wall-sized hard drives. I find it hard to believe that a film as culturally significant as Star Wars would not receive the same treatment. Lucas is trying to rewrite history simply because he's the only person in the world that didn't love the original theatrical cut of the film, and it's sad because he's the only one with power to change the movies.
Rumor also has it that the Library of Congress's National Film Registry, after selecting Star Wars as one of the first twenty-five films selected for preservation in 1989, was denied by Lucas repeatedly when they asked for the original archival print of Star Wars to preserve. Reportedly, Lucas sent them three different cuts of the film, including the '97 Special Edition, and all three were rejected by the National Film Registry. To my knowledge, the National Film Registry has yet to receive the archival print requested, and Lucasfilm has yet to offer up said print in an act of submission. The behavior being shown by Lucas and his company, if this rumor is true, is absolutely despicable and disgraceful. Your '97 fan edit of your own movie is not the film people fell in love with, not the film the Academy awarded seven Oscars to in 1978, and certainly not the film that captivated a generation of fans, future filmmakers, astronomers, physicists and other achieving people of promise.
So there you go. Either the negatives still exist and are now stored within Disney's famed Vault, a brand of Blu-ray and DVD releases that are released once for three weeks and then disappear forever in what is truly a top-notch shithead marketing strategy, or the negatives are lost forever and what we have are inferior 2011 Blu-ray cuts that we're stuck with and degrading VHS copies of the film we know and cherish. Either George Lucas knows what he's doing in regards to salvaging the original negatives and preserving them, or he's the biggest dumbfuck on the planet in letting them be destroyed. Will we ever know? Certainly Kathleen Kennedy, the current head at Lucasfilm, has knowledge of the whereabouts and status of these negatives, as does Bob Iger, the Chairman and CEO of the Walt Disney Company. Will they ever tell us?
One thing remains known and that's that George knows...
