For most cinephiles, yellow text on a black background takes them back to one place\u2014The Star Wars movies. Yellow prominent text crawling against the backdrop of pitch black and John Williams\u2019 score\u2014that\u2019s how the first Star Wars movie opened, which became the identity of the Star Wars movies. While the world was familiar with space stories in both comics and movies, Star Wars was the first of its kind space adventure on the silver screen. Thus, for Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope (1977), context was as important as the narrative. <\/p>\n
Voice-over<\/a> was an obvious choice to quickly bring viewers up to speed, especially kids for whom reading the moving text might be quite difficult, and so 20th Century Studios even tried to replace the text with a narrator, but director George Lucas wanted something different\u2026something that would also set the tone for the narrative visually. \u201cBut they\u2019re [kids] going to have to learn to read sooner or later. Maybe Star Wars will give them some incentive,\u201d was Lucas\u2019 defense for the crawling text, as he shared in J.W. Rinzler\u2019s book, The Making of Star Wars: The Definitive Story Behind The Original Film.<\/a> <\/p>\n In this article, we\u2019re examining the origin of the iconic Star Wars opening crawl, which begins with \u201cIn a galaxy far, far away\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n The Origin of Star Wars <\/p>\n It\u2019s no secret that Star Wars was inspired <\/a>by the legendary Flash Gordon comics series by Alex Raymond (1934-1947). Lucas had grown up on Flash Gordon, and after he became a filmmaker, he was eager to bring them to life on the silver screen; only he couldn\u2019t obtain the rights. Reportedly, Italian producer Dino De Laurentiis had held on to the rights till 1980. Lucas had even tried to talk it out, but was denied as Laurentiis\u2019 former collaborator was to direct the film. Lucas was disappointed but even more determined now to create a space opera of his own. Thus, the Star Wars franchise came into existence. By 1st August, 1971, Lucas had registered the \u2018The Star Wars\u2019 title at United Artists. <\/p>\n Right after finishing American Graffiti in 1973, Lucas dove right into the development of Star Wars, and after four years of sweat and blood and four completely different screenplays of the same concept, Lucas was ready to pitch his dream project. Lucas was always very open about his inspirations for Star Wars. In an interview with American Film<\/a> that was published in April 1977, Lucas said, \u201cI wanted it to be an adventure in space, like John Carter of Mars. That was before science fiction<\/a> took over, and everything got very serious and science-oriented.\u201d <\/p>\n Talking about the spirit behind Star Wars, he said<\/a>, \u201cAs a kid, I read a lot of science fiction,” Lucas recalls. “But instead of reading technical, hard-science writers like Isaac Asimov, I was interested in Harry Harrison and a fantastic, surreal approach to the genre. I grew up on it. Star Wars is a sort of compilation of this stuff, but it’s never been put in one story before, never put down on film. There is a lot taken from Westerns, mythology, and samurai movies. It’s all the things that are great put together. It’s not like one kind of ice cream but rather a very big sundae.”<\/p>\n About The Text<\/p>\n Before Star Wars, opening crawls were used in film series like Flash Gordon (the inspiration for Star Wars) and Buck Rogers. To be more specific, the opening crawl takes significant inspiration from Cecil B. DeMille\u2019s Union Pacific, where the opening crawl ran along a railroad track toward a vanishing point, as the main title sequence and credits. <\/p>\n The Essence of The Crawling Text And Its Journey To the Screen<\/p>\n The first time I saw the crawling text, it reminded me of the solar system (or space in a broader view). The dark, pitch black background covered in sprawling yellow text, that\u2019s as bright as a celestial object (read: the sun). Clearly, Lucas hit the bullseye. <\/p>\n An opening so iconic, but it wasn\u2019t perfect. In fact, a couple of renowned filmmakers and friends of Lucas extended their creativity to help him bring his vision to life. Reportedly, the rough cut was screened before a small group of filmmakers (also Lucas\u2019 friends) such as Steven Spielberg and Brian De Palma, Jay Cocks, Willard and Gloria Huyck, Hal Barwood, and Matthew Robbins. But the reaction was quite far from what Lucas had expected. <\/p>\n