THE DAM BUSTERS INTO STAR WARS

TVO (TVOntario) played the classic 1954 British war film The Dam Busters again last night. It seems that every time they play it I sit myself down to watch a film I have seen many times. Last night, or very earlier this morning, rather, I actually did not watch. Part of this reason is that a few days ago I heard that a new remastered version was released to selected cinemas and DVD in Britain (back in September of last year). Maybe this new print was struck off the original negative as opposed to a projection print; which is what the source probably was for the version that has been around for years. (Or maybe it was an dupe negative of a lower quality; see bottom of posting for answer.)

I await its North American release.

Someone has edited a nice video where they integrated the visuals of The Dam Busters with the audio track from Star Wars (the original). The title is, no surprise, Dam Wars. I have been well aware at the influence that the war film had on George Lucas and his Death Star attack scene; with 633 Squadron (1964) as another big influence. But I was amazed at how well this integration worked.

Trivia time: Gilbert Taylor, the British cameraman who shot Star Wars, was the visual effects cinematographer on The Dam Busters. Also, Stuart Freeborn did makeup work on both films. Small world... Universe.

My father flew on Lancasters (the featured bomber in The Dam Busters) during WW2 and he liked the first Star Wars film -- he would have gotten a kick out of this short.

Check out Dam Wars...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NMfBKrdErY&NR=1

There is also a clip of the first Dam attack from The Dam Busters...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCRIsjJFRNo&feature=related

Here is how this war film was restored (the answer to my above question)...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/08/28/ndam128.xml