Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope: Special Edition [2004]

Random Trivia For This Title:

• Han and Luke "transfer" Chewbacca from cell block 1138, a reference to George Lucas' earlier film THX 1138. "THX-1138" was going to be the serial number of the guard with the faulty transmitter on the Death Star, but this was changed.
• "Vader" is Dutch for "father".
• The humorous moment when Chewbacca frightens a skittish mouse droid, was improvised on set and not scripted.
• Denis Lawson, who played Wedge Antilles (his name is misspelt in the credits as "Dennis Lawson"), is the uncle of Ewan McGregor, who plays Obi-Wan Kenobi in the three prequels.
• Darth Vader's breathing was originally meant to be much more labored and raspy. The sound of this labored, raspy breathing would be used later on in Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi after Vader has killed the Emperor.
• Peter Cushing found the boots that came with his costume extremely uncomfortable to wear because they were too small for his feet. Thus he only wore them in the few shots in which Tarkin's feet could be seen. In all other shots, Peter Cushing wore a pair of fuzzy slippers.
• The term "Moff", used to describe some Imperial characters (such as Tarkin) is used to mean a regional governor of a specific sector of space. Military officers can also be Moffs - Tarkin, for example, is listed in the script as an Admiral in the Imperial fleet.
• When 20th Century Fox attempted to distribute the film in the U.S., fewer than 40 theatres agreed to show it. As a solution, Fox threatened that any cinema that refused to show Star Wars would not be given the rights to screen the potential blockbuster The Other Side of Midnight (which ended up grossing less than 10% of what Star Wars did).
• The film was initially budgeted at $8 million but production problems forced the studio to contribute an additional $3 million.
• When the film was re-released in theaters after it became so successful, the Daffy Duck cartoon {Duck Dodgers in the 24-1/2th Century} was run preceding the feature at the request of George Lucas.
• To preserve the dramatic opening of the film, George Lucas insisted on moving all the credits to the end of the movie, thereby not intruding on the iconic opening crawl. The Directors' Guild in particular took issue with this, and demanded that Lucas, at that time a DGA member, follow Guild regulations and put the credits at the beginning or face a fine. Lucas kept the film as is, paid the fine and promptly resigned from the DGA after Star Wars' release.