Star Words: Episode IV, Part 17
Jul. 11th, 2019 01:33 pmConsidering it contains the word "war" in its very title, Star Wars has never really been about gratuitous violence. The films are, after all, created with children as their primary audience. Although horrors such as torture or brutal murder might be referenced, they occur offscreen. The point is not to portray the actual act but to show its aftereffects, the emotional echoes of aggression. So rather than offering a gruesome visual of the genocide on Alderaan, we cut immediately to Obi-Wan's reaction. From his response we recognize the sheer enormity of Tarkin's awful deed, a massacre so tremendous that the very Force shudders in its wake.
"As if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror...and were suddenly silenced."

This single sentence conveys the horror and tragedy with perfect, almost poetic brevity. Obi-Wan's body language, as well, is powerfully illustrative. He staggers, touches his heart and his head as if they throb with the reverberations of death and cruelty. A Jedi has great gifts, but they come with a price. Anyone's suffering is your own suffering, resulting in pure, unfiltered empathy. Perhaps that is the key to quelling all aggressive instincts. When you feel someone else's pain, how could you ever raise a hand against them?
This moment is echoed (or perhaps the other way round, depending on your chronology) when Yoda senses the aftermath of Order 66, making similar gestures to Obi-Wan's. There is also the use of emotional response in place of gratuitous violence when Anakin's assault on the younglings is cut short to show Padmé weeping. We don't need to see it. We need to feel it.
Next, the words of a hardened skeptic...
"As if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror...and were suddenly silenced."

This single sentence conveys the horror and tragedy with perfect, almost poetic brevity. Obi-Wan's body language, as well, is powerfully illustrative. He staggers, touches his heart and his head as if they throb with the reverberations of death and cruelty. A Jedi has great gifts, but they come with a price. Anyone's suffering is your own suffering, resulting in pure, unfiltered empathy. Perhaps that is the key to quelling all aggressive instincts. When you feel someone else's pain, how could you ever raise a hand against them?
This moment is echoed (or perhaps the other way round, depending on your chronology) when Yoda senses the aftermath of Order 66, making similar gestures to Obi-Wan's. There is also the use of emotional response in place of gratuitous violence when Anakin's assault on the younglings is cut short to show Padmé weeping. We don't need to see it. We need to feel it.
Next, the words of a hardened skeptic...