Elstree 1976 - Dietro le maschere di Guerre stellari

Track down a group of people who aren't famous but millions of people would give their right arm to have been in 1976 and interview them. In case you hadn't realised it these people had parts large and small in the original mega smash Star Wars. How fascinating it would have been then to hear their stories about being on the film, how they got into it, what role they played, their memories of the life changing moment... instead what we get is way way too much waffle about their mostly uneventful lives. I'm 10 minutes in and not heard one interesting thing. The opening sequence has the great idea of introducing the interviewees with their action figures but because the 1970s action figures look nothing like the people who played them you gave no idea at all who or what they did... except 'Dave' of course. 20 minutes in now and still nothing interesting or even Star Wars related. I'm going to skip through the rest in the hope it picks up. Ok. 25 minutes in, things start to get a bit more relevant. Someone starts to talk about Elstree. Let's see how this goes. Now we might actually find out who these people are. Anecdotes are starting. The first 25 mins was just a waste of time. False start I'm afraid 27 minutes and we're back in the realms of obscurity and nothing much to tell. Hang in Dave's just said he got invited to lunch with Alec Guinness and George Lucas. Ok I think you get the point. This is slow paced and not very imaginative film making. It could have been 60 minutes long, but probably stretched out for financial reasons. I could have made a much better movie than this if I'd had the access. We have Greedo... not heard anything from him interesting. We have an XWing pilot. Nothing interesting heard yet. Storm Troopers... tales of smoking breaks and their reluctance to be called in to shoot because there was a heatwave in 1976. 30 mins in starting to get some stories now. And so it goes on. What I'd say to conclude is that the film is mostly just underwhelming... not many interesting stories and the people telling them mostly could not be bothered to take part when they were there. But it still makes you wish you could have been one of them. Watch from the 30 minute mark and save 30 mins of your life.

The timing of this movie couldn't be better. With The Force Awakens hype at a feverish pitch, this nostalgic look back at the stories of ten individuals whose acting jobs during the summer of 1976 forever changed their lives. No one knew it at the time, but this American Sci-Fi project they were hired for would go on to be one of the highest grossing franchises in the history of cinema. While none of these actors has found worldwide success in film or had their life cut tragically short, Elstree 1976 is a touching story about their common brush with fame as pioneers in the Star Wars universe. If you're a fan of the 1977 classic, you will love this film. If you're not a big fan, but appreciate a great character driven documentary, this would also be for you. There is enough here to keep everyone happy as we travel back a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away

I'll make my review of this film short and sweet and without much care to finesse the details. I usually like documentaries about people, and a movie about the extras of Star Wars should have been right up my alley. Unfortunately, the film focused on the lives of few extras, some of whom were interesting and some of whom were not. I found a few of the anecdotes of working on the actual film or conventions amusing but there was an awful lot of rambling on by people who I could care less about. I could care less about some guy playing squash with Kiera Knightly's father, or about the guy who had a backache and ended up taking too much Valium. While I often find the stories of regular people interesting,this put far too much focus on people telling mundane details of their lives and careers. A better movie would have been made by interviewing more people and including more interesting details, or alternatively, to follow the lives of one who had a particular unique story or path of this life. You might like this if it covers one of your very favorite favorites, but if you want something more than just filler, i don't recommend it.

Interesting story from original Starwars actors stories on set and how they give back signing autographs for fans and when I went to a celebration the Stars I met had great stories to tell.

Actors and extras reminisce about their time on the set of "Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope" (1977) and how making the film affected their lives.

My interest in this film is that i believe in celebrating the "men in suits", the actors who are important to film but do not get the recognition. Although I am not a "Star Wars" fan (blasphemy!), I appreciate the role that Greedo plays in the series, as well as Darth Vader and Boba Fett. As one actor points out, there are action figures... you may not know the actor's name, but you have him immortalized in plastic! Die-hard fans might like the film. I found it interesting, but it didn't add a whole lot to the understanding of the "Star Wars" franchise, and even if it did that might not mean as much to me. I was interested in the convention angle. I am shocked how much people pay at conventions for a signature from an actor who had a small part decades ago, and was already paid for that part. (Going to annual horror conventions, I am certain many of the actors make more on signing fees than they ever did as actors!)