I Am Your Father

This documentary is a nice enough retrospective on the history and legacy of veteran British Hammer Horror film actor David Prowse, the actor who filled the dark shape of Darth Vader in the original trilogy of Star Wars films.

However, the documentary teases throughout a particularly fanboy mind-blowing scene in which the director of the documentary allows Prowse to reprise the penultimate scene in Return of the Jedi in which Darth Vader, who lay dying, removes his mask and reveals his face to his son Luke for the first time.

In the original film, Sebastian Shaw played the face of the man behind the mask, much to the chagrin of Prowse. The director of this documentary teases that he has reshot this scene with Prowse restored to the role of the dying Vader, and very nearly shows part of it, but cuts away before fans are treated to what they have dreamed of seeing since 1983.

Given that Disney allows fan films to be made in the Star Wars universe, and that Lucasfilm has had a long history of doing so, showing this to the world would cost the director nothing. Granted, Lucasfilm did not give permission, but Lucasfilm doesn't give tacit permission to anyone who asked to do something specific with the Star Wars universe if there is a profit involved. For a not-for-profit cause, such as just showing the clip to all of us fanboys really want to see the scene, it would cost them nothing. All it does is tease your interest all the way through the credits, hoping you will see it in this documentary.

Spoiler warning: you don't.

The producers had a great idea: find an irrelevant person that is well known in disguise and sell lots of tickets to the freak show in which we reveal you "the real person". Unpleasant way of presenting a human being, but the makers of this movie have to make a living too. It turned out freak show was the only part the producers were interested into.

Darth Vader is a character created by Lucas. The script was written by several script writers. The costume was designed by two other people. There were several people manning the costume even if we restrict ourselves for the sake of argument to the original series. The voice is someone different. The stunts are done by a totally different person. The sounds were made by the special effects team. And the dishonest producers want the audience to believe their guy IS Darth Vader. They even bring in talking heads to say something about the acting. Acting? A human clothes hanger moving a big costume around? Not only that, but the world owes him recognition for his what? The guy got paid for his work and it was not charity.

Sure the man was upset for not getting a bigger part. It's human. And the ego in every one keeps pointing out "you're the main character". But in this spirit why not make a documentary called "I Am the Janitor on the Star Wars set". Oops! Even the Star Wars name was out of reach for this production team.

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I'm amazed by the low ratings and unkind reviews this documentary gets. It seems a lot of people didn't get from this documentary what they wanted, which is indeed different from what I felt the makers intended.

It's not only about 'the actor that played Darth Vader' or 'the man behind the mask', it is about a man who has worked six years on a job and did it extremely well, but who, till this very day, was not given the chance to finish his hard work to his own satisfaction, dictated by misunderstandings and prejudice with his employer. It is about how everybody sees this man deserves rehabilitation and recognition but does not receive it from his former employer.

Every good documentary has a story line: it has a starting point, often posing some sort of goal, a middle part where it is attempted to reach that goal, often with the introduction of a new set of problems that need to be solved first, and finally a conclusion, where the goal is achieved or where the gathered information raises new questions.

The dissatisfaction that you might feel about this particular documentary didn't come from the makers, it is just part of the story they tell. I might not be happy with the conclusion, but I am very happy I got to hear this story.

There's some intriguing info and interviews in here if you don't know much about David Prowse.

However... The filmmaker inserts himself as a main character, which is kind of annoying, especially since he obtained some GREAT interviews from a variety of people close to the Star Wars franchise...including Prowse himself. Those interviews could've carried it just fine had that been the agenda.

Another small inconvenience (on the Netflix version anyway), there were no built-in subtitles for the two brief scenes that are completely in Spanish.

If you can get past those minor annoyances, it is otherwise decent.

Despite featuring some wonderful interviews and archival footage, I Am Your Father is ruined by the film-maker's senseless insistence on inserting himself into the film.

The film has a fascinating story at its heart - that of David Prowse, who played Darth Vader in the original Star Wars trilogy and remained remarkably unrecognizable despite playing one of the most iconic characters in all movie history.

Yet the central story - that of David's all too human journey and disappointment - is elbowed out of the way so the film-maker can indulge in some wish fulfillment.

While I understand the temptation for the film-maker to become his story, particularly given Star Wars' place in the Pantheon, the Michael Moore approach weakened the film and turned what should have been a richly poignant piece into just another ho-hum documentary. Pity.