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Ash Latest

Select April 1997

Ash watch the Star Wars Trilogy

Mark Hamilton is living life to the full. With a quality European lager in one hand and a plastic Jabba The Hut figurine in the other, the Ash bassist and Star Wars obsessive is reclining on a settee watching Han Solo being encased in carbonite during The Empire Strikes Back.

He's transfixed, as only an obsessive can be - but every now and again, he blurts out anecdotes that make his own Star Wars fixation seem eminentlely reasonable.

"When we were on tour in America, we met this real nutcase in Pheonix," he cackles. "He spent all night telling us how he used to see how many Star Wars figures he could stick up his arse" He reckoned he got the entire Jabba The Hut up there...."

Rick McMurray is not convinced. "There's no way," he states firnly. "But I suppose everybody needs a hobby."

Pop's most senior youth-side are gathered here tonight with space and science fiction on their minds. With a classy menu of four crates of lager, innumerable fags and prestige snacks, they're here - with lady-friends in tow - to watch every film of the Star Wars trilogy. As a band who've been photographed dressed as their Force-equippped heroes, hired the original Dart Vadar outfit for party hi-jinx, covered the Wars msuic on the B-side of 'Girl From Mars' and who kicked off their '1977' LP with the screeching dive on an imperial Tie-fighter, it's fair to say they're amply qualified to do so.

The original films, as if anyone needed reminding, are re-released this year with new scenes and supa-enhanced effects - and there's a new trilogy of prequels on the way, so the wrold-changing hysteria that greeted Star Wars may well be on its way back. In Ashworld, of course, it never went away. Their debut LP title had nothing to do with punk - it was the release year of...oh, you know. That only Rick was actually alive when Star Wars first came into creation is but negligible frippery.

"It never occurs to me that it's an oldish film made before I was born," Tim Wheeler reasons. "You can get excited by old music, or Shakespeare and shit like that without having been there first. It's just a cool fairy tale with loads of great hardware and battles. I dunno if I'm at the same level of obsession as Mark or Rick, but I grew up with it and I loved it and spent years playing with it. I can't wait to see the new versions, but the originals will do for now. Do I take it seriously? I did when I was wee."

"When we were four it was still in full swing," Mark protests. "It was actually getting bigger then. Everyone in school always had their Star Wars men with them. I lived my childhood through the peaks of the craze and when I got my toys out of the attic again I thought, 'Holy shit! There's some memories here. '"

Mark has turned up with a bag of Star Wars insider magazines, some paperbacks and an incomprehensible card game. Known for settling the 'Are the new figures inferior to the old-skool versions?' debate by playing with them all at once, he's a dedicated member of the global congregation of Star Wars heads. Put it this way: getting William Hootkins' character's name wrong (Red 6, as it happens) in his presence is a crime akin to treason. He may well be the world's number one Star Wars fan - an honour he's shruggingly prepared to accept.

"Well, he muses, "I have got a huge fuckin' collection of toys. And being in the band has given me the opportunity to spend even more money on it than ever before. I'd never spend all my cash on it, but it's a pretty high percentage, like 97 per cent. I don't even know why.

I don't see myself as a madman at all: there was a spell of about five years when I didn't watch the movies. But when I was about 14 I just sort of went 'hmmmm' when I got them on widescreen video. And then I started really liking them."

And so to tonight. Great pains are taken to create the correct cinematic environment in photographer Rip's Bermondsey lounge. The room is darkened and sealed. Pringles, beer and smoking mixture are easily to hand. The handsome surround-sound TV is carefully tuned.

"I swear to God I can't say how many times I've seen these films," Mark chortles. "In all honesty, it's got to be more than 200 times each. Nothing's ever got me like this. The X Files is pretty big, but I couldn't get fanatical about it. And I'm not into Star Trek or any of that shit.

Film one: Star Wars.
Plot resume: Doe-eyed farmhand Luke Skywalker has serendipitous meeting with R2-D2 and C-3P0 who convey 'Help me' message from Princess Leia. Then visits forgotten ninja hermit Obi- Wan Kenobi and commences anti-imperial struggle with reluctant aid of Han Solo and Chewbacca. Finally liases with rebel forces and launches decisive projectile to destroy Death Star. Cue awards ceremonies and tears all round.

State of Ash:
Worryingly sober

At l0.l7pm precisely, the 20th Century Fox fanfare sounds and Star Wars commences.

The evening's stereotypical Ash behaviour soon manifests itself. Mark reels off the names of numerous droids and irately identifies continuity gaffs. Tim grins, getting off on the simple entertainment value. Rick is clearly the one closest to the Dark Side: sat smoking and reciting the scrolling story-so-far, he visibly perks up when Darth Vader appears on screen.

" 'Tear this ship apart! '" he parrots. Mark recites all of Princess Leia's lines. And C3P0's. Tim tries to shut up this self-authorised narrator but ingrained habits from interminable on-tour viewing run deep. When the Jawas, the dwarf scrap-metal men of the desert planet Tattooine appear to take R2-D2 captive, the group recite their alien tongue as one. This is clearly a bonding process and meditation ritual as well as an interstellar slugfest.

Not surprisingly, one of Rick's specialities is remodelling dialogue to make it puerile. Thus, the feared Sand People become the Village People, and it's announced that 'Obi-Wan Kenobi' contains the word 'wank'. "Wilfrid Brambell [the dad out of Steptoe] would have made a good Death Star commander," he argues, referring to the large number of gruff British character actors on the Imperial side (Peter Cushing looking especially evil, takes the role of - and read this slowly - Grand Moff Tarkin). God knows what Carries Fisher, reputedly so drugged off her nut during shooting that she believed the action was real, made of that.

Back in space, the Death Star hovers into view.
"Someone should make a drug called Lightspeed," Mark suggests, apropos of very little. With the showdown between good and evil approaching, the worst line in the film is uttered: Harrison Ford can barely bring himself to say, "May the Force be with you" to flying ace Luke Skywalker. As the jubilant ending rushes forth, Rick claims Luke mutters 'Bastard' when Obi-Wan spookily tells him to, "Trust your feet."

Only McMurray's vocal admiration of Darth Vader's unnecessary willingness to get stuck into the battle detracts from the thigh-slapping celebration of the universe being saved at the last split-second. Mark glances disapprovingly at the evidently pro-Empire drummer and raises a fist as the Death Star is reduced to so much cosmic slag. The Dark Side representative responds with a resounding burp.

All that remains is for Mark to identify Luke's medal-receiving coat as "a yellow bodywarmer" and wipe away a tear as battle-scarred R2-D2 is seen restored to full health - and the Ash posse to ponder the gravity of what they have witnessed.

"That film's got the answers to the universe and life in it," Tim claims. "I like the way Empire... is a bit darker, but I remember thinking the first one was fuckin' full-on when I saw it first and I still do. When Ben says, 'You'll never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy...' about the Cantina, what a fantastic line! And I love that bit when Han Solo comes back right at the end. Yes! Spot on."

Mark, meanwhile, is impatient to get on. "Roll on the next one!" he gesticulates with a large gin and tonic. "Press play and let's get going."

Film two: The Empire Strikes Back.

Plot resume: Dark Side has now recuperated and invented startling new war machines (witness the Walkers). Rebel forces now taking refuge on frozen planet Hoth, where Luke ends up captured by gargoyle-faced ice monster. Escapes to seek advice from dwarfish non-human sage called Yoda (voice by same bloke as Muppet Fozzie Bear) and bravely seeks out Darth Vader. In meantime, Han Solo is being trailed by bounty hunters. Whole tangled plot leads to Bespin Cloud City, where Luke discovers Vader is his pater and loses hand, while life of Han Solo gets suspended in a Findus stylee. Leia and Luke then snog, but question remains: will the rebels ever recover?

State of Ash: Drunk,frankly.

At 12.52 am, we begin the second instalment. "This is the best film!" Tim announces, accidentally sitting on Select's plastic Millennium Falcon. Rick, not entirely surprisingly, is having trouble getting off the couch and thinking straight. "I must concentrate my mind, that's the scary thing. I have no choice - this is the best film."

When the recuperating Luke Skywalker, given a trouncing by a ferocious Wampa on the ice planet Hoth, gets a kiss with tongues from Princess Leia - who ends up being revealed as his sister - Mark is quick to dispel thoughts that George Lucas was some kind of perv. "Me and my sister do it all the time, he remarks airily. "Nothing wrong with it. "

Hmmmf. Mark continues his meditations with a seriousness Obi-Wan would approve of. It's only fitting, for this film - for, when the gargantuan battle with the Empire Walkers commences and Luke's Snowspeeder gets stomped on by a monstrous hydraulic foot, it becomes clear that the easily-digestible fairy-tale thrills of the first movie have been replaced by a far harsher agenda.

Mr Bronson from Grange Hill is one of the Imperial guys in this. That's an indication of how dark this shit is, Rick leers. "I'll believe anything right now.., where's that bastard ashtray gone?"

Mark is now growling along with Chewbacca. Tim leans anxiously towards the screen when the Millennium Falcon enters an asteroid field and nearly gets eaten by a deep-space beast. "Not many people can say they've gone in one end of a giant space worm and come out the other," he crows. Rick's undermining of The Force increasingly knows no limits. He even extends his criminal irreverance to Yoda, the Jedi Master. "Yoda - he's always in a bathrobe. He thinks he's Peter Stringfellow," he remarks, sounding worryingly like Peter Cook.

The film's real linchpin is Bespin Cloud City: a future-centric Manhattan that floats in space, where Han Solo gets frozen and all manner of criminal intrigue is played out. It's also where Luke has his climactic sabre-battle with Darth Vader - who turns out, in a twist worthy of Brookside, to be his dad.

There's an audible gasp when Vader goes down, and, though certain elements of the Ash party make trifling complaints about the improbable nature of events (about as valid as criticising a Bond film for a cunning escape, incidentally), the band hold firm as the finale comes.

"It's the middle segment," opines Rick, slipping into Baz Norman mode. "There are probably more classic moments in the first one, but I prefer this. It's more adult and story-based. There's a heaviness to it: everyone's double-crossing each other all the way through. In Star Wars the good guys win the strugle, but in this, Han Solo, a main guy, is frozen and taken away to his worst enemy. What's gonna happen to him? That's some cliffhanger,to make people wait three years to find out."

In the courteously-provided games room upstairs, Tim breaks up the cinematic sensory assault by playing Rebel Assault. "Ooh!" he shrieks. "I feel a Star Wars frenzy coming on the more pissed I get. It's deep - it's like religion, all the same themes are there, searching for the answers to life. And it could all be for real... heheheheh. You don't think about the ropey effects, put it that way Excuse me for a minute, anyway, I'm blowing things up."

Film three: Return Of The Jedi.
Plot resume: Infamous fatty monsta Jabba The Hut has frozen form of Han Solo. After disguised Leia thaws him out, both end up captive until rope-swinging Luke commences hard-fought liberation. Skywalker then completes Jedi training with Yoda, and asks ghost of Obi-Wan about Darth/Dad intrigue. Meanwhile, rest of gang link up with rebel forces for anti-Empire mission centred on colonised Ewok planet of Endor. But! It's a trap! Luke, having joined compadres, surrenders to Empire to save them but finds that it's a trap! Again! Death Star has been rebuilt and curtains looming for rebels. In amazing volte-face, with aid of Ewoks, rebels pull off original mission, facilitating complete Empire defeat and conversion of Vader to niceness. Mean while, Leia is revealed as Luke's sister, thus giving victory unseemly Nat/Georgia element. But never mind, eh?

State of Ash: All over the place.

A few ales and some crisps later, at the big hour of 3am, it's time to focus on the final part of the trilogy. Though tiredness and alcohol are turning this into a beer-splattered endurance test, things are looking tasty in the palace of legendary fatso bounty hunter Jabba The Hut.

There's a ripple of sniggering and applause when Jabba eats a live frog and licks his lips - Rick belches admiringly - and gasps as Luke does his Milk Tray man act and rescues Princess Leia. However, such top-drawer thrills are short-lived and thereafter it's slow-paced tedium on the leafy-glade Ewok planet.

"There's a real lack of pace here, Rick complains of this Beatrix Potter-esque diversion, having just returned from shouting his Uncle Hughie down the lav. "But imagine all the drugs you could get from alien planets... if the trade routes were there."

This segment marks a clear nadir, and a collective groan goes up at the sight of a baby Ewok. This race of dwarfish aliens were the collector's plate element of the trilogy's roll-call, and singularly failed to kickstart a mini-industry of oven-gloves and paddling pools.

Tim exhales wearily "This a far cry from Empire," he gripes. All this Disney Ewok shit: this is a fuckin' family movie. Top effects, though."

As it becomes clear that every rebel triumph means another Imperial officer being snuffed out by Darth Vader, Mark notes that Dave Prowse, the man-mountain who also portrayed the Green Cross Code man, was under the impression that his Rolling West Country Burr was to be the actual voice of The Dark Lord. "If only they'd kept it in," he snorts. "That voice would have made you shit yourself."

Rick begins to drunkenly rhapsodise. "God, Darth Vader. He dominates every scene he's in. He's the embodiment of evil, and he's fuckin' hard. A bad man, but cool as f**k. It'd be really great to be Darth Vader. It's total attraction for me [belch]. You could act like a complete bastard all your life and then re-join the good side! That destiny stuff, deciding between good and evil and following your own path, as you get older you read that element loads more...

Incredibly even Ash's Star Wars extremist has ended up taking the piss. C-3P0's constant refrain that he speaks six million languages gets the raspberry from Mark. "There should be a droid who can do six million funny voices," he ventures, before falling asleep with his Pierre Cardin jockey shorts clearly visible. Rick, meanwhile, is similarly insensible.

It is 5.15 am. Only Tim, the least fervent apostle, remains awake. "I think you have to watch all three films," he reasons, "Then it all makes sense - Obi-Wan had to merge with The Force, even though you feel gutted when he does. And you see there's still good in Darth Vader. They're all still there. I love the fate theme. I have a really romantic attitude to it."
"I'm down with Lobot," slurs McMurray, referring to a bit-part android as he is kicked awake. Tottering uncertainly to his feet, he has a go at kick boxing. "Tim, stop being weird!" he says inexplicably. Clawing his way back to reality, he manages a final verdict. " I'm kinda disappointed Darth returns to the good side of The Force. It's a sell-out. And you can see it coming. It's shit when he gets weak and stops being ruthless. A man of his stature! It's the fuckin' Ewoks' fault."
"There's a lot of people who followed the trilogy through who think Return Of The Jedi was inferior, Mark ponders. "But at the age I was when I saw it, which was very young, I thought it was f**kin' great and I still do. I can't say why it's so good. It's just the end of a huge heroic saga.

With the viewing over and Rick and Mark roused
from their comas, there's now intense soul- searching for the winner. Ultimately a two-thirds vote for Star Wars comes in, with a quisling point for Empire from Grand Moff McMurray.
For obvious services rendered, Ash have been invited to the premiere of the Star Wars Special Edition on 21 March, a date uncannily coinciding with Mark's 20th birthday. Aware of this mystic resonance, he has another go at articulating the vast appeal of George Lucas' techno-mythologising.
"It's a total adventure of good and evil, and it's mad," he stares. "Think about Luke. He goes off, leaves his tiny f**kin' wee home planet and goes off on this adventure into this universe he didn't even know existed. He doesn't have it easy, there's trouble along the way, but he takes it all on and he wins.., there aren't any other films that come close."

It must be damn strange, Select ventures, being called Mark Hamilton, standing just three letters away from cosmic synchronicity with the bloke who played Mr Skywalker.
"No, Mark lies, following Tim, Rick and girlfriends out into the darkness and the waiting taxis. "But at school I said the 'ton' bit quieter than the rest. Maybe I've made this whole thing up for myself, but you watch it and hear the theme music it's like.., when I met Princess Leia on a plane in America, right, I wasn't thinking, 'There's Carrie Fisher'. It was her I went up and said 'Please sign this, Your Highness.' That's how powerful it is."

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