A healthy return on the Jedi
As the Skywalker saga concludes it’s worth checking your loft for Star Wars memorabilia, the prices it will fetch could surprise you
I’M NO film critic. I’m not even sure I’ve seen all the Star Wars films. So, I’m not judging the latest and last that brings the 42-year-old franchise to a finale. Pukka critics meanwhile, mostly described the movie as “mediocre” – a B+ where all the others rated got A or A-.
Box office takings seem to bear that out. On opening weekend, The Rise of Skywalker took $175.5 million. Analysts had predicted $200 million. No doubt it will go on to gross billions, though.
All that aside, collectors and dealers quickly spotted a lucrative market. The amount of money that has changed hands for Star Wars memorabilia over the years probably equals that of several of the blockbusters.
The pinnacle thus far peaked at a staggering $185,850 (£141,890) paid last November for a prototype figure of the rocket-firing bounty hunter Boba Fett.
According to auctioneers Hake’s of York, Pennsylvania, there had been two versions of the toy. One had a firing slot resembling a backward letter “L” and a rarer type with a J-shaped slot design.
Only around 100 J-slot prototypes were made, and of the 20 or so that have survived to date, most show damage sustained during manufacturer Kenner’s forms of stress testing, which involved heating and freezing. Index marks on the underside of the recordbreaking figure’s feet showed it had undergone the tests but had survived unscathed.
Boba Fett and the same auctioneer set the previous record for a Star Wars toy with the $112,926 paid last July for an L-slot rocketfiring prototype.
The figure was unveiled at the New York Toy Fair in 1979 as part of the Empire Strikes Back range of memorabilia, but it was subsequently dropped owing to safety concerns over the toy’s rocket-firing mechanism and the cost of manufacture.
The final production figure came without the troublesome projectile but is itself a rare collectors’ item.
An example, still sealed in its plastic bubble-wrapped packaging, owned by a Japanese seller, sold in an online auction last October for $2,229.99 (£1,700.85).
Even top people’s auctioneers Sotheby’s has recognised the money-making power of memorabilia generated by the Star Wars franchise.
In an online auction last month the only known example of a cast fibreglass and resin C-3PO helmet painted in metallic gold doubled its £15,000-25,000 presale estimate to sell for £56,250, plus buyer’s premium.
It was produced by Industrial Light and Magic, the visual effects company founded by George Lucas, for the promotion of The Return of the Jedi, the final film made in the original Star Wars trilogy in 1983. It came from the private collection of a former ILM employee.
Whether or not it was ever worn by actor Anthony Daniels, who has played C-3PO in all the movies since 1977, was not known.
The chance to own a real lightsaber came during an online auction held by Prop Store in London that ended last October.
Made for actor Mark Hamill to wield as Luke Skywalker in A New Hope (1977) and offered with a letter of authenticity, it fetched £120,000.
It was given to the son of the managing director of Elstree Studios after it had been discarded once filming was completed.
A dent in the metal plate at the end of the emitter suggested that at one point an attempt was made to weld a blade onto it.
Several of the lightsabers from the first films are now missing, and this was believed to be one of the few original Luke Skywalker props still in existence.
Collectors with less deep pockets have plenty to keep them happy. For the space-conscious (no pun intended) the huge range of models and action figures has kept children of all ages amused for decades.
For every frighteningly expensive rarity, there are dozens that cost pocket money.
My choice would be movie posters – particularly those designed by Manchester artist Tom Chantrell – a visually exciting way to pay homage to the heroes from a galaxy far away, so long as you have sufficient wall space large enough to display them.
Chantrell, born in Ardwick in 1916, produced the artwork for posters promoting a panoply of memorable movies from The King and I (1956), through many of the Hammer House of Horror scarers to Carry On comedies to that memorable image of actress Raquel Welch in One Million Years BC (1966).
However, undeniably his finest work was for the British release of George Lucas’s 1977 blockbuster starring Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, David Prowse, Peter Cushing, and Alec Guinness, who all featured in the design. No other poster captures the excitement and adventure of the film and it is said to be Lucas’s favourite.
Interestingly, Chantrell was 20th Century Fox’s second, or even third, choice to produce the artwork. The American artist Tom Jung (b.
1942) was hired to create a poster for the U.S. but Lucasfilm considered it “too dark” for the British audience.
Next, the American twin brothers
Greg and Tim Hildebrandt
(b. 1939) were commissioned and their poster was issued to UK cinemas for the opening run. However, it was produced using drawings of the characters and it was subsequently decided the poster should depict the actual actors, so the second version was discontinued in favour of Chantrell’s replacement. He died in 2001. Surrey auctioneers Ewbank’s sold a copy of Jung’s poster for £550, the Hildebrandt replacement for £4,200, while Chantrell’s version sold for £900 (all prices plus premium) last December.