The long-lost short film that accompanied The Empire Strikes Back is striking back — 33 years after its release.
Roger Christian's 22-minute film Black Angel played before the 1980 Star Wars sequel in theaters throughout Europe and Australia. After its release, the short was sent to the archives, but the storage space the copies were held in eventually closed. Since the film was never released on VHS or DVD, it was believed to be lost all together.
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That is until December 2011, when an archivist at Universal Studios found a tin labeled "Black Angel," Ars Technica writes. Nearly two years will have passed between the film's discovery in December 2011 and its rerelease later this year at the Mill Valley film festival, in George Lucas' home county of Marin.
Christian debated whether the old-school special effects in the short were of the quality where it should be shown again. Ultimately, he decided he couldn't deny the fans who had waited for it for so long.
Christian wrote the script, about a medieval knight who falls into a parallel universe and must rescue his maiden from the Black Angel, while he was in film school. The idea went from script to a film with a $50,000 budget and 11 cast and crew members.
Even though Black Angel doesn't feature any Star Wars characters, fans have considered the film a part of the Star Wars collection. George Lucas viewed and approved the film before its theatrical release.
After months of restoration, the film will be shown Oct. 13 at the Mill Valley Throckmorton Theatre as part of Northern California’s Mill Valley Film Festival.
Before Black Angel, Christian won an Academy Award for Best Art Direction for his work on the original 1977 Star Wars. Since 1980, he has directed movies such as Battlefield Earth and Underworld.
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