Forty years ago, Star Wars opened in thirty-two US cinemas to an initial lack of fanfare.
It came here around Christmas... I might have seen it then, at three and a half. If not, I believe it was shown again, with “Episode IV” added to the opening crawl, a year later. I certainly have early issues of the UK reprint Star Wars comics, giant green rabbit and all, though they may have been handed down from my brother. And the toys, and... if I recall correctly... wallpaper.
I had definitely seen it before The Empire Strikes Back, which I remember seeing pretty clearly (with Black Angel in front of it, which I was relieved to discover really existed) while we were on holiday in the Highlands at my aunt Evelyn’s and spotted it was on in Aberdeen. (My mum went to the Beechgrove Garden instead.) I am similarly puzzled that the first ESB figure I got was a US import of Leia in her Bespin outfit.
I saw it again in a double bill with my dad a year or so later. By then I knew to close my eyes for the carbonite scene.
And then we saw Return Of The Jedi in the USA, which was a bit of an adventure in itself, as part of the summer I got appendicitis twenty feet from Mexico and a hundred and fifty miles from a hospital....
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