Strange Stories

Star Bucks - Back in 1972, a young unknown film director, George Lucas, developed was working on a project for a film to be called American Graffiti. The budget was only $700,000. United Artists decided to back it - and then withdrew after the script had been completed. Then AIP refused to back it, as it was `commercially unacceptable'. Universal decided to reject it too - then relented at the last moment. American Graffiti became one of the highest-grossing pictures of all time. Following the success of American Graffiti, Lucas decided that his next project would be a sci-fi movie tentatively titled Star War. In spite of the success of his first picture nobody seemed interested, not even Universal. After months, Twentieth Century Fox decided to gamble some development money. But Lucas had to raise most of the money himself - all the other established film companies having rejected the film. When the film was eventually completed, Lucas was flat broke and dispirited - though he, rather than Fox owned the picture and the rights to any sequels. In the first four months after its opening in May 1977 Star Wars grossed £134 million. Receipts for the first year exceeded $300 million. In the year after it opened the sequel, The Empire Strikes Back, grossed a further $200 million.

If you want to read more stories like this, you will find them in the Greatest Mistakes category.