While the film struggled to make an impact at the global box office, bringing in $392m against a budget of over $300m, Solo: A Star Wars Story has unjustly become a poster boy for unsuccessful Star Wars when in fact it’s a rollicking great adventure, a romp of a film that wears its heart on its sleeve while detailing the early life and career of Han Solo with engaging leads, incredible ILM visual effects and a soundtrack that stacks up against any of the great Williams scores. Famously, the original directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller saw the film very differently to Lucasfilm, who made the tough decision to replace them with Oscar-winner Ron Howard, and speaking with Vulture Howard remembers the situation as it stood when he came onboard.
“They basically said, ‘We’ve reached a creative impasse with Lord and Miller. Would you ever consider coming in?’ I looked at some edited footage, and I saw what was bothering them. There was a studio that liked the script the way it was and wanted a ‘Star Wars’ movie, but there was a disconnect early on tonally, and they weren’t convinced that what Phil and Chris were doing was working effectively.”
“I couldn’t judge that because I didn’t see enough of it to know. But they were sure. Once I said, ‘Okay, I think I can do this script, and I think I understand what you want of this script,’ they said, ‘We’d want to reshoot a lot.’ I looked at the whole movie and then pointed out some things that I thought were great. And Phil and Chris were incredibly gracious throughout that process. They were just seeing two different movies. So I came in, I had a blast, but there’s nothing personal about that film whatsoever. It’s still just a shame. I can’t wait for Phil and Chris’s next movie.”
