The world is still a few months off from the release of the next Star Wars film, but we're hitting the rewind button in a big way next month, when Star Wars creator George Lucas' futuristic debut, THX 1138, comes to SBS On Demand.
THX 1138 presents a dystopian future in which citizens are medicated into blissful submission ("Are we happy and effective?" / "We are all now programmed for perfect happiness") and love is forbidden. LUH 3417 (Maggie McOmie), a disenchanted surveillance worker, consciously stops taking her mandatory drugs — medication that suppresses emotions — and gives placebos to her roommate, THX 1138 (Robert Duvall). Now free to feel, the two rebels fall in love, plot to flee the facility and make a short-lived bid for freedom.
Lucas adapted his own student film TO MAKE THX 1138, with the aid of producer Francis Ford Coppola. Once he hit it big with his iconic tale of those other rebels in a galaxy far, far away, he stayed true to his roots and buried references to his formative film all over the place (Fun fact: the film features the first utterance of the word "wookie").
THX 1138 launches at SBS On Demand on 1 June.
Watch the original trailer
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