Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent

Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens: How Harrison Ford injuring his ankle improved the film

'When Ford got injured — which was a very scary day — we ended up having a few weeks off'

Jack Shepherd
Thursday 21 April 2016 04:21 EDT
Comments

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

While filming Star Wars: The Force Awakes, Harrison Ford managed to injury his ankle, delaying work on the film and leading to rumours of re-writes.

Thankfully, Ford was back flying the Falcon after just two weeks, giving director JJ Abrams just enough time to improve the script, mending the broken chemistry between Rey and Finn.

“When I was on the set of the Millennium Falcon and we started to do work with Rey and Finn, the first time we did it, it didn’t work at all,” he told an audience at Tribeca film festival, as noted by Uproxx.

“It was much more contentious. I didn’t direct it right. It was set up all wrong, and when Harrison Ford got injured — which was a very scary day — we ended up having a few weeks off, and it was during that time that I really got to look at what we had done and rewrite quite a bit of that relationship.

“So when we came back to work again, we actually just reshot from the ground up, those scenes. It was an amazingly helpful thing to get these two characters to where they needed to be.”

Abrams is likely talking about a segment on the Millennium Falcon in the film, the one where Finn and Rey have a little argument over where to head next. For those who don’t remember the film so vividly, it is the part where BB-8 gives Finn a thumbs up. It is quite easy to see how, if not written correctly, that scene could have been more contentious than playful rivalry.

In other Force Awakens news, the film has been released on DVD and Blu-ray, angering UK fans as the deleted scenes are not included on the DVD.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in