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So that the CORVETTE SUMMER JEDI popularity can grow once again...

VANISHING POINT PERSPECTIVE

Got lucky with this vanishing point perspective shot... takes place right before the final standoff

Speaking of a VANISHING POINT, rest in peace to a great car movie director Richard Sarafian

P.S. LOTS OF INCREDIBLE CARS HERE

When in love you think you can see her just about everywhere...

Mark Hamill's Kenny Dantley is a young man, all alone... Well, pretty much... A stranger in a strange land... 

His only outlet being his journal, what we'll call The Incredible Journal, where he writes to his teacher back home: Expository narration providing a glimmer of hope with each... new... post...

Perched like a brooding gargoyle, Kenny writes to his teacher...

Dear Mr. McGrath,

I’ve tracked the Corvette to Las Vegas, Nevada… It’s here, I saw it… Someone probably won it in a card game… 

Betcha four to one I find it… Get it? 

Don’t worry about me, I won’t gamble… I don’t have the money for it… 

Goodbye for now, 

Sincerely, 
Kenny Dantley

THE TELL-TALE KEYCHAIN

Kenny Dantley says farewell to a caravan moving much too slowly

Mark Hamill's Kenny Dantley begins his road trip adventure, hitchhiking from Los Angeles to Las Vegas, which, by car, would take only three hours... 

Wandering the open highway, Kenny's first ride consists of a gang of slow-rolling Latino Low-riders headed by Isaac Ruiz as Tico, who played Freddie Prinze's buddy in CHICO AND THE MAN...

Tico the Low Rider has Kenny Dantley all figured out

Tico assumes Kenny is the type of standard white kid into Chargers, Camaros... And, he says with punctuating finality, Corvettes... 

Which surprises Kenny until he realizes that Tico had seen his Corvette keychain that, like the killer car itself, has a classic look and style all it's own... 

The cool blue keychain says it all

Mark Hamill as Kenny Dantley in CORVETTE SUMMER

THE IMPORTANCE OF SIGNS

Kenny Dantley about to head back home while the hot Corvette approaches

Heading quickly back to Los Angeles

Whether he's coming or going... Coming from Los Angeles to Las Vegas in search of his stolen Corvette... Actually the school's Corvette he built that was suddenly stolen... 

Or whether he's going back home... 

In either direction, signs play an important part in CORVETTE SUMMER... First the HAVE YOU SEEN THIS CAR sign at the gas station Mark Hamill's Kenny Dantley works... From here he's given a clue to travel to Las Vegas...

Kenny had his voice of colorful pens for the first sign

A real Las Vegas sign this time... and the chase is on

With a LAS VEGAS sign the adventure begins, but doesn't last very long... Soon enough he's got another sign, L.A. CALIF, until he spots her... 

No, not Vanessa... Nor the slightly older blonde babe who was gonna give him a ride in her red convertible, but the Corvette... 

And thus the adventure begins, all over again... 

This babe wanted to give Kenny a ride all the way back to Los Angeles... missed opportunity!

Jack Tripper's jerk boss from THREE'S COMPANY provides Kenny the catapulting clue

And before Kenny rescues Vanessa we can see two cool rats who will perform at the casino

GUARDIAN MENTOR GLOOM IN THE DESERT

Eugene Roche and Mark Hamill within the Vegas desert in CORVETTE SUMMER

Every lonely teenager needs a father-figure, especially if they don't have one... a father, that is. So an uncle, like Owen Lars (Phil Brown)... or an auto shop teacher/mentor, like Ed McGrath, makes up for the loss, but not completely...

In STAR WARS and CORVETTE SUMMER, Mark Hamill plays characters Luke Skywalker and Kenny Dantley, both with surrogate working-class dudes that wind up... by either verbally thwarting progression or surreptitiously plotting a car heist... letting him down.

In scenes where Hamill feels the angst of youth combined with a lonesome melancholy, he's smack dab in the middle of the desert, be it the scorched planet Tatooine or Las Vegas, Nevada... 

Meanwhile, Uncle Owen and Ed McGrath lecture Luke and Kenny on basically staying put, compromising fate, and worst of all, putting dreams on hold... 

And in another desert far, far away is Phil Brown with Mark Hamill in STAR WARS

MARK HAMILL DELIVERS ON NIGHT GALLERY

Mark Hamill plays Francis the Messenger Boy in ROD SERLING'S NIGHT GALLERY

On Season 2 of Rod Serling's NIGHT GALLERY, a new fangled TWILIGHT ZONE during the early 1970's, MARK HAMILL appeared in an episode titled THERE AREN'T ANY MORE MacBANES as a messenger boy named Francis...

Darrell Larson plays a smug young man named Elie, but Hamill's character thinks it sounds more like a girl's name, and, after laughing, Elie asks what his name is... 

The tables turn when Francis realizes he too has a woman's moniker...

CORVETTE SUMMER VAN NUYS BLVD POSTER

Order this awesome CRUISIN VAN NUYS BLVD... This is not affiliated with this blog, only recommended

CORVETTE SUMMER JEDI WILL NEVER MOVE AGAIN

The Corvette Summer Jedi is here to stay...

"HEY BIG BOY, YA GOTTA LIGHT... SABER?"

Kenny realizes his Corvette is not in the Las Vegas showroom...

ANNIE POTTS AND MARK HAMILL

Annie Potts (Vanessa) stares at Mark Hamill (Kenny) with the look of love... What an actress!

18 AND LIFE: CORVETTE SUMMER TRIBUTE VIDEO

SHOTGUN DRIVER VOL ONE: ALBERT INSINNIA

Mark Hamill with Albert Insinnia as Ricci in CORVETTE SUMMER

Mark Hamill with Albert Insinnia as Ricci in CORVETTE SUMMER

 Albert Insinnia in ROLLER BOOGIE

TRASH COMPACTOR

In CORVETTE SUMMER there's suspense right off the bat. Once Kenny sees the car of his dreams, can he save it from the junk yard trash compactor? Wait a minute... A trash compactor. 

Does that sound familiar? Well it wasn't a new concept for MARK HAMIL who, in STAR WARS, nearly became a human scrape heap. 

THE VISION

Kenny Dantley (Mark Hamill) gets a vision that will change his life. While on a field trip to an auto junkyard, things were looking down for the bored teen until something drops from the sky. Newton's Apple's got nothing on a CORVETTE... 

This discovery alters Kenny's existence just like that hologram did for Hamill's Luke Skywalker in STAR WARS.

JUNKYARD BLUES

There's nothing better for an auto shop class than a visit to the local junkyard, right? The skeletons of vehicles being carried around by giant metallic arms and junk spread throughout the auto graveyard: the possibilities are endless for a car enthusiast... Especially one like Kenny Dantley (Mark Hamill), who, unlike his friends, has the knowledge and capability to build a car from scratch... Or droids!

"I have to get a Power Converter for my Corvette!"

Helplessly...

Searching for hope...

And moments before the frame of the Corvette enters his vision, thus changing everything, Dantley has an expression of a lost, vacant soul: a young man who hasn't found his way. Much like Luke Skywalker staring off at the double-suns of Tatooine, his niche has yet to be carved.

Please no smoking in...

The mobile junkyard...