@@kimleechristensen2679 to quote James Berardinelli . But, like all great craftsmen, Lucas has managed to fashion this material in a manner that not only honors the original sources, but makes it uniquely his own. Hacks rip off other movies; artists synthesize and pay homage to their inspirations. Compare to and the difference will become apparent.
Admittedly I was a bit worried people would think I was making fun of the bravery of the original pilots, which of course I wasn't - I was satirizing the similarities between two films. I have the utmost respect for any pilot who would fly a bomber low above a river right into enemy fire, all while targeting a bomb.
This epic mission of Sq. 617 has been the greatest inspiration for first attack on the Death Star, so this footage can be considered just as a tribute, i think.
+blackjac5000 I recall seeing a collection of storyboards from the original Star Wars, not long after the movie came out. One pair from the collection showed a Zero chasing a Mustang over a tropical landscape, while the adjacent drawing showed a TIE fighter chasing an X-wing over the Death Star. Same positions and perspective. The SW production crew never tried to hide the copying; in a way, it was a tribute to the dramatic impact of the visuals in the original movies.
+BillThompson1955 If Star Wars was a tribute, it should have been marketed as a tribute. After seeing some other videos, is anything about Star Wars original???
momthree789 The music and Chewbacca's lines were original. Star Wars is far from the first movie to copy from other sources. When Kurosawa's friends told him that "The Magnificent Seven" was a rip-off of "Seven Samurai," he laughed and said "Do you know how many Westerns I ripped off to make 'Seven Samurai"?" The difference is that Kurosawa was brilliant. (When I saw SW in 1977, my first thought was that the credits should have read "based on James Schmitz's 'The Witches of Karres.'")
I love how when the guy says "we should be able to see it by now" there's a shot of the navigator looking at his chart! This parody is complete from start to finish!
This was a great movie. I remember watching it on TV as a kid. I think the pilot in the lead plane is Richard Todd. And back at their headquarters, the civilian is Michael Redgrave. Really thrilling movie.
Jane Sellman :- That civilian is Barnes Wallis, the inventor of the swing wing jet, the 6 ton Tallboy and the 10 ton Grand Slam deep penetration earth quake bombs which penetrated the U boat pens, sank the Tirpitz and destroyed many other reinforced targets
Great stuff!Lucas has admitted to being inspired by WW2 dogfights and used actual combat footage in the place of unfinished effects during a test screening of S.W.I`m sure he had Dambusters and 633 Squadron in mind when he made the trench sequence.
Only thing missing is Baron von Vader in his Stuka fighter saying "I have you now young Brit-talker" and a heroic American pilot named Solo saying "You're all clear kid! Now let's blow this damn dam and head for home!"
Excellent work, sir! Dambuster's is one of my fave films, and I've always noted the simularity. Not long ago I was lucky enough to see it at the cinema and brought a mate along who's a big Star Wars fan but hadn't seen the film before. He was left comically open-mouted at the end - "That was essentially the Death Star run!" - My fave bit - "Luke, you've switched off your targetting computer!" (Officer drinks tea nonchalantly.) Shame Star Wars didn't have tea drinking dude.
Yep, that is the best YT video I've seen so far! Well done! And I don't find it at all disrespectful of the Dambusters raid - it is just comparing the film-making process of two different movies!
I'm pretty grateful it got 100,000 views, which I completely didn't expect. Like I said in the commentary for it, I only made it because I was bored one Saturday night.
This is a work of art! Don't need to remake the Dambusters anymore! Thank you from a fan of both movies! P.s. Just like in Star Wars where Red Squadron has a pilot who was played by a British actor called Dennis Lawson the Dambusters actually had an American pilot called Joe McCarthy!
Luke and his uncle Obi-Wan Kenobi walk into a bar to get passage off Tatooine, a desert planet. They meet a spaceship captain with a dubious past who is torn between indifference and morality but agrees. They get past the imperial soldiers and take off in the space ship. In Casablanca, Ilsa and Laszlo walk into a bar to get papers to allow them to leave the city (in a desert region) from the proprietor of the bar whose past is dubious, Rick Blaine (H Bogart) who is torn between love and morality. Morality wins. They get past the German troops in the city and eventually take off in an airliner. Round up those directors who are usually suspected of making reference to other movies in their movies.
Brilliantly done, I wouldnt say any of it was in bad taste, the film was a great memorial to those who lost their lives that day and this is excellent, I'm sure those who served would have found it funny as well.
@MechaGojira00 Basically I put the trench run sequence into WMM, then cut it up by each individual shot, separated the audio, and put in video from The Dam Busters over each shot. If you watch (or listen) to the "Commentary" I did for it in the video responses, I explain a lot of how I did this.
Well done sir!!!! I knew of the connection but you made it perfectly clear just how close they were to each other. Reminds me a bit of "633 Squadron" as well, which was itself inspired by Dambusters.
I remember this movie from the same times that it was first shown on tv. because as us kids were watching, my father came in and said the dam bastards? And we said no the dam busters. and to see it in this light of the post star wars era, it was done with a the same frame of mind the last time i saw this movie. thanks for the memory and the parallel conection in my consciousness.
Actually, it's not just clever, some of it is quite inspired. The bit where Obi Wan Kenobi is telling Luke to "feel the force" is conveyed quite brilliantly with Richard Todd's facial expression beneath the mask changing as he hears the voice. Indeed, it is quite amazing how so many films have that type of premise and the same types of scene. Didn't Lucas admit that the Deathstar attack was somehow inspired by the Dambusters?
I know where you're coming from Judge, but you're wrong on Spielberg - I saw an interview with him marking his 60th Birthday a while back, he cited 'The Cruel Sea' and 'The Dambusters' as two of the best war films ever made. You have to understand that it's the Sutdios (Fox, Paramount etc) who make films which are 'All American' because they believe that's the only audience and that's what they want!
There are some definite similarities besides scene composition. The part where the pilots read off their call-signs to let the leader know they're on cue is very similar to both Star Wars and the Dam Busters. Although you could argue that's just how a military unit would have done it, again the style of film making and the use of it is similar to both the films.
This is GREAT. Thanks for getting the clip from this classic old movie. And BTW, just in case anyone complains about the tracers from the light flak looking "Hokey" I have it on VERY good authority (a guy who flew Lancs in WWII) that light flak looked exactly like that....
Brilliant stuff there Henry - 5 stars. When the 1st Rough Cut of Star Wars was made in 1977, Lucas didn't have any of the Death Star/Trench Run sequence completed, so he spliced in bits of The Dambusters and Battle of Britain to make up the final combat sequence. Even when the final footage was completed, the influence of Dambusters is still there in the film.
I am a huge star wars fan, and am always happy to see some of Lucas' roots. So yeah lots of Kurosawa films, other sci fi influences like Dune and Foundation and everything Joseph Campbell wrote. So this just adds to it. Thank you. Gave you 5 stars!
I understood Star wars trench run was based on the movie 633 squadron (and influenced by dambusters) would be interesting to see starwars with 633 squadron soundrtrack and Ron Goodwin's music!!
YOU DID THIS? YOURSELF??? OMFG!!! THIS IS HANDS DOWN THE FUNNIEST dam (hehe "Dam") thing I have ever seen on UA-cam. Funnier even than Chad Vader! Anyone who knows the upkeep missions AND Star Wars will fall out of their chairs at this. My hat is off you you man! Wish I had thought of this.
I didn't even know you had done something like that until after I uploaded this. It was inspired after I had seen it with my parents and told them how I had heard many people compare Star Wars to it. I wouldn't say I "copied" you, since you weren't the first to compare the two.
Excellent made Henry! :) Couldn't stop laughing... the sounds were so awkward combined with the film but then again it fit so perfectly that it's almost scary.
One of my neighbours was an RAF navigator during the war and had friends killed on the Dambusters Raid and on the successive raids the survivors were sent on thereafter. Real war, where soldiers don't get up when someone shouts 'cut'.
Lucas and steven spielberg were big on taking WW2 and making movies or plots around it ..Like the two AAA gun towers on the dam same as the Laser Cannon towers on the death star "StormTroopers" ..Watto Long bent nose slave dealer that talks yiddish> Jewish? ewoks short had there land taken over by the empire> Chinese had there land taken over by the Imperial empire of Japan.. Jabba the hut Big fat slob that sat around and made orders to everyone not caring if his own men die ..(Luke falls in the trap door with 2 guards to the monster below) = Russians I.E. Stalin ordered His troops to fight Germans with or without guns and if they ran away from the German lines he had a reserve line to shoot any russian troops falling back and label them as cowards ..There are sooo many of these But its too long to list
Beautiful piece of work! By the way, I'd never heard of The Dambusters before, or of the whole story behind it... Just happened to find my way here after it was mentioned in an episode of the British version of the sitcom "The Office". Am eagerly looking for to Peter Jackson's remake. Anyway, thanks so much for the creative work.
Ha ha, glad you enjoyed it. Unfortunately there weren't any fighters going after the Lancasters (well, FORTUNATELY for the RL guys) so I had to edit out Vader.
Very cleverly done. Good job. It raises the question; what element is most important to making an interesting movie scene? Is it cinematography, editing, pacing, or screenplay? Because all of those elements are in you video, and it's as gripping as the original of both films.
Two of my favorite movies. For all the technology, some things about combat are forever the same. Big difference though, the men who died in that WW 2 raid really died.
the Deathstar attack has got bits from three ww2 movies in it that I've seen, the Dam busters "I see about ten guns, some in the fields and some on the towers" and others. 633 squadron for the trench run. and Guns of Navarone for that final set of shots dotted around the death star preparing to fire before it explodes at the last moment. :)
![REVISITED Battle of Yavin | A New Hope (1977) [Revisited, DeEd, Blu-ray, Puggo]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/m2iiQuGn-oM/mqdefault.jpg)
Lucas even took dialogue directly from this script. "How many guns would you say?" "I say about 20 guns, some on the towers, some on the surface."
"lost Harry, lost Hutch" - Hutch was Hutchinson in the Dambusters, a radio operator.
Not just that
You should see it by now
"I reckon you should be able to see it by know"
You mixed the two movie quotes.
Fields not surface; In Dambusters.
How many guns do you see Gold 5; Star Wars.
😉😉😉
@@kimleechristensen2679 to quote James Berardinelli . But, like all great craftsmen, Lucas has managed to fashion this material in a manner that not only honors the original sources, but makes it uniquely his own. Hacks rip off other movies; artists synthesize and pay homage to their inspirations. Compare to and the difference will become apparent.
Admittedly I was a bit worried people would think I was making fun of the bravery of the original pilots, which of course I wasn't - I was satirizing the similarities between two films.
I have the utmost respect for any pilot who would fly a bomber low above a river right into enemy fire, all while targeting a bomb.
I would have said more Squadron 633 than The Dambusters, but probably I am not the first... :-D
This epic mission of Sq. 617 has been the greatest inspiration for first attack on the Death Star, so this footage can be considered just as a tribute, i think.
Of course those pilots didn't have laser guidance systems and smart bombs available to them, or they would have made full use of them.
MrHarvester82 indeed it was, it’s mentioned in a Star Wars doc. It’s almost plagiarism tbh lol almost
@@AdmiralAckbar. James Berardinelli summed it up. Hacks rip off. Craftsmen synthesize material and make it their own. Lucas did the later and it shows
The Star Wars sequence must surely owe more than a little to the final reel of the film "633 Squadron".
+QuorkEx I suspect Y-wings were inspired by Mosquitoes. TIEs are definitely Zeroes. Perhaps X-wings are Spitfires, if not P-51s?
+QuorkEx I suspect Y-wings were inspired by Mosquitoes. TIEs are definitely Zeroes. Perhaps X-wings are Spitfires, if not P-51s?
+blackjac5000 I recall seeing a collection of storyboards from the original Star Wars, not long after the movie came out. One pair from the collection showed a Zero chasing a Mustang over a tropical landscape, while the adjacent drawing showed a TIE fighter chasing an X-wing over the Death Star. Same positions and perspective. The SW production crew never tried to hide the copying; in a way, it was a tribute to the dramatic impact of the visuals in the original movies.
+BillThompson1955 If Star Wars was a tribute, it should have been marketed as a tribute. After seeing some other videos, is anything about Star Wars original???
momthree789 The music and Chewbacca's lines were original. Star Wars is far from the first movie to copy from other sources. When Kurosawa's friends told him that "The Magnificent Seven" was a rip-off of "Seven Samurai," he laughed and said "Do you know how many Westerns I ripped off to make 'Seven Samurai"?" The difference is that Kurosawa was brilliant. (When I saw SW in 1977, my first thought was that the credits should have read "based on James Schmitz's 'The Witches of Karres.'")
I love how when the guy says "we should be able to see it by now" there's a shot of the navigator looking at his chart! This parody is complete from start to finish!
I don't think it's a paradoy
It's not a parody though
A fine tribute to some very brave young men, some of whom never got any older. RIP.
This was a great movie. I remember watching it on TV as a kid. I think the pilot in the lead plane is Richard Todd. And back at their headquarters, the civilian is Michael Redgrave. Really thrilling movie.
Jane Sellman :- That civilian is Barnes Wallis, the inventor of the swing wing jet, the 6 ton Tallboy and the 10 ton Grand Slam deep penetration earth quake bombs which penetrated the U boat pens, sank the Tirpitz and destroyed many other reinforced targets
Great stuff!Lucas has admitted to being inspired by WW2 dogfights and used actual combat footage in the place of unfinished effects during a test screening of S.W.I`m sure he had Dambusters and 633 Squadron in mind when he made the trench sequence.
Impressive... most impressive
As a fan of both films, (20 years+) I give you a big WELL DONE!!!! Thanks for a new look at a classic.
Great to have the sound back on this video - it's an absolute gem!
Only thing missing is Baron von Vader in his Stuka fighter saying "I have you now young Brit-talker" and a heroic American pilot named Solo saying "You're all clear kid! Now let's blow this damn dam and head for home!"
I love both movies and this is very clever and fun. Congratulations!
Lucas was heavily inspired by WW2 air combat films for the space batles so I'm not surprised this works so well.
Excellent work, sir! Dambuster's is one of my fave films, and I've always noted the simularity. Not long ago I was lucky enough to see it at the cinema and brought a mate along who's a big Star Wars fan but hadn't seen the film before. He was left comically open-mouted at the end - "That was essentially the Death Star run!" - My fave bit - "Luke, you've switched off your targetting computer!" (Officer drinks tea nonchalantly.) Shame Star Wars didn't have tea drinking dude.
Yep, that is the best YT video I've seen so far! Well done! And I don't find it at all disrespectful of the Dambusters raid - it is just comparing the film-making process of two different movies!
Very good, it's funny seeing the Dambuster's film against the Star War's one extremely similar in action I would say.
May the Royal Air Force be with you!
I'm pretty grateful it got 100,000 views, which I completely didn't expect. Like I said in the commentary for it, I only made it because I was bored one Saturday night.
amazing work
brilliant
You know, that bomb is not much bigger than two meters . . .
(gad I am such a nerd)
We have one at East Kirkby. The same size as the original
This is a work of art! Don't need to remake the Dambusters anymore! Thank you from a fan of both movies!
P.s. Just like in Star Wars where Red Squadron has a pilot who was played by a British actor called Dennis Lawson the Dambusters actually had an American pilot called Joe McCarthy!
Well done, very enjoyable. Thank you.
Ha ha ha! I was half-expecting the Praxis effect at the end!
Ten years later, still a fine tribute to two classic movies.
Look at Wallis' wife hair in The Dam Busters. It might have inspired Princess Leia's.
More like Chewbacca.
No. The inspiration for her hair comes from Mexican revolutionaries.
one of the coolest videos i have ever seen...great editing.
This is brilliant, I'm laughing all the way through.
Great job
Luke and his uncle Obi-Wan Kenobi walk into a bar to get passage off Tatooine, a desert planet. They meet a spaceship captain with a dubious past who is torn between indifference and morality but agrees. They get past the imperial soldiers and take off in the space ship.
In Casablanca, Ilsa and Laszlo walk into a bar to get papers to allow them to leave the city (in a desert region) from the proprietor of the bar whose past is dubious, Rick Blaine (H Bogart) who is torn between love and morality. Morality wins. They get past the German troops in the city and eventually take off in an airliner.
Round up those directors who are usually suspected of making reference to other movies in their movies.
“Remember, the RAF will be with you…always.”
There are are a lot of these so called 'funny' mixes on youtube but this is the exception. It's well edited and very funny. Excellent job.
Brilliantly done, I wouldnt say any of it was in bad taste, the film was a great memorial to those who lost their lives that day and this is excellent, I'm sure those who served would have found it funny as well.
Remember Luke, the Force will be with you always.....the Royal Air Force that is.......
@MechaGojira00 Basically I put the trench run sequence into WMM, then cut it up by each individual shot, separated the audio, and put in video from The Dam Busters over each shot. If you watch (or listen) to the "Commentary" I did for it in the video responses, I explain a lot of how I did this.
Well done sir!!!!
I knew of the connection but you made it perfectly clear just how close they were to each other. Reminds me a bit of "633 Squadron" as well, which was itself inspired by Dambusters.
Well done Henry, I enjoyed all three films, Star Wars, The Dambusters and yours. Thanks, you get a DFM...Damn Fine Movie.
An absolute ripper of a video. The editing is great and the dialogue fits perfectly. Bloody well done.
This was really well done. The selected shots were perfect for each section.
Class, good job you've done there, two of my favourite movies of all time.
Excellent the (Royal Air) Force was with you
I remember this movie from the same times that it was first shown on tv. because as us kids were watching, my father came in and said the dam bastards? And we said no the dam busters. and to see it in this light of the post star wars era, it was done with a the same frame of mind the last time i saw this movie. thanks for the memory and the parallel conection in my consciousness.
Excellent. Best thing I've seen on youtube in a long time.
Man... even hearing the audio from this SW scene makes me smile, even after so many viewings. This video is dead-on though.
I love how you synced the R2D2 sounds with shots of the bomb aimer - laughed my arse off.
Truly wicked. I never considered just how similar these elements of those two films are until I saw this.
Oh! mygod!!!! that was absolutely masterful, a work of genius.
Actually, it's not just clever, some of it is quite inspired. The bit where Obi Wan Kenobi is telling Luke to "feel the force" is conveyed quite brilliantly with Richard Todd's facial expression beneath the mask changing as he hears the voice. Indeed, it is quite amazing how so many films have that type of premise and the same types of scene. Didn't Lucas admit that the Deathstar attack was somehow inspired by the Dambusters?
This video most definitely deserves its rating but it also deserves exponentially more views! This is brilliant.
Star war is unreal and dambusters is history.
How do you know?
I've been saying this for years but the young ones have never seen this classic great.
Superb.
And I love the comparison between R2 and the navigator/bombadier
I know where you're coming from Judge, but you're wrong on Spielberg - I saw an interview with him marking his 60th Birthday a while back, he cited 'The Cruel Sea' and 'The Dambusters' as two of the best war films ever made.
You have to understand that it's the Sutdios (Fox, Paramount etc) who make films which are 'All American' because they believe that's the only audience and that's what they want!
There are some definite similarities besides scene composition. The part where the pilots read off their call-signs to let the leader know they're on cue is very similar to both Star Wars and the Dam Busters. Although you could argue that's just how a military unit would have done it, again the style of film making and the use of it is similar to both the films.
Outstanding. Masterful editing prowess.
superb! epic!bloody brilliant piece of editing work!
This is GREAT. Thanks for getting the clip from this classic old movie. And BTW, just in case anyone complains about the tracers from the light flak looking "Hokey" I have it on VERY good authority (a guy who flew Lancs in WWII) that light flak looked exactly like that....
Thanks for that. Just finished watching some clips from Dam Busters and found this - very very funny! Nice job.
Brilliant stuff there Henry - 5 stars.
When the 1st Rough Cut of Star Wars was made in 1977, Lucas didn't have any of the Death Star/Trench Run sequence completed, so he spliced in bits of The Dambusters and Battle of Britain to make up the final combat sequence. Even when the final footage was completed, the influence of Dambusters is still there in the film.
The force is strong with you HenryvKeiper! Awesome! Made my evening! lol
I am a huge star wars fan, and am always happy to see some of Lucas' roots. So yeah lots of Kurosawa films, other sci fi influences like Dune and Foundation and everything Joseph Campbell wrote. So this just adds to it. Thank you. Gave you 5 stars!
This is great man. EPIC WIN! awesome job dude!
I understood Star wars trench run was based on the movie 633 squadron (and influenced by dambusters) would be interesting to see starwars with 633 squadron soundrtrack and Ron Goodwin's music!!
Cool! Good to see that he made a considerable cotribution to our success!
That was beyond outstanding. Well done.
The use of Red Leader's scream with the look on that Bombardier's face was hilarious as well.
THAT WAS BRILLIANT
Loved both movies
3:30 the" use the force Luke" transition to resolve is quite majestic - well done :)
YOU DID THIS? YOURSELF??? OMFG!!! THIS IS HANDS DOWN THE FUNNIEST dam (hehe "Dam") thing I have ever seen on UA-cam. Funnier even than Chad Vader!
Anyone who knows the upkeep missions AND Star Wars will fall out of their chairs at this. My hat is off you you man! Wish I had thought of this.
...May The Royal Air Force be with you.....
I didn't even know you had done something like that until after I uploaded this. It was inspired after I had seen it with my parents and told them how I had heard many people compare Star Wars to it. I wouldn't say I "copied" you, since you weren't the first to compare the two.
This is a slice of editing genius. I haven't been so amused in a long time.
Excellent made Henry! :)
Couldn't stop laughing... the sounds were so awkward combined with the film but then again it fit so perfectly that it's almost scary.
This makes me chuckle! Love it!
Oh, that was such a hoot! Now let's see what can be done with Dr Stangelove!
3:36 - 3:49 I love how the music and Obi Wan’s voice perfectly fit the scene
Also John Williams used many British composers themes.
Amazing. Extremely well done sound edition!! In fact, seen now, Star Wars is a complete copy to that Dambusters raid!
One of my neighbours was an RAF navigator during the war and had friends killed on the Dambusters Raid and on the successive raids the survivors were sent on thereafter. Real war, where soldiers don't get up when someone shouts 'cut'.
The audio reminds me of Airplane, where the jet made noise like a B-25, only the opposite. Well done.
Lucas and steven spielberg were big on taking WW2 and making movies or plots around it ..Like the two AAA gun towers on the dam same as the Laser Cannon towers on the death star "StormTroopers" ..Watto Long bent nose slave dealer that talks yiddish> Jewish? ewoks short had there land taken over by the empire> Chinese had there land taken over by the Imperial empire of Japan.. Jabba the hut Big fat slob that sat around and made orders to everyone not caring if his own men die ..(Luke falls in the trap door with 2 guards to the monster below) = Russians I.E. Stalin ordered His troops to fight Germans with or without guns and if they ran away from the German lines he had a reserve line to shoot any russian troops falling back and label them as cowards ..There are sooo many of these But its too long to list
Dam it indeed...Nice splicing! Can't stop smiling!
I'd say the original Dambuster survivors who lived to see "Star Wars" would have been flattered by the comparison :)
Beautiful piece of work!
By the way, I'd never heard of The Dambusters before, or of the whole story behind it... Just happened to find my way here after it was mentioned in an episode of the British version of the sitcom "The Office". Am eagerly looking for to Peter Jackson's remake.
Anyway, thanks so much for the creative work.
Ok, this was totally brilliant!
fuck knows how you worked out or even thought of combining these 2 great movies but the result is brilliant
Absolutely brilliant! It also REALLY makes me want to see "Dam Busters." I know the story but have never seen the film. Masterful editing job, buddy!!
Ha ha, glad you enjoyed it. Unfortunately there weren't any fighters going after the Lancasters (well, FORTUNATELY for the RL guys) so I had to edit out Vader.
I feel a disturbance in the dam
"Luke,you've switched off your targeting computer!!" yeah that would be the stick with two nails in each end would it?Brilliant!
The Star Wars Death Star attack is basically the script from dam busters with the visuals from 633 squadron. I love all 3.
Heavy Inspiration.
Spot on Vogonford - is a well known fact that the battle sequences in the first star wars film are largely based on the 1955 Dambusters Movie
Thank you for letting me see the footage. I stand corrected. But did you check Dr. Strangelove as well? Just asking?
Well done. Tremendous job of work!
Very cleverly done. Good job. It raises the question; what element is most important to making an interesting movie scene? Is it cinematography, editing, pacing, or screenplay? Because all of those elements are in you video, and it's as gripping as the original of both films.
His computers off, Luke, you switched off your targeting computer what's wrong, nothing I'm alright
This is awesome....thank you so much!!!!! Haven't laughed this much in ages!
Two of my favorite movies. For all the technology, some things about combat are forever the same. Big difference though, the men who died in that WW 2 raid really died.
Hi Henry. You are hereby inducted into the ranks of the Mad Buggers. Great work ;0)!!
Well, Star wars was made after the shadow of WW2, so I'm certain it was inspired by it, at least the use of fighters are concern.
Yea, I agree.
the Deathstar attack has got bits from three ww2 movies in it that I've seen, the Dam busters
"I see about ten guns, some in the fields and some on the towers" and others.
633 squadron for the trench run. and Guns of Navarone for that final set of shots dotted around the death star preparing to fire before it explodes at the last moment. :)
Superb piece of editing!