Those were great scenes, right? Just after Luke Skywalker asks Obi-Wan about The Force in A New Hope, and then Obi walks over to that chest, opens it and pulls out a nice cold bottle of ice-cold Cerveza Cristal. Or the time The Emperor used his Force Powers to pull a nice can of Cerveza Cristal into his hands during Return of the Jedi. You remember that scene, don’t you?

See, it really did happen. No, this is not some long-lost George Lucas special edition, nor is it a fan-made cut. This is genuine, well genuine as in, it was made by an official source. The story goes that, back in 2003 a TV channel in Chile (Channel 13) aired the original Star Wars trilogy and to avoid interrupting the films with ad breaks, they integrated ads for Cerveza Cristal (a very popular beer in Chile) into the films themselves. Exactly how many of these ads were made and cut into all three films is not known, but some say it was over a dozen. Only a few of those have been found so far and aside from the one above, there is the Obi-Wan one that I mentioned in the intro (please do click these links to watch). Another one with Obi turning off the tractor beam on the Death Star. Then there is this one with Luke and Yoda from The Empire Strikes Back.

It turns out that in 2004, George Lucas himself learned about these ads, and he filed a grievance against the Chilean Council for Self-Regulation and Advertising Ethics. Lucas won, and the ads were never allowed to be shown again. At least, not the Star Wars ads. Channel 13 and Cerveza Cristal did the same thing when other films were shown in 2004 including, American Beauty, Notting Hill and Gladiator. Sadly, none of these ads seem to have surfaced… yet. Which is a bit of a shame as I’d love to see Maximus deliver his “My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions and loyal servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife. And I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next”, to then reach for a cold bottle of Cerveza Cristal, with that catchy Cerveza Criiiiiistaaaaaaal jingle playing. Peak cinema!