Ask Kershner which scene from Empire Strikes Back was the hardest to get right, and he doesn’t even have to pause to answer.

“The toughest shoot was the Carbon Freeze scene,” he says, referring to the infamous moment when Han Solo is sent to his doom, frozen in a carbon coffin by the villainous Darth Vader.

“The set was painted black,” Kershner recalls. “It was a round set but we couldn’t build the full circle because it would have been very hard to manipulate with the camera. So we built half of it, and it was a challenge because it was very hot and we were using lots of steam shooting out of the floor.

“Some of the little people fainted because they were closer to the steam. The staging was very difficult. The actors were about 30 feet off the ground and we had to be careful that they didn’t fall.”

That particular scene also became a bone of contention between Kershner and Lucas…