France was still using the guillotine when Star Wars came out

It sounds like a historical editing error, but the dates are exact. In May 1977, Star Wars premiered in the United States and kicked off the blockbuster era. A few months later, on 10 September of that same year, France executed Hamida Djandoubi at Baumettes prison in Marseille. By guillotine.

It wasn't some archaic exception: it was the Republic's official method of execution, the same one since the Revolution of 1789. While half the world queued up to watch lightsabers, a real blade was still falling in Western Europe.

It was the last time. France abolished the death penalty in 1981, after a celebrated speech by minister Robert Badinter, and the guillotine went straight from official use to the museum. No stage in between.

That's why this fact is so disorienting: we assume the guillotine belongs to the age of powdered wigs and carriages, when in fact it coexisted with bell-bottom jeans, synthesizers and the first film of a saga that is still releasing sequels.