Yep, I've done it again… here it is, more than a month since I saw it and I've yet to post anything about the last Star Wars film? God knows, you've all been waiting to hear what I think about it, right? (Of course, waiting this long lets me get away with talking about the ending and not worrying too much about yelling "SPOILER ALERT"… but I figured I might as well put it in anyway.) So, without further delay…
(Frankly, part of the reason for this is that this film just feels more cohesive than the last two. There's less filler and more story. In Entertainment Weekly's recent Star Wars coverage, they spoke with Lucas and he acknowledges that 60% of the story he wanted to tell in the prequels ended up in this third film. All I can say, George, is it shows.)
The fall of the Jedi. I have to admit that, for once, George Lucas actually managed to get an honest emotional reaction out of me. The betrayal of the Jedi scene, with Jedi marching into battle only to have the clones, under Palpatine's command, turn on them and shoot them in the back, actually packed some emotional heft. (Yes, saying this is probably the truly geekiest I've ever felt in my life, but what can I say? It worked).
Humor. Yeah, the logic might be lacking, but I'll also cop to enjoying the humorous moments early on in the film. The last two films have been so damn ponderous and serious that, clunky or incongruous as they may be, the light moments early on really helped to make this feel more like the Star Wars films I remember, rather than the Star Wars films I want to forget.
This is one of those moments that reveals one of the traps of pure digital characters. When an actor makes a decision like this—"hey, it'd be really cool if this guy walks with a limp!"—he's got to justify it somehow. (Well, at least the good actors do.) And a good director would demand it of the actor. Here, the only one making the decisions is Lucas, (a man who freely admits he's more comfortable working with the visual end of things) who figures it'd look really cool if they gave Grevious some deformities (instead of the rigid, military stance of the character as it appears in the Clone Wars cartoons). And visually, it's fun. But it sure as hell makes no sense!
"You were like a brother to me!" Obi-Wan's tearful outburst during the climactic lightsaber battle simply falls flat on its face. From the school of "show, don't tell", George, where the hell has this relationship been during the last two films? Sure, in Episode I, the kid's a bit young, and he and Obi-Wan don't meet till nearly 2/3 of the way into the film. But at NO point have I ever seen anything in their relationship that says brotherly. Much as he obviously cares for Anakin, Obi-Wan is the mentor and Anakin the student. So don't throw this sad attempt at an emotional hook in at the last minute and expect us to buy it.
Anakin's Darth Vader look. Yes, it's the moment we've been waiting years for, but all the lifts and padding in the world couldn't hide the fact that Hayden Christensen simply can't fill Darth Vader's shoes, in the purely physical sense. His moment of angst as he comes off the operating slab was mercifully short, but he still looked like someone playing at filling out the costume. Sorry Hayden.
But how much more interesting would it have been if, instead of the Emperor lying to Anakin about her death and telling him that she died of the wounds he inflicted, what if he actually was responsible? I mean, what's the point of Palpatine lying about it if there's no payoff (as we know there isn't, as Vader never learns any of this in the final three films)? What if she were allowed to die as a strong character who faced up to the man who betrayed her and her ideals and her love, and paid the price for it. Isn't that stronger than "she died of a broken heart"?
(continued in "Episode III, part 2")
Things that worked
The overall story. From the beginning-of-the-end of the Republic and the betrayal of the Jedi to the revelation of the soon-to-be Emperor's real schemes and Anakin's fall to the dark side, the pieces of the mythology that we've been waiting 30 years to see are finally all here. And, for the most part, they work. Sure, there's the typical George Lucas clunky dialogue and oft-times incongruous jabs at humor (but don't knock it… at least he attempted some humor in this one!). But in the end, I have to say I liked it.(Frankly, part of the reason for this is that this film just feels more cohesive than the last two. There's less filler and more story. In Entertainment Weekly's recent Star Wars coverage, they spoke with Lucas and he acknowledges that 60% of the story he wanted to tell in the prequels ended up in this third film. All I can say, George, is it shows.)
The fall of the Jedi. I have to admit that, for once, George Lucas actually managed to get an honest emotional reaction out of me. The betrayal of the Jedi scene, with Jedi marching into battle only to have the clones, under Palpatine's command, turn on them and shoot them in the back, actually packed some emotional heft. (Yes, saying this is probably the truly geekiest I've ever felt in my life, but what can I say? It worked).
Humor. Yeah, the logic might be lacking, but I'll also cop to enjoying the humorous moments early on in the film. The last two films have been so damn ponderous and serious that, clunky or incongruous as they may be, the light moments early on really helped to make this feel more like the Star Wars films I remember, rather than the Star Wars films I want to forget.
Things that didn't work so well
General Grievous. What the hell is up with an asthmatic, Dracula-shambling droid? Even assuming that he was human at one point and ended up in a droid shell (a kind-of precursor to Darth Vader), why the hell would it be a crippled droid body? It might be more interesting visually, and you get to milk that Saturday morning serial vibe that Lucas has been wallowing in for decades, but this one pushes suspension of disbelief right off the edge as I sat there wondering, in every scene the damn thing showed up in… "why?"This is one of those moments that reveals one of the traps of pure digital characters. When an actor makes a decision like this—"hey, it'd be really cool if this guy walks with a limp!"—he's got to justify it somehow. (Well, at least the good actors do.) And a good director would demand it of the actor. Here, the only one making the decisions is Lucas, (a man who freely admits he's more comfortable working with the visual end of things) who figures it'd look really cool if they gave Grevious some deformities (instead of the rigid, military stance of the character as it appears in the Clone Wars cartoons). And visually, it's fun. But it sure as hell makes no sense!
"You were like a brother to me!" Obi-Wan's tearful outburst during the climactic lightsaber battle simply falls flat on its face. From the school of "show, don't tell", George, where the hell has this relationship been during the last two films? Sure, in Episode I, the kid's a bit young, and he and Obi-Wan don't meet till nearly 2/3 of the way into the film. But at NO point have I ever seen anything in their relationship that says brotherly. Much as he obviously cares for Anakin, Obi-Wan is the mentor and Anakin the student. So don't throw this sad attempt at an emotional hook in at the last minute and expect us to buy it.
Anakin's Darth Vader look. Yes, it's the moment we've been waiting years for, but all the lifts and padding in the world couldn't hide the fact that Hayden Christensen simply can't fill Darth Vader's shoes, in the purely physical sense. His moment of angst as he comes off the operating slab was mercifully short, but he still looked like someone playing at filling out the costume. Sorry Hayden.
So what didn't work?
Having said that the overall story worked, there is one major portion of it that simply fails for me. What the hell happened to Padme? In the first film, she's a butt-kicking, you-can't-keep-me-out-of-the-fight action heroine… similar to Princess Leia in the original films. But in Episode II she starts to lose that strength and by this film, she's stuck on a balcony, watching her world collapse. In a final insult to the character, she dies in childbirth, presumably from "heartbreak", since there's nothing physically wrong with her (Anakin's beating apparently didn't damage her). Never mind that she's now abandoning her babies to the vagaries of a world where everything she's believed in has been betrayed… she simply can't go on.But how much more interesting would it have been if, instead of the Emperor lying to Anakin about her death and telling him that she died of the wounds he inflicted, what if he actually was responsible? I mean, what's the point of Palpatine lying about it if there's no payoff (as we know there isn't, as Vader never learns any of this in the final three films)? What if she were allowed to die as a strong character who faced up to the man who betrayed her and her ideals and her love, and paid the price for it. Isn't that stronger than "she died of a broken heart"?
(continued in "Episode III, part 2")
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