Revisiting Star Wars - Episode III: Revenge of the Sith

Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005): Written and directed by George Lucas. Starring: Ewan McGregor, Hayden Christensen, Natalie Portman, Ian McDiarmid and Samuel L. Jackson. Rated PG-13 (Slain younglings and a charred body). Running time: 140 minutes.

3 ½ stars (out of four)

What a relief Episode III is. Where the previous Star Wars movie, Attack of the Clones, often seemed hesitant to do anything but belabor political exposition, Revenge of the Sith lets loose, unafraid to go over the top. This is a film that revels in its grandeur and embraces its eccentricities. For the first time since the original trilogy, we are reminded why George Lucas became such a revered name in blockbuster entertainment.  He swings for the fences and delivers a thrilling, unabashed space opera.

The Clone War is nearing its end and Chancellor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) continues to rally support and gain power in the Senate. He has taken Anakin (Hayden Christensen) under his wing, a relationship the Jedi Council fears. While there is little doubt the Republic is winning the war, the Jedi express concern that Palpatine may be priming himself for a dictatorship once the fighting is over. Anakin becomes caught in the middle, asked by both Palpatine and the Jedi Council to spy on the other.

Though the plot relies on politics established by the previous two films, Revenge of the Sith wisely brings its characters to the forefront and uses the politics as a backdrop for the action. Anakin’s transformation has precedence in the story and we see how Palpatine poisons his mind with tantalizing stories of Sith Lords who have conquered death. This possibility excites Anakin, who grows increasingly fearful that he will lose his wife, Amidala (Natalie Portman). By giving Anakin a clear motivation to turn to the Dark Side, Mr. Lucas brings some much-needed focus to the film.

Perhaps because of this newfound focus, the acting, which was a weak point in both of the earlier prequels, is stronger. Hayden Christensen lacked the subtlety to make Anakin’s initial steps toward the Dark Side believable in Episode II, but his weaknesses as an actor are less of an issue in Episode III, a film with few subtleties. Here, his cheesy line delivery is almost well suited to the film’s tone.

Natalie Portman isn’t given much to do other than look distraught and weep (both are things she excels at), and Ewan McGregor continues his strong work as Obi-Wan. Even Samuel L. Jackson gets some memorable scenes in a part specifically tailored to his strengths – looking cool and delivering passionate monologues. Mr. Jackson has a way of making even the blandest of exposition sound like a sharp one-liner.

The true scene-stealer of Revenge of the Sith, however, is Ian McDiarmid. He is a thrill to watch in his scenes with Mr. Christensen as he gains Anakin’s trust before luring him to the Dark Side. Mr. McDiarmid has the quiet, screen-commanding presence typical of a British thespian but is equally convincing when called upon to shout at the top of his lungs and shoot lighting bolts from his fingers. As the central villain of the entire saga, both qualities are essential.

Mr. Lucas allows a number of scenes to enter over the top territory, a choice that works because of the film’s operatic grandeur. Where else should the climactic battle between Anakin and Obi-Wan take place but on a volcanic planet where lava explodes around them? And while Palpatine bides his time revealing his true motivations, the wonderfully named General Grievous (voiced by the film’s sound editor, Matthew Wood), a caped, asthmatic robot, serves as the antagonist.

Visually, the film is as stunning as we have come to expect from the new Star Wars films but Episode III is also vibrant and colorful in a way its predecessors were not. The sets and costumes are imbued with an almost expressionistic style, making it perhaps the most visually interesting Star Wars. Even a relatively simple set such as the Chancellor’s office is painted lavish hues of purple. Take also, for example, the scene when Anakin and Palpatine converse in a balcony seat at an opera. The scene, which is exquisitely shot, offers occasional glimpses of the performance – ribbons streaking through a watery sphere – and we are reminded that the Star Wars films take place in a richly detailed and fully realized world. Even in his final (to date) film, Mr. Lucas finds room to continue exploring and inventing in his fictional universe.

When watching Revenge of the Sith, one gets the impression that George Lucas is giving it everything he’s got. His energy and enthusiasm can be felt in every scene. Many viewers will likely continue to put the original trilogy on an untouchable pedestal but with Episode III, Mr. Lucas has created an extravagant and supremely entertaining movie, as wild and exciting as one can ever hope for from a Star Wars film.

- Steve Avigliano, 2/21/12

Revisiting Star Wars - Episode II: Attack of the Clones

Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones (2002): Written and directed by George Lucas. Starring: Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman, Hayden Christensen, Ian McDiarmid, Samuel L. Jackson and Christopher Lee. Rated PG (Bloodless violence and some smooching). Running time: 142 minutes.

2 stars (out of four) 

On the surface, Attack of the Clones seems to offer everything we have come to expect from a Star Wars film – lightsabers, blasters, a woman with her hair in a bun. As a standalone film, however, it’s a mess. Strip away the familiar settings, characters and John Williams score and what we have is an overlong political thriller, all exposition and no payoff.

The film begins on Coruscant with a failed attempt to assassinate Amidala (Natalie Portman), who has been elected Senator in the ten years between this film and the last. She has returned to the capitol planet to vote on the creation of an army for the Republic, a military force that would be used to quell the growing separatist party and… already the film has lost us. George Lucas has responded to criticism regarding Episode I’s confusing politics by writing an entire film about them.

But let’s set all that aside for now. What is important is that Amidala is in danger and two old friends are assigned to protect her – Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) and the all grown up Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen). Following a second attempt on the senator’s life, Anakin becomes her personal bodyguard while Obi-Wan follows up on a clue left by the assassin.

His investigation leads him to the rainy planet Kamino where he learns that a clone army is already being built for the Republic. Who ordered this secret army and when? Perhaps answers will be found on the drab, desert world of Geonosis where Count Dooku (Christopher Lee), leader of the separatist movement, hides.

Somewhere in here is the potential for a good detective story but Attack of the Clones is all mystery and no intrigue. We’re always a few steps behind the film, grappling to understand political motives when we should be absorbed in the action. This is what happens when the motives of characters take a backseat to those of committees, senates and councils.

The few characters we have to cling onto aren’t much to speak of. Mrs. Portman is even stiffer than she was in the first. Count Dooku is a perfunctory villain and Christopher Lee’s performance feels strained, particularly in comparison to the actor’s portrayal of Saruman in The Lord of the Rings (which played in theaters the same year as Attack of the Clones). Only Ewan McGregor gets away unscathed; his Obi-Wan is charming, personable and the sole character worth rooting for.

Hayden Christensen, the poor guy, is horribly miscast. His take on Anakin is all wrong. Anakin’s innate abilities have made him cocky but rather than playing the character with a sort of self-assured charisma, Mr. Christensen is unlikable from the get-go. He is whiny and full of himself, oblivious that he comes off as a real prick. He’s the guy you meet at a party and immediately know you don’t want to talk to. I suppose at least half the fault here lies with Mr. Lucas for writing the character this way but, man, you’d think the protagonist of the whole trilogy would at least make for tolerable company.

Then there are the would-be romantic scenes, so clumsy and awkward they threaten to derail the whole film. Mr. Christensen hits on Mrs. Portman with pitiful pick-up lines, ogling her like a pervy teen. The two have no chemistry together and their scenes become labored exercises in clichés that would sound uninspired on a soap opera.

The only moment when Attack of the Clones works is in a scene late in the film when our heroes are tied to stone pillars and face a gladiatorial public execution. The three monsters that show up to kill them look as though they have been lifted from some glorious, forgotten B-grade horror film, and what fun it is to watch Obi-Wan, Anakin and Amidala thwart them!

Even this is short lived though. The troops march in and the battle that ensues is disorienting because we don’t know which side to root for. If Palpatine’s Republic army is a prototype for the Empire from later episodes, aren’t the separatists the good guys? Count Dooku is said to be dabbling in the Dark Side. So he’s on the politically correct side, but the wrong side of the Force? Again, why is George Lucas making everything so complicated? By the time we get to Yoda’s thoroughly silly fight scene, we’ve lost all interest in the film.

Much of the action goes unexplained and the plot becomes so muddled and unclear that multiple viewings are necessary to follow it all. Why, for example, was Amidala the assassination target and not one of the galaxy’s thousand-or-so other senators? And who is behind it all? That these important details should remain obscured from the audience through to the film’s end is absurd. The special effects are amazing as expected but without a coherent story to anchor them, they are just window-dressings. Attack of the Clones is a failure of storytelling, though at least it’s a failure set to a John Williams score.

- Steve Avigliano, 2/17/12

Revisiting Star Wars - Episode I: The Phantom Menace

With the 3D re-release of The Phantom Menace arriving in theaters Friday, I thought I would take a look back at the Star Wars films and reassess them. I have long been a fan of the series but never gave myself the opportunity to watch them from an unbiased perspective. Beginning today and continuing over the next five weeks I will do just that. I will review them not by comparing them to one another or ranking them, but by looking closely at each and discussing their strengths and shortcomings as standalone movies. I will include a brief wrap-up post following the Return of the Jedi review. (Note: The review below is not of the 3D re-release, which I have not yet seen, but was written after revisiting the film on DVD.)

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Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999): Written and directed by George Lucas. Starring: Liam Neeson, Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman, Jake Lloyd, Ian McDiarmid, Ahmed Best and Ray Park. Rated PG (Blasters, lightsabers, the usual). Running time: 133 minutes.

3 stars (out of four) 

The first Star Wars prequel was in an unenviable position in 1999. By some cultural fluke, George Lucas’s films about a galaxy far, far away had become an absolute phenomenon and two decades later, diehards and new fans alike prepared to sit in theaters and watch the first of three new movies in the series. No other film has had to endure these levels of anticipation, and the hype surrounding Episode I will surely never be replicated. The Phantom Menace was perhaps destined to disappoint many, thrill others and set box office records regardless.

Now that ample time has passed and the prequels have jelled into our collective cultural consciousness much as the original trilogy has, we may look at the film for what it really is. Forget comparing the movie to its predecessors. Throw away any preconceived notion of what it should have been. Taken on its own terms, Episode I is a flawed but undeniably entertaining movie boasting a lighthearted tone and a wonderful sense of invention.

We meet a young Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) as he nears the end of his Jedi knight training under Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson). The two have been sent to the planet Naboo to investigate a political squabble. The squabble soon turns into a full-scale invasion by the Trade Federation – a nefarious organization led by a pair of green, robed, noseless aliens – and Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan must protect Naboo’s leader, the young and beautiful Queen Amidala (Natalie Portman).

One thing leads to another and they are forced to stop on a familiar planet (familiar to us, not them): the desert world of Tatooine. There they meet a precocious, little, slave boy named Anakin Skywalker (Jake Lloyd). There is something special about the boy, Qui-Gon says. Those familiar with the original trilogy know what Anakin’s future holds but for now he is simply a gifted child. So gifted, in fact, that Qui-Gon decides to buy him from his owner, Waddo (voiced by Andy Secombe), a winged creature with the schnoz of an anteater, and take the boy on as a second apprentice.

Buying the boy will not be so easy though, Waddo explains. Qui-Gon must win Anakin by betting on a podrace, a delightfully dirty (and very dangerous) sport where racers fly hovering vehicles through canyons and caves. Cheating and sabotaging other racers’ pods are not only allowed but apparently encouraged too.

George Lucas and his team of designers and computer animators let their imaginations run wild with this and every other scene in the film. At every turn, Episode I offers us some new, dazzling thing to look at and the sheer joy of taking it all in is intoxicating. I have not yet even mentioned Darth Maul (Ray Park), the silent, shadowy villain with red and black face paint and horns on his head who stalks our heroes. Or the majestic, underwater world of half-fish people who live in giant bubbles. Or the city so big it takes up an entire planet.

The Phantom Menace is a cheerful adventure that hops from one richly detailed world to another. Is the film’s tone sometimes childish? Sure, but that’s no problem since Mr. Lucas has elected to make a children’s film. One that has the ability to draw you into its playful world if you allow it to. (The much-despised Jar-Jar Binks (Ahmed Best), a resident of the aforementioned underwater world, is a grating presence, that much I will concede, but no less so than any other goofy, kids’ movie sidekick.)

If the movie is truly aimed at younglings, however, why is it bogged down with convoluted political exposition? The opening scroll refers to a tax dispute and trade blockades. There are senators and chancellors debating the galactic legality of the Trade Federation’s actions. Surely Mr. Lucas cannot expect children to follow these scenes, much less enjoy them. Can’t the bad guys just be bad guys for the heroes to defeat?

On top of this, the script is encumbered by clumsy, hackneyed dialogue. Mr. Lucas’s strength never was for writing dialogue but this lack was never as apparent in the original trilogy as it is here. The actors deliver their lines in bland, overly serious, faux-fancy talk, looking less animated than the ubiquitous CGI surrounding them.

In another film these issues would be damning. That the film is still a lot of fun in spite of these problems is a testament to the strength of its action. The finale, a sort of Star Wars Greatest Hits that intercuts a lightsaber fight, a space battle, a ground war and a stealthy break-in, is thrilling enough to make you forget all those dull scenes in the Senate and ends the film on a high note.

Is the movie as good as the old ones? Does it have to be? I am inclined to say that Episode I falls more in line with George Lucas’s original vision for Star Wars than perhaps some fans are willing to admit. His original inspiration came from the serialized space operas of pulp magazines and The Phantom Menace offers many of the same pleasures as those adventure stories: strange planets, heroic rescues, epic battles and more than a little cheese. The film might have benefited from trimming the politics and a few dialogue rewrites but these are not serious detriments because the plot is not what is on display here. This is a movie infatuated with its own bright, colorful, zippy self and, now more than ever, I am all too happy to succumb to its gleeful pleasures.

- Steve Avigliano, 2/9/12