Like watching a train wreck (*spoilers*, if that's still possible)

Rating: 2/10 (21 February 2002)

In the interest of fairness, I rented The Phantom Menace recently to assure myself that my recollections of the movie were accurate. Unfortunately, they were.
It's not as though there's *nothing* good about this movie. The effects in some bits are quite nice (though overall they violate the `less is more' creed) and the lightsaber duel (up to the end, where Darth Maul turns into an idiot) is fairly scintillating.
Having said that . . .
I remember watching the movie in the theatre when it came out and having this little internal struggle where I tried to convince myself that what I was seeing wasn't as bad as it seemed to be. I have fond memories of watching the first Star Wars movie as a five year old and I really wanted to enjoy this iteration. But it is what it is, and what it is is a pretty bad movie.
Plotting was never Lucas's strength. Star Wars relied on a simple, straightforward plot. Empire was more complex but was in the hands of a more skilled director. Return was back to being simple. That's okay-some of the best movies have very basic plots. Unfortunately, Lucas puts a complex, labyrinthine plot at the forefront of Phantom Menace, and he just can't handle it. Why he would emphasize a writing weakness is beyond me, but there it is. Just for fun, let's look at some serious plot problems. Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan free Amidala and her imperial guard, then take her to the hangar to steal a ship. Yet the robots guarding the hangar, besides being pretty minimal for such a key location, seem to have no idea that Amidala has been loosed. I mean, get these guys a walkie-talkie! This would be pretty incredible in its own right, but when we learn later that all the droids are controlled by a central orbiting ship (some poor planning never changes) it's really impossible to believe. This leads directly to problem two: The escaping ship flies through the Trade Federation blockade, is saved by R2D2 (the astonishment of the pilot when this happens is amusing-he can't believe our little friend repaired the shield deflectors. Well, duh, isn't that what he was built to do?), and then Â… nothing. The Trade Federation seems to not understand the idea of a blockade, and fails to pursue a tiny, essentially defenseless ship. Why not? Who knows? The basic idea of the plot, that the whole Trade Federation-Naboo conflict is a ruse-a `phantom menace'-and the real scheme is for Palpatine to have himself elected chancellor, a la Hitler, is not a bad one. But the execution is so clumsy that the good idea is defeated.
`Show, don't tell.' Lucas violates this basic storytelling tenet throughout, but most egregiously in regard to the situation on Naboo. The invasion seems to be accomplished by the Trade Federation viceroy walking into the palace and declaring victory. There is no fighting at all. None. And we know the Naboo have defenses because they later steal back their own fighters to attack the droid-controlling ship. Later we have various accounts of Amidala's people in camps, starving, dying, etc. Not that we would know, because we never see it. There's never any sense of urgency to see these people saved because you never see that they need saving. In fact, aside from Amidala and her coterie, I don't remember seeing any of the planet's people (aside from the Gungans) at all, except at the very end, and it's too late to start caring then.
Motivation. Character motivations and actions seem to change almost whimsically. Shmi doesn't want Anakin to race, then reasons that he's the only one who can help (shocking that Anakin grew up to be arrogant!). Yoda doesn't want the boy trained but then turns him over to Obi-Wan for that purpose. (Good one, that-they think the boy is dangerous so instead of training him themselves where he can be carefully watched, they turn him over to a freshly minted Jedi whose own mentor was not known for being conventional. Well, it does explain why by A New Hope the Jedi are dying out. They are not very bright.)
Dialogue. Really awful. I think the line `But that's impossible!' was actually used twice in this movie, and that's not good. The scene in which Anakin asks Qui-Gonn to explain midichlorians seemed as though it was lifted from one of those Troy McClure public education films from the Simpsons. (`Mr. Qui-Gon, what's a midichlorian?')
`Deus ex machina.' Lucas really lost me for good with the scene in which our heroes' underwater craft is attacked by a sea creature, then just when all seems lost, a second critter chomps on the first, freeing the ship. Given the rest of the movie, it might have been better if it hadn't.
But more than anything, I wanted mention my `Star Wars finale' theory (someone else may have mentioned this, but I wasn't about to read 2600-plus comments to find out). Basically, there is one battle for each `number' of the film, in order of release. To wit: Star Wars: A New Hope had one climactic battle--Luke and friends assaulting the Death Star; Empire had two-Luke v. Vader and Leia and Lando escaping Cloud City; Return had three-Luke v. Vader and the Emperor, the rebellion fleet attacking the new Death Star, and the battle on Endor; and of course Phantom has four-Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan v. Darth Maul; Anakin attacking the droid ship; Amidala's crew hunting the viceroy; and the Gungans v. the droid army. At this rate, by the sixth movie the final battles should start about ten minutes in.
Is this the worst movie ever? Of course not. But it *is* a bad movie of little merit beyond technical expertise. If you want rousing adventure with a good story and lovely effects, see the first three, or even better, Raiders of the Lost Ark.
2/10