Racial stereotypes? Come on, people!

Rating: Null/10 (1 June 1999)

I managed to keep myself almost completely ignorant about this movie before going to see it nine days after it was released. I had only seen one trailer and heard that Jake Lloyd's acting was terrible. Well, now that I've seen it, I have to say that the trailer didn't even give a hint of the magnificence of this film, and Jake Lloyd's acting was more than adequate.
One quibble I have with it is the amount of screen time given to Jar Jar Binks. And no, not because he's supposedly a stereotype of a Caribbean and whatever else people have labeled him. There seemed to be too much comic relief in this movie, more so than the other three movies when it was just up to C3PO and R2D2 to provide laughs.
This movie has been slammed for perpetuating racial stereotypes and I have to disagree with a lot of self-righteous people who are making a big deal out of nothing. I am college-educated and graduated with high honors, so I think I am intelligent enough to see a racial stereotype when I see one. And I will say right now that when I was watching PHANTOM MENACE, the only thing that was running through my head when I saw Jar Jar was, "Boy, he's a lot like Roger Rabbit." I even checked the credits to see if the man who did the voice for Roger Rabbit did the voice for Jar Jar. The other character in the film who has been singled out for criticism is Watto. Supposedly he is a stereotype of a Jew, because of his accent and his big nose. His accent has also been described as Turkish. I thought the accent was vaguely Italian and as for his nose...why didn't people go out gunning for Gonzo when Muppets first aired? Come on, let's dig up Jim Henson and throw the mud at him right now! When I saw Watto, I thought he was supposed to be a kind of bug, like a dragonfly or mosquito with the long beak, because I saw the wings.