Great-looking, otherwise empty

Rating: 5/10 (21 June 1999)

Something about PHANTOM MENACE seems unfinished. With all the time and much of the money in the world, Lucas has fashioned a movie which engages the eye much more than the heart (except anger, perhaps justified, at the shameless exploitation manifest in Jar Jar Binks). Palpatine is good as a sort of Iago, coming off as the most fully realized character -- which is not saying much.
Lucas was brave to make what is essentially a socio-political film about taxation and blockades, but he should have salted the thing with characters we might actually care about. Nobody is bad here, but no one really has a chance to shine, either. Harrison Ford jumped off the screen in the first -- er, fourth -- film, and Alec Guiness was very impressive; here, the players are rather dull and flat. This hurts.
Perhaps all this will be more interesting in retrospect, when the second and third installments are released. Still, the movie needs to be able to stand on its own, and this one, with some pleasures, is oddly lifeless.