Worth the 3D dollars at the box office

Rating: 7/10 (7 March 2012)

SPOILER WARNING! Some of my comments may spoil the movie for some.
I won't bore you, the reader, with a review of the movie as far as the characters - some more annoying than others, the content, the story, and other like details: Unless you have no interest in Star Wars, or have lived under a rock for the past 13 years, chances are you've at least heard of the movie or have seen it somewhere, and therefore have already formulated your opinions of the movie in that arena.
I will therefore concentrate on the 3D experience itself. NOTE: I know I'm late in the game in writing or posting this, and Star Wars: TPM might have left the theater in your area by the time this has posted. I hope not that's not the case, and this is of a help to you.
I was sitting in the theater watching the all-too-familiar opening crawl scroll by, and a thought struck me: The natural habitat of Star Wars IS the movie theater. Try as you might (or I for that matter) to buy the most beefed-up home theater system imaginable, there's simply no replacing a movie theater for seeing and/or enjoying some movies, and Star Wars is certainly one of them. Once when I realized that, I sat back, relaxed, forgot about nitpicking apart the 3D, and enjoyed myself.
When the 3D shined, it shined extremely well. Example: In the opening sequences, a Jedi ship gets blown up in a Trade Federation starship hangar, and you see smoke and pieces of Jedi ship flying straight towards you. They even enhanced (inserted? who knows?) some pieces so that you can see them flying out toward you through the smoke. On a personal note, I've always wondered - and forgive my naivete here - if the references to "The Federation" were really veiled barbs pointed in the direction of Star Trek. I'm sure someone has already answered that question, but that's beside the point..
Still, George Lucas seems to be a real stickler for details, and that's readily apparent here. It seems that real care was taken to make sure the 3D quality was superior here, and this is no exception.
Another example: The podrace sequence. This is the high point for the movie, 3D-wise, and I won't spoil the movie by going into too much detail. Needless to say, I think you'll find the 3D during this sequence was worth the 3D dollars you'll spend at the box office. Keep an eye out for the all-too-familiar cheap 3D gag. There's one in there, and it's not hard to spot.
The point I'm making is - when the 3D was expected to shine well, it never failed to satisfy, and shined at times when I wasn't expecting it to. This happened throughout the movie.
Despite what I've said so far, one of the consequences of doing movies in 3D is that between the actual process of making a movie "3D" and then viewing the movie with the polarized glasses is that the result viewing experience tends to be dark.
I'm sad to say that this is also true of Phantom Menace, and I'm hoping they fix it for the next movie. Outdoor scenes looked like it's constantly just before the sun is about to set - regardless of the actual time of day, nighttime scenes sometimes were difficult to see, sometimes skin tones didn't look right, and other times the actors looked "pasty" - for want of a better word.
Overall, I would say the 3D was good - not great, but good. I would not go out and completely overhaul my home theater system (such as it is) in anticipation of buying the inevitable Star Wars series in 3D on BluRay when it comes out, and I wouldn't buy the 3D BluRay set just to get it in 3D, but I WOULD go back to the theater to see the rest of the movies in 3D when they come out in the near and not-so-near future in their natural habitat. Can't wait for Ep. 4 and 5! I look forward on seeing the improvements (hopefully) in Attack Of The Clones.