Lucas, not loosing his touch, changing his focus.

Rating: 2/10 (24 October 2002)

Some years after it came out and there are still people buzzing about this movie. Comparing and defending it against the others.
Here is my thought on the entire situation as made obvious in this 4th presentation: Episode 1.
I was 4 years old in 1977, I remember waiting in line for 2 or 3 showings (4 or 6 hours) so that we could watch "Star Wars". Even at the age of 4 I was able to understand enough of what was going on to watch it more often than I have ever seen another movie. By the time "The Empire Strikes Back" came out, I had seen Star Wars over 50 times, this all in theaters as VCRs were not known back then. I then watched #5 a lot and then #6 3 or 4 times. When I saw "Return Of the Jedi" I was still young, yet saw that Lucas was dumbing down the story for the kids. It still had its good moments yet was not as interesting as #4.
I was working in a movie theater when the redigitized version came out about 1997 and watched them a few times when we had them. And then when #1 came out I was very excited. But Lucas decided that he wanted to make films for his grandkids rather than people that knew the story. Fine it is his movie, do what you will, but my thoughts are this. You don't need to talk down to kids to make them enjoy movies. He could have kept the same seriousness in "Jedi" and "Phantom" as he did "A New Hope" and still make kids enjoy them. Jar-Jar and the Frog-King's "shake the head and make the cheeks splatter" are just a few ways to tell parents that this movie is not intended for people that know the plot, but rather for the kids of people that know the plot.
He is no longer making Sci-Fi movies, but rather "After-School specials". Jake Lloyd was too old for the part he was playing, but they said he was perfect, so they kept him... WHY? Yes he is a child actor and he wasn't that great, but a 4 year-old could not have done a worse job. Why didn't they find a kid the age Anakin was suposed to be and just live with the fact kids can't act, Jake couldn't either. We were suposed to feel sorry for Anakin, but Jake made me think, what a brat, why do they want to make YOU a Jedi so bad. There was nothing endearing about him, even when he left his mom, she didn't seem too sorry to see him go.
Even in the Indiana movies you can see Lucas making the series into kids movies. He tried so hard to get the movie industry to get their SFX better so that he could redo #4 the way he intended, so much so that he made his own effects system, yet in #1 he hid behind the effects and decided not to put any effort in the story.
Lucas is no longer a producer of good movies, just over priced, pre-school kids movies with a lot of special effects.