Ouch

Rating: 6/10 (9 September 2010)

The evil Trade Federation is plotting to take over the planet of Naboo, and the Jedi Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson) and his apprentice Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) set off on an adventure to save the planet. They go to warn Queen Amidala (Natalie Portman), but they come to find they Naboo is already being invaded, and they must evacuate the planet, including the Queen. They head to the planet Tatooine, and happen to come across a boy named Anakin Skywalker, who is supposed to be very strong with the force. So they must take him on their journey, all while battling against Darth Sidious, the leader of the Trade Federation, and his apprentice Darth Maul.
Well, I must admit, I am terribly disappointed in this film. The original three, or at least first two, are some of the greatest movies in history, and I really thought George Lucas could have done a much better job with this film. The first three had fantastic special effects, along with fantastic characters, and an obviously incredibly creative story. The only space adventure near this is Star Trek, and if you are educated on both of the series then you will know that the biggest similarity between the two is the name starts with "star" and they take place in space. Clearly, Lucas already has the creative story made out for him, and with yet again Oscar Worthy special effects he had to go wrong somewhere right? Yes, unfortunately he went seriously wrong with the character development. Where were the outstanding characters from the first three films? Definitely not in this movie. It really was pretty bad. The only memorable character was Darth Maul, and he barely said a word. The plot was not great either, but the story was original, so that worked out fine. But yet again, not nearly as good as the first three movies, and since this is the first movie of three that are telling us the story of how everything came to be, I think that The Phantom Menace really needed to be better than it was.
Now I do not want to be too hard on the film, or George Lucas, because he brought us one of the greatest movies of all time, and he is an overall excellent director. The acting in the film was actually pretty good. Liam Neeson was of course good, as always. And Ewan McGregor was good as well. No one was Oscar Worthy, but good enough. I didn't really care for Natalie Portman's performance, not that it was bad, I just did not think it was great. She was probably the right person for the role though. Jake Lloyd was great for the part of Anakin. Everyone thinks he is cute, and even at a young age he was an excellent actor, though it is a shame we had to switch to Hayden Christensen after this first film.
The special effects saved this film! With decent acting the film was alright, but without these effects I would not have cared one bit for this movie, and would have second guessed seeing the next. Especially for 1999, these special effects truly were unbelievable, which is one thing Lucas brought back from the old movies. The Phantom Menace was visually stunning, and deserved to win the Oscar for special effects.
Overall, The Phantom Menace lacks severely in character development, but has a few good performances, and incredible special effects. Along with an amazing character such as Darth Maul. The movie was not terrible, but this is a legendary series, and it needs to stay that way.