A fine start to a long journey.

Rating: 7/10 (25 August 2000)

It's a unique scenario. It's a prequel distanced from the source by two more intervening films and 25 years (real time). A hard journey for any small film to make. But with expert tuition and a handsome fan base before during and after conception it's proved to have weathered the storm admirably.
In time we may come to call it "The introductory one", or "The one to show to the boy when he's nice and young, in order to get him into Star Wars at an early age". By this I mean that it seems much more like a children's story than it's sequels do.
I've a daughter aged 8 months and I'm already working out when she'll get to really sink her teeth into it. This is by no means meant in a bad way. The simple elegance of a narrative meant for children is very fashionable right now (see Harry Potter etc) and rightly so.
I watched Star Wars IV when I was 7 and I was 7 again when I sat in the cinema last year, and on the sofa last night. Bliss...
However I find two faults:
Jar-Jar can be left out of any further adventures. & Darth Maul was the better fighter. By far.
Oh yeah and the props were superb (this comment has nothing to do with my brother in law having worked on them).