A squandered opportunity for greatness.

Rating: 4/10 (19 May 1999)

First, some positives. Liam Neeson and Ewan Mcgregor are great as Jedi. This movie is easily one of the best looking films ever made. The Pod race scene is fun. The final fight is fun. The Gungans aren't Ewoks.
Now, the real review: this movie was even more disappointing than I expected it to be. Reasons: *The good dialogue is non-existent. For those that disagree, wait 5 years and then give me one cool line that you remember from this film. I can give you at least 10 from Star Wars, even more from Empire, and even a few from Return. There is perhaps one bit of even remotely memorable dialogue in this film. *The mediocre dialogue comes in vast quantities, usually when you wish something was happening. The guy sitting next to me growled during one scene "When will they stop talking!" *The 2 most important alien races are ethnic stereotypes and completely out of place. One race speaks just like Charlie Chan, and I kept expecting the Gungans to pull out Bongs and start Jamming to Shaggy. *Jake Lloyd, who plays Anakin Skywalker, is a giant pit of anti-coolness that sucks every ounce of coolness from every scene he is in like a black hole. I cannot believe that he was the best Lucas could come up with for this part. His lines are straight from a "Leave it to Beaver" episode and he has the emotional depth of a block of balsa wood. *There is little emotion of any kind. Anakin and his mother act like they hardly know each other. Darth Maul looks evil, but hardly has enough screen time to build up vague unease, let alone menace in the audience. The Jedi, admittedly, are supposed to be emotionless, and yet they show more depth of feeling than any other characters. *The absolutely absurd description of the Force as mediated by microscopic organisms. This sudden shift in description brings to mind the backstory whiplash of Highlander II.
Overall, this film is the biggest disappointment of a film I have seen in a very long time, and this is from a person who was expecting it to be pretty bad. Please wait to til this one hits second run before you waste time on it. $7 to $9 is just too much to pay.