what was George Lucas thinking - SCHMALTZ!!!

Rating: 1/10 (4 June 1999)

I love Star Wars. Don't get me wrong. I am a fan. I know the original films very well. The Phantom Menace is an insult to their memory and more insultingly to mine as well. The Star War films are part of my childhood but they were never childish, this is something that cannot be said of The Phantom Menace. It is a cliched downgraded mix of the plot of A New Hope with a few elements of Return of the Jedi thrown in (thing annoying supposedly amusing aliens far removed from the menace of the Mos Eisly Cantina "I'll be careful", "You'll be dead" repartee). When I stop feeling sorry for nmyself and other educated fans out there I will feel sorry for the kiddies who although they may like this film now will equate it with the merging masses of action films they have seen in their youth, they will not carry a distict Star Wars memory with them into adulthood like so many of us did with the first trio of movies.