Stays at an okay level that is rarely memorable though

Rating: 6/10 (6 October 2016)

"Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones" is the fifth of so far seven Star Wars films and the second film from the second trilogy, which makes it film number 2 as well in terms of chronology. The director is once again George Lucas and he is also one of the writers as usual. The cast includes a handful names that defined the second era of Star Wars films, such as Portman, Christensen and McGregor. And of course all the known characters that I won't have to mention here by name.
I may be a bit biased here as sci-fi is definitely not my favorite genre and I also never have been a really great Star Wars fan, not even of the old films. But still, there are sequences here where it was easy for me to appreciate the film. But the problem is that these sequences are far from frequent enough for a film that runs for considerably over 2 hours. And this is why I would say that this film we have here stays a work that has clearly not fulfilled its potential in terms of the epicness it tries to deliver. This refers to the script mostly, but also to the acting. But the script is the bigger problem. At some point, it feels they just try to include as many fantastic creatures as possible, give them a punchline here and there and hope this is enough so that people may overlook the deficits in storytelling and appreciate this film as something close to a comedy. But with this approach, it can never be a great work.
The key is walking the fine line between fantasy and reality (in Star Wars usually the struggles in terms of politics) without getting too absurd or too uninteresting in any of these departments. It is definitely a small line, but they have succeeded before, but here they do not. The quantity and quality of new characters, the non-human ones, is just far from where I wish it could have been. And with the human ones, there aren't that many interesting moments either, so sometimes it seems that they really went way past the franchise's peak. This only refers to acting and (especially) story though as the visual side is once again very impressive, which makes it a much much better viewing at a theater or on a gigantic screen in your home theater and this is certainly where you should see it.
This film was nominated for an Oscar in the special effects category, but lost to "Lord of the Rings", the other big (Christopher Lee) thing back then. And not only the effects are pretty great, also the costumes, sets and cinematography are as convincing as in all the other Star Wars films. But the high level in there also shows how mediocre the script is and how important a good script is because if a film only or mostly delivers on the visual side, then it still cannot make up for major flaws in the story or just the lack of a convincing story altogether that has you on the edge of your seat. And this is the feeling I had here. The film kept drifting slowly forward, but there was nothing really that wowed me or really impressed me to an extent where I would say I have to see this film again soon. You can maybe call it an example of "style over substance". But it is not a failure or even a weak film. It is a solid work that just is underwhelming in the face of how much it cost. I do recommend the watch. Cautiously.