Star Wars: Attack of the Clones - Movie Review

Rating: 7/10 (16 April 2020)

I firmly believe that Star Wars: Attack of the Clones is the most underrated film in the prequel trilogy. It's not the best, because that still goes to Revenge of the Sith, but a lot of people consider this film to be worse than The Phantom Menace and I don't see that at all.
The acting was very mediocre in the first film, but it was all pretty good in Attack of the Clones. No one is exceptional, but they are all extremely serviceable and a that's a definite improvement from the first film.
My main problem with The Phantom Menace was the screenplay and the directing. Whilst they aren't great in Attack of the Clones, and some of the dialogue is extremely rough, they are a definite step-up from the first film and I found the narrative to be far more interesting than it was in The Phantom Menace.
The central relationship between Anakin and Padmé was sweet, although it doesn't entirely work all of the time and it was difficult to buy into it when Anakin was re-cast to make him ten years older than the first film and Natalie Portman as Padmé only looked three years older.
Overall, there were plenty of exciting scenes and an interesting enough story in Attack of the Clones to keep me locked in, and the visual effects were spectacular for 2002, although the screenplay doesn't work all of the time and there were a few slip-ups along the way.
SCORE: 66%