New IMAX cut is subtly better

Rating: Null/10 (10 November 2002)

Thank the Maker. For his "Attack of the Clones" IMAX release,
George Lucas has come to his senses and cut out the worst
excesses of his hugely entertaining but occasionally flawed Star
Wars film. No more than about five minutes of screen time
disappear, but as a result, the audience gets a subtly leaner, more
plot-driven adventure. Some spoilers follow:

One of the main kinds of cuts Lucas makes is getting rid of
unnecessary exposition. In the original May 2002 release, this was
when the film introduced a character who has no importance in
"Attack of the Clones," but who will become important later in the
Star Wars saga. Gone is the scene in which we meet Bail Organa
on Coruscant as well as the scene in which we meet Owen Lars
and his girlfriend Beru (Luke Skywalker's future aunt and uncle) on
Tatooine. To be sure, these characters appear in later scenes, but
since their names are not integral to the plot of THIS movie, Lucas
wisely leaves them out. Instead -- what joy! -- the IMAX film
assumes the audience can figure out precisely who these
characters are: supporting players. No more, no less.

Lucas also thins out the cloying dialogue in the budding romance
between Anakin and Padme. Since their attachment is inevitable,
(given that their children are Luke and Leia) Lucas reedits the
sequence on Naboo into something resembling the conventions
of two-dimensional cinematic love affairs. In the case of Star Wars,
which is after all a fairy tale, it's in the interest of the genre to keep
these scenes brief. "Attack of the Clones" can't outdo the Balcony
Scene in "Romeo & Juliet"; in the new IMAX cut, it doesn't even try.

My concern, then, is whether George Lucas will take his own good
advice and make this new cut the official one, the one that goes
out on DVD and gets broadcast on network television. Too often,
"the director's cut" means more scenes, not better scenes -- as it
did for the DVD release of "The Phantom Menace." I myself would
prefer to put this new cut of "Attack of the Clones" into my video
library. It's a much better film.