Better than Episode 1 but

Rating: 3/10 (18 May 2002)

that does not say that Episode II is that much of an improvement.
It should have been.
But it wasn't and how many reasons do you need to classify a film as bad?
For a start let's take a look a Lucas' contribution to this whole mess of a movie. Namely his script and his direction.
With regard to his script, Lucas ain't exactly Shakespeare. In fact he isn't even Ed Wood or Robin Moore. At least with Ed Wood, his bad scripts had the factor that they were done in complete sincerity. With this George Lucas script we don't even get the sincerity. Lucas seems to believe that he is writing a masterpiece for the ages.
So we get some real clunker dialogue with the real zingers being delivered by our star-crossed lovers Amidala and Anakin, done with all the intensity of a read through rehearsal. Their romantic banter was embarrassing with their relationship being conducted with the white hot intensity of an arctic winter. Do we honestly believe that these are the two most essential characters who will shape the destiny of an entire galaxy?

Also, do alien beings really say 'Mom' and 'Dad'? For a galaxy far, far away, some of the characters seem to come from downtown.
Then there's Lucas the director. What made Episodes 5 & 6 good was that the script and direction were farmed out to different writers and directors who brought their own vision of Lucas' universe to the screen. What we have here is Lucas' baby and this is his vision. And it does not feel real. The direction drags and the plot exposition seems to only exist to move the characters from one set-piece to another to show us how great and advanced the special FX are in this scene. Even the climatic battle scene feels truncated as though somebody got lost for ideas.
Indifferent acting didn't help (though armed with that script, do you really wonder why?). The two young leads were wooden, Ewan McGregor posted in his performance, Ian McDiarmid had little interest in his dialogue and character, Pernilla August must have been on set for all of a day for all that she contributed to the plot and we found out that Stormtroopers have New Zealand accents.
So what was to like. Christopher Lee, who seemed to realise how ridiculous the whole exercise was and outacted everybody, which wasn't difficult. Then there was the CGI and special FX. Very spectacular but I was too aware that it was special FX. I couldn't lost in the whole fantasy and the magic that should been there wasn't.
Yoda could kick arse but his fight with the Count and Yoda's bouncing around felt like an out-take from Muppets in Space. One almost expected Miss Piggy to turn up with a light sabre and a well-placed karate chop.
So I was disappointed. Lucas has got to go a long way in Episode 3 to tie up all the loose ends in his story. Perhaps this time, he will give it to a more talented writer and director.
Stars: 3 out of 10 (begrudgingly)