Better than Phantom Menace but not by much

Rating: Null/10 (12 January 2003)

Contains Spoilers!!! I remember when the first 3 Star Wars movies came out, reading several times that George Lucas intended them to be the middle 3 films of a 9 film series. The next 3 films would deal with events before "A New Hope" and the last 3 would cover what happens after "Return of the Jedi." When "Phantom Menace" came out I then heard he never said that--i guess it was just a rumor--and only wanted to do the original 3 movies. Considering the troubles he went through just to get a studio to produce "Star Wars" it makes sense. The script was turned down by every major studio in Hollywood, and only bought by 20th Century Fox because of the success they had with the Planet of the Apes movies, and also because the studio head, David Ladd, was a big fan of both "American Graffiti" and science fiction (he later formed his own studio which produced "Outland" and "Blade Runner").
Now after having seen both recent Star Wars movies, it's easy to see another reason why Lucas didn't want to do any more movies. He's had a difficult task ahead of him, which was to flesh out events and characters that were actually better left just mentioned in the original Star Wars movie. For instance, Governor Tarkin's few lines about the "Imperial Senate" went so much further in evoking images of a ruling body than any computer graphics could accomplish in the new movies. Unfortunately not only today's filmmakers but also much of today's video game oriented audiences seem to be in love with visual effects, especially BIGGER and MORE effects, so that is what we have dominating genre movies as a whole (witness the latest Bond atrocity, Die Another Day).
Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy good effects, but i find myself being bored by, say, an aircar chase through a crowded sky that goes on for 10 minutes. Used to be a scene like that would be the climax of a movie, now they come every 15 minutes. I know this sounds like a cliche, but if i don't care about the characters or the story i won't be impressed by the effects. Which was how I felt during "Phantom Menace." I found the action scenes, such as the pod race, incredibly boring and predictable, because I found the characters boring and the story less than compelling. Unfortunately this continues with "Attack of the Clones."
Several attempts to assassinate Senator Amidala from the Planet Naboo result in her being protected by young Annakin Skywalker, Jedi in training, and in Obi-wan Kenobi, Jedi turned detective, being sent off to find out why. He never really does find out, but his investigation leads him to a lot of much bigger issues, much of which I found hard to follow. Well at least I found the Kenobi scenes interesting because he is keeping some sort of plot going. Sadly the Annakin/Amidala romance is right out of a Harlequin romance, and bogs the movie down. Hayden Christensen has a rather large task in portraying someone who will be the most evil man in the galaxy, unfortunately he fails to rise to the occasion. He seems to have been cast because he looks like he came from a popular boy band so as to get teens into the theater. The only time I found him or his character interesting was when he goes off to save his mother, and succumbs to his hatred toward her killers. But even that segment is brought in from out of nowhere and quickly dropped. I must confess the only thing that kept my interest in those "romance" scenes was amazement at how beautiful Natalie Portman had become. Unfortunately she shatters the illusion of a brainy resourceful beauty by telling Annakin they can leave Tatooine and rescue Obi-wan Kenobi (see below) before the other Jedi can arrive there, forgetting they have hyper-drive ships.
Getting back to Detective Kenobi...he goes after a certain bounty hunter named Jango Fett, the trail leads him to a planet which received an order for a gazillion clones from a previous Jedi Knight, he meets Jango, chases him to another planet where there is a cool chase through an asteroid field, then discovers a factory where a gazillion robots are being made (yes, there are lots and lots of clones and robots in this movie), then gets captured by the villains behind the whole thing (which he could have avoided by first LEAVING the planet then contacting Yoda). Okay, now we've got TOO much plot! I agree with another reader, who was the Jedi who placed the order, why all of a sudden do we leave there and discover a planet with a huge self-run factory churning out robot armies? Most mysterious of all is just why Jango Fett is doing all this. Why use yourself to clone millions of soldiers, ordered by a Jedi knight, to be used by Senate, then fly off to hook up with the villains, who are planning to overthrow the Senate? Before any of his motives are explained, he's killed off in the climax. Great.

And talk about overkill. I will admit I did slightly enjoy the scene with the monsters sent out in the arena to kill our heroes, but it seemed too much of a ripoff of "Starship Troopers," and besides we've got two Jedi fighting off essentially mindless creatures, so there wasn't much suspense as to how it would turn out. Then like the cavalry coming to the rescue, all the Jedi in the universe arrive to fight off the robots. I guess the villains learned from the first movie not to have a central power source for the robots, since the jedi have to fight them off and destroy them one at a time. This interminable sequence is just too jumbled to be exciting, and makes no sense since the Jedi should have used their powers to stop the robots in a more efficient manner. I was also a bit shocked that the the junior jedi knights that Yoda was training were involved in the battle, and they all seemed to have been killed! I'm surprised no critic or anyone else for that matter made mention of this.
I almost forgot R2-D2 and C-3P0, but then again they were so badly used it would have been just as well to forget them. R2 is his (its?) usual resourceful self, but it makes no sense that now he can fly, yet R2 can't fly in the first three movies, which take place AFTER this one. Another continuity flaw is that we see 3P0 working on Luke Skywalker's great uncle's farm, and we also meet Owen Lars and his wife. Yet in "A New Hope" "Uncle" Owen not only buys 3P0 but acts as though he sees him for the first time. I guess being out in the desert so long he lost some of his memory! And I am getting tired of seeing the poor robot constantly being dismembered for the sake of cheap jokes, which really weren't very funny anyway. Surely after all this time Mr. Lucas could have come up with more material for such an engaging character.
Of all the cast, Ewan MacGregor managed to make the most impression on me, mainly because he at least is given something to do to move the plot. What i found most amazing is how he is starting to resemble and sound like Kenneth Branagh, who Mr Lucas originally wanted to play the young Obi-wan. A lot of people liked Yoda, but he didn't make too much of an impression on me. But I must admit my main reason to see the movie was because the great Christopher Lee was in it, fortunately playing the villain. I agree with one reader who said his character had the depth of wall paper, but I was so thrilled to see Mr. Lee back on the big screen I didn't care. He could read the yellow pages and steal the picture, which is basically what he did. Honestly I thought there were too many villains and they were all brought in too late in the movie (more overkill). Having Christopher Lee play the lone villain, and brought in earlier in the movie, would have been more than enough.
In conclusion, some okay acting, a confusing plot hampered by a corny romantic subplot but kept moving by a bit of detective work and some nifty action scenes, a beautiful but not very resourceful heroine and an appearance by one of the screen's great but underrated movie legends, all combine to make a loud and colorful time at the movies but little more. Mr. Lucas would have done better to stick to his word when he said he never intended to make more Star Wars movies, but then he wouldn't have had the chance to make a few more hundred million dollars, which is what movies are really all about.