Meh ... :shrugs shoulders:

Rating: 7/10 (26 May 2005)

At last it arrives ... the film linking the glory of the original Star Wars saga with the mediocrity of the new series.
I am relieved it is finally over. It has been too painful to watch, but I felt I needed to get to the end.
I suppose this isn't that bad of a film. I was 12 years old when the original Star Wars was released, perhaps today's twelve-year-olds will look upon this with the fondness I have of the tale of Luke, Leia, Han, and the Big Walking Carpet. I suspect they will, because in the nearly thirty years since the original release, this film series hasn't matured, hasn't grown, hasn't met the contemporary standards of quality film-making.
Movies themselves have changed since 1977. Good filmmakers have built upon the ground-breaking work of filmmakers that have come before them. Spielberg built upon Kurosawa. Tarentino built upon Scorsese. Ridley Scott built upon John Ford. Everyone learns from those who came before, and therefore make better films.
Not George Lucas.
George Lucas has only looked upon himself. He wrapped himself in a world of his own creation, a world of profits, merchandising, and lavish praises from those seeking to capitalize on his earlier success. Yes, he made great advances in the field of special effects, but has lost all the soul, all the passion, all the emotion of good storytelling. He has not learned from those directors past, and is not paying attention to those great directors of today. If, for example, Lucas studied Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy, he would have learned how to infuse a majestic, awe-inspiring, effects-laden magnum opus with heart, and love, and loss, and pain, and success, and failure. But Lucas did not, and therefore Star Wars languished in several reels of mediocrity.
Visually, this film is too busy. Too much going on, too many effects, too much action, too much noise blocking the focus on the heart of the story. The performances are too wooden and so poorly filmed the tension and doubt are washed out. The story is so convoluted and contrived it's hard to see the political allegory that should be intended.
Such a waste. Such a waste of icons of popular culture. It could have been so much more in the hands of a talented director.
I give this film 7 out of 10, really out of the kindness of my heart more than on the merits. I grew up on the original series of films, even tolerating the Ewoks because of the message of redemption in Return of the Jedi. Sadly this film has no redemption, but I lend it some anyway.
Barky