My compliments to the chefs!

Rating: 9/10 (15 November 2005)

Where to begin? From the thrilling opening moments when about a zillion things zoom all over the screen to the final tragic death of Padme at the hands of a midwife droid - THIS FILM ROCKS! Is this George 'God' Lucas's finest moment? The battle scenes on Mustafar are easily the best part of any of the six films (apart from when we first get to meet Darth Maul) and the lava is particularly convincing - something I know is hard to get right in films.
Also note the way Lucas leavens the dough by introducing humour at the most pivotal and emotionally charged moments of the film, when a little droid looks quizzically at Anakin/Vader and Obi Wan. Superb! Only the greatest directors - Ford, Wilder, Coppola, Verhoeven - have such deftness of touch as not to get this sort of thing oh-so-tragically wrong.
(A similar lightness of directorial touch can be seen in AOTCs where a scene in which Boba Fett is seen lifting his father's severed head is sandwiched between horseplay involving R2 and C3PO. Hilarious AND moving!)
As for Natalie Portman! Well, what can you say? 'Love me like you did on Naboo!' Don't need asking twice, love! Wurgh! Seriously, though, Padme looks much better than she did in the first one, where all that make-up made her look like Boy George (an English pop star. I am from England.)
But surely the real star of the film has to be the Imperial Rehabilitation Centre. In this, possibly the moment all the films have been leading toward, Anakin finally gets made into Darth Vader (I think it's OK to say that - I did give a spoiler warning.) At one level this is terrifying. Anakin has quite literally lost his humanity, and his dark robotic carapace is perhaps symbolic of his immersion in the dark side of the force. There is a moment of great pathos as Vader's mask is fitted - we know that the *psychological* mask that is Darth Vader will not removed, metaphorically, until his final act of redemption: saving his son Luke 20 or 30 years later. Vader is perhaps better seen as a Mephistophelean figure rather than Faust: willingly corrupted yet always aware that he is in Hell.
In fact this is so deep and moving, it's fortunate Lucas chooses at this point to lighten the mood again with Vader doing a Basil Fawlty impression. I haven't laughed so much since I saw Freddie Gets Fingered!
Genius, from beginning to end. Or is it The End? (Actually probably 'yes', according to what George Lucas has said.)