Undoubtedly the best of the new trilogy

Rating: 8/10 (18 May 2005)

OK, first, I have to say I'm not a Star Wars fan. I got a kick out of the original trilogy as a kid, but since then I watched a couple of the original films maybe once more. Episode one I hated. It was boring and pompous, and wholly unexciting. Episode 2 was slightly better, but still, I found it pointless, as nothing really interesting happened. I was just about to write off Lucas as a hack. Enter Episode 3. Here we get all the goodies that Lucas denied us in the previous two films. If in Episodes 1 & 2 the feeling was he had been holding back, this time Lucas unleashes his imagination and lets it roam wildly. Needless to say, the visuals are stunning. CGI has never looked this good. The action and fight sequences almost consistently take your breath away. Apart for a few scenes in the beginning involving Anakin & Amidala (which unfortunately have some of the corniest dialogue I heard), the rest of the scenes are well-written and engaging. I was happy to see the acting has improved greatly since the last time around. This time we don't get the feeling the actors are reciting the lines. We actually get to see some emotion! And as the film progresses, the emotions get more intense, and the tension rises. Hayden Christensen does a wonderful job, and his performance becomes more powerful the darker he becomes. The only weak link, acting-wise, is Ian McDiarmid, whose performance as Palpatine is sometimes ridiculously over the top. Another of the film's strongest points is the intelligence of the script, which presents us with a dilemma about the nature of evil. We are exposed to several definitions of the differences between the Force and the Sith, and what makes a Jedi dark, and to be honest I found myself more than once empathizing with the dark side. The Force is presented as something cold and detached, while the Dark Side is dark because it's driven by the passions and weaknesses that makes us human. Going to the film, I had a lot of doubts, but soon after I was swept up in the excitement. I think I'm starting to get what all the fans are fussing about.