Now the Circle is Complete...

Rating: 9/10 (26 May 2005)

The third film in each of the Star Wars trilogies seems to be about redemption. For Return of the Jedi, redemption came to Luke Skywalker's father, Darth Vader. In Revenge of the Sith, Vader's father, George Lucas, is redeemed.
Like many other fans of the Star Wars saga, I entered the theater with much hope, but also much trepidation. Ever since George Lucas announced his plans to do the prequel trilogy, I would wait for each movie with baited breath, get pumped up by the trailers (and I was one of those who would see a film specifically because a Star Wars trailer was packaged with it) and the hype, and then feel a little (or more) let down by the end result. This time around, I vowed not to be swayed by the hype, even though early reviews indicated Sith to be on a par with The Empire Strikes Back, which many (myself included) consider to be the best chapter of the saga. I would watch the film with as few outside influences as possible, and then judge for myself.
I left the theater with the feeling that all of the praise the film receives is well deserved.
The script draws heavily from the legend of Faust, and specifically Goethe's interpretation of the legend, in which a good man agrees to sell his should to the devil in exchange for knowledge and power.
The opening scroll reveals that full scale war has broken across the galaxy, and that Chancellor Palpatine has been kidnapped by Separatist forces under Count Dooku. Anakin Skywalker and Obi Wan Kenobi are dispatched to rescue him.
This opening sequence establishes Anakin Skywalker's growth since the last film. While still cocky and arrogant (traits that follow Vader into the next trilogy), Anakin is now more controlled and more capable than he had been in the previous films. This is seen mainly in the confrontation with Count Dooku:
OBI WAN
This time we'll take him together.
ANAKIN
I was about to say that.
It's clear that Anakin has matured significantly since Episode II. Now, although Obi Wan is still considered the master and Anakin the apprentice, Kenobi will defer to his student's judgment. There is more mutual respect between them. At one point, Obi Wan even acknowledges that Anakin is a greater Jedi than he himself could ever hope to be.
So with all of this going for Anakin, what is it that turns him from the Light and gives rise to Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith? Believe it or not, it's his own good intentions. Anakin's motivations for doing what he does are understandable, even admirable, although his actions may be less so. And these actions carry with them grave consequences which Anakin is fully aware of. He is tortured by his fears and desires and by his conscience which pulls him in opposite directions, the stuff of great personal conflict. Anakin's internal conflict weighs heavily in every decision that Anakin makes throughout the film, and in the end of course, fear and desire wins out with tragic results.
Chancellor Palpatine/Darth Sidious preys upon Anakin's fears with subtle layers that he is unable to resist, by appealing to the nobler aspects of his character. At the same time, he maneuvers the Jedi across the galaxy, spreading their force thin enough to overwhelm them with the clone troopers' superior numbers. Watching Palpatine operate in this film is like watching the final six moves in a grandmaster chess match.
The climactic duel between Anakin and Obi Wan was as visually stunning as the one between Obi Wan, Qui Gon Jinn, and Darth Maul in The Phantom Menace, and surpasses the one in Return of the Jedi between Luke and his father, in terms of emotional intensity. Obi Wan's heart is breaking even as he forced to confront his best friend, and the audience's hearts break alongside his.
Lucas has these past few years been criticized for placing visuals above story and character development. Sith, however, shows that both story and character were there all along, but that we were looking too closely to see it for what it was until the third chapter placed everything in perspective, just as the Republic and the Separatists in this trilogy did not realize that an Empire was being created until it was too late.
Sith not only succeeds on its own as a film, but also manages to elevate the ones that came before it. The jabor snippet carving that Anakin made for Padmé in a seemingly throwaway scene from The Phantom Menace returns in Sith with new emotional and symbolic weight as it represents all of the innocence that Anakin has lost since he was a boy.
Also, the way and reasons for Anakin's turn to the Dark Side bring new resonance to Luke's training with Yoda in Empire, particularly when Luke interrupts his training to try to rescue his friends Han and Leia. We see how well justified Yoda's reservations are in taking on a new apprentice in Luke.
Sith, therefore, is the film which places the entire prequel trilogy into context, much as Empire did with the original trilogy. It is the keystone film that completes the saga, and in the words of Darth Vader himself, "Now the circle is complete."