Back to what made it great

Rating: 7/10 (19 May 2005)

George Lucas returned to the style that made the original Star Wars trilogy so memorable. The significance of the original trilogy was its use of implementing aspects of historical films. This is abundantly seen in "A New Hope" with its parallel of Samurai films and classic westerns. The second installment, "Empire Strikes Back," is full of this form of homage as well; even paying homage to detective noir classics with Luke's search through Cloud City for his comrades. While this aspect has been missing from the two previous films of the prequel series it returns in this latest installment. George Lucas pays homage to classic romances with cuts from Anakin to Padme showing what love has done to each of them and reminding the viewer of what classic romance films continually did: love is hell. The homage continues when Lucas places Obi-Wan on a lizard-like beast reminding us of classic "prehistoric serials" even the music accompanying the scene has a "Land of the Lost" type of feel. And lest even the dimmest of viewers missed it, who could not appreciate the homage paid to Frankenstein in the scene introducing Darth Vader to the universe. Thanks for all of the great memories in these terrific trilogies George.