More machine now than man

Rating: 7/10 (20 May 2005)

There's a good line in Return of the Jedi: "He's more machine now than man". Obi-Wan is, of course, speaking of Darth Vader, but he could just as well have been Alec Guinness speaking of George Lucas. Lucas simply seems more at home with machinery than he does with people. He can conjure up truly eye-popping battle sequences, but when it comes to two people in a room talking, he just flounders, becoming what some critics call "medusa director": Turning his actors into stone.
Even someone as talented as Ewan MacGregor just can't make some of Lucas' ham-fisted dialogue work, although his final words to the nascent Darth Vader are suitably Shakespearian in their tragedy. But poor Natalie Portman: Just when she has wrenched out some great emotional body language, she has to try and reel off the most dreadful clunkers, and her whole performance just falls flat on its face.
The same goes double for Hayden Christensen. There are moments when he absolutely burns up the screen (no pun intended). His final scene with his pregnant wife is truly dark. He is the hurt, angry man who justifies himself by imagining he is betrayed and misunderstood. You almost expect him to give her a backhander ... which telekinetically he does.
However, at what is supposed to be his moment of greatest torment, his performance is made a mockery of by Lucas' pure directorial lunk-headedness. As Anakin finally wakens to find himself become machine-man Darth Vader, and to realise the enormity of his error, Lucas slaps him with the oh-puh-lease dumbest scene of the whole film: In a mind-bogglingly stupid pastiche of "Frankenstein", he lumbers off the operating table and screams "Noooooooooooooooo!!!!" Why not go the whole hog, George, and have him shout "Khaaaaaannnnnnnnn!!!!!"? There are other moments, though, that are truly terrific: The Emperor's Night of the Long Knives betrayal of the Jedi, especially Anakin's murderous rampage in the Jedi Academy, is magnificently tragic.
Ian McDiarmid's performance as Emperor Palpatine is suitably sinister. In fact, in many of his scenes with Anakin, he comes across as almost paedophilic in his lust to pervert the young Jedi. Unfortunately, at the same time, these scenes have some of the movie's clumsiest moments of exposition. Anakin's anti-heroic journey to being a Sith Lord at times just is not believable. However, Palpatine's transformation into the scarred and deformed emperor, and Anakin's ordeal by fire, are indeed horrific.
I would advise George Lucas to take a long hard look at the "Lord of the Rings" movies. Peter Jackson has not only shown how to create an artificial world that is totally believable, he is also adept at directing humans. For instance, in "The Fellowship of the Ring", what is, for my money the single greatest scene in the film is the purely human moment of the Fellowship weeping for the lost Gandalf.
Again, to compare the two: Both "Fellowship of the Ring" and "Revenge of the Sith" feature tree cities. Peter Jackson's looked absolutely believable. George Lucas' looks exactly like a digitally rendered model.
All in all, Peter Jackson shows George Lucas up to be just what he sometimes is: The most talented second-unit director ever.
But did I like it? Well yes I did, very much. The closing scenes, with their subtle little vignettes from "Star Wars Episode IV" (including a brief glimpse of Grand Moff Tarkin) almost made me feel 12 years old again. But I really shouldn't find myself bursting out laughing at what is supposed to be one of the greatest moments of high drama in the film.