A Steady Decline in Scriptwriting

Rating: 1/10 (29 November 2005)

Duelling, dueling, dueling, over a sea of lava? Remember the charm of the first Star Wars movie? The market scenes, the buddy stuff, the rapid-fire conversations with three or more persons exchanging conflicting views or anticipating the next crisis? The long suspension of threat as in the garbage disposal scene in the first movie? And no boring, illogical, laser fights? All gone into history. Now, clichéd dialog and endless battle scenes. The exploration and conflict of ideas is given two or three minutes, and though the actors try their best, fundamental changes happen too fast. More script on talk, and less on action. Please. I say (in many contexts) action is boring, talk is interesting. And Yoda was so out of character that I thought Lucas must have had nothing to do with the film. A great embarrassment, and a candidate for the worst movie ever made, especially against the background of some great ones earlier. Other reviewers who rated this film low have pointed out many more defects. Peter Morgan