Spectacular movie

Rating: 10/10 (29 May 2008)

I remember when this movie was re-released in theatres about 10 years ago I went to see it with my family and was disappointed. I definitely preferred the sequel The Empire Strikes Back. Star Wars (by which I mean Episode IV) seemed to lack energy in comparison. Recently I rented it, however, and my opinion of it has changed. This is a candidate for being the best movie in the series. I watched it three times. Although you wouldn't think you'd need to mature to appreciate an action movie, this is a smart movie and the action actually is good. It would probably be thrilling had I not known that the Death Star would be destroyed- just as it was about to destroy another planet!
There are times, admittedly, where you can tell this is from the same guy (George Lucas) who wrote the appalling dialogue from Episodes I and II. Episode III was better because Lucas sought help. But Episode IV is mostly fine because Lucas keeps it simple and to the point. The biggest redundancy is a later addition; the new scene with Jabba the Hutt is awful. It adds no information to what we got with the scene with Greedo. But as this is an added scene, I won't hold that against the original movie.