The Humour Does Help

Rating: 8/10 (27 July 2013)

Amazing to think that this was once considered the weak link of the original ST trilogy . Time has told us that THE PHANTOM MENACE and its two follow ups shows us that that there's a sucker born every minute who will watch any old rubbish if it ties in with STAR WARS . While watching RETURN OF THE JEDI I was struck as to how impressive it was in its own right never mind compared to the prequels spewed up by Lucas but also how superior it was to James Cameron's AVATAR a film that owes a lot to this one
Story wise JEDI is no great shakes , being just a retread of the most part of the first film where The Imperial Empire are building a Death Star and the Rebel Alliance trying to stop them . Where the film does succeed is a sense of humour when the first half concentrates on the droids R2D2 and the camp and cowardly C3PO as they find themselves at the mercy of Jabba . Some fans of the series might complain that this loses some of the darkness that EMPIRE contained but as someone who isn't this was welcomed by me since it makes the film more watchable as a neutral audience member
The story then jumps to the forest world of Endor which is populated by Ewoks . Lucas is on record as saying a technologically advanced power being beaten by a backward guerrilla force was inspired by Vietnam and you can see the parallels to an extent and while you won't be reminded of APOCALYPSE NOW you are aware that that Cameron had the same idea with AVATAR but at least the scenes on Endor don't suffer from the ponderous effects laden self importance we got with Cameron
RETURN OF THE JEDI ends the trilogy that became part of a great number of peoples childhoods . I was never taken too much by the STAR WARS films though I was impressed by the costume design and I can see why so many people fell in love with the original movies . They are entertaining where the story telling and special effects compliment one another rather than the story being written around the effects and set pieces as happens in so many films in the 21st Century so even for nostalgic reasons I can understand he affection the films are held in . Just a pity Lucas had to go and ruin things by later making a trilogy of product placement