Nostalgia.....Have you felt it?

Rating: 8/10 (24 December 2015)

I don't need to explain what this movie is; everyone knows what Star Wars is, we all know there were three good ones and then there were three not-so-good ones. It's no secret that this movie is the most important film of the year to a lot of people...so what did I think?
I'll star off with what I enjoyed, which was a lot. I always love a J.J. Abrams film and so I enjoyed seeing his directing now in this Universe. He gives you some absolutely amazing shots showing you this fantastic world and it's characters, a highlight for me being the opening scenes. He also does action pieces well, and a few times I could see things reminiscent of 2009's Star Trek; so on a directing front I can't think of anyone else who could've done it. In a similar vein to that, I love the use of practical effects in this; the film of course had CGI and used it well but I always smiled when seeing what I knew was really there, weather it be some alien bird pecking away or a monstrous thug lounging in a bar, it really worked well.
Script-wise was not bad at all. I think they did humour pretty well, I definitely laughed out loud at scenes, maybe for me personally one or two didn't land as much but as a whole it's entertaining on that front. The drama as well was done excellently; you really fell in love with these characters and were invested in their lives, including even the little BB-8 droid and Oscar Isaac's cool-guy pilot character, which added to the emotional beats and shocks of the plot. A high point for me was the Finn and Poe friendship that had very short screen-time but in those moments you could see these guys were bros.
Just mentioning the cast quickly, Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher did great jobs reprising their roles, couldn't fault them really and they jelled so well with the new guys, Daisy Ridley and John Boyega who were phenomenal and can definitely see them having future careers. I loved their characters and am looking forward to seeing them again. Mark Hamill was also in this film and all I'm going to say is that I enjoyed every moment he was on screen.
Now for some things I didn't enjoy as much. Don't get me wrong, The Force Awakens is definitely it's own thing and gives us places and concepts we've not seen before but unfortunately it did slip into a similar problem Jurassic World had which was that it just recreated too many moments and plot points from it's predecessors. Scenes were happening where I was thinking "Really? We're doing this again?" and that was it's main weakness for me, too much of what we'd already had and so it made it predictable in or or two places.
Another point that I'd like to mention, that may only be something I feel, but the climax didn't seem very....climactic. It wasn't until we were in the middle of a scene and I thought about how long it had already been on that I realised I was watching the final battle, as it were. It was fine in itself, definitely some tense and action packed moments but I think due to the fact that the movie was constantly fast paced it didn't transition well that this was now something big.
In the end Star Wars: The Force Awakens is a fantastic movie and entertaining on it's own, it gives some exciting references and cameos for the long-term fans but if you're not a casual viewer then you may feel it's retreading some familiar ground.