Went with my family to see Star Wars III the day
after it came out (for my wife's birthday), and pretty much reviewed
it in a response I posted to a newsgroup, seen below. --Mike--
> Yeah this movie was the tragedy
that GL promised us, I walked around all
> day today feeling slightly worse then when my last GF and I broke
up, now
> thats powerful s***! The part where they are putting vader back
together, and
> Padme dying in childbirth really strikes a chord.
My reply: For me, no comparison to the way I felt leaving the
theater after Episode V,
Empire Strikes Back. Opening night, San Francisco, midnight show and
out on the street at 2:45am wondering what was to become of Han Solo
and whether Darth Vader really was Luke's father... not to mention a
universe in which your friends turn on you and then come back to
help, all in the briefest period of time. And knowing that the
answers were three years away! A very different feeling than when
you're looking at the past (as in Episode III).
> 1) Yoda being a total badass. Alas, if he could have just hung
on
> with his fingernails, the galaxy would be safe.
> 2) Grievous was awesome. Not only in concept, but the execution
of
> his character and animation was flawless. Ditto the clone
troopers.
> 3) Palpatine was really good. If Ian McD had sucked, this movie
> wouldn't have worked at all.
> 4) The Anakin/Obi-wan sabre battle lived up to expectations.
> 5) The memory wipe debate has been settled.
> 6) Bail Organa was actually cool.
My reply: The younger Yoda is certainly a force to be
reckoned with, and a lot of fun to watch.
Palpatine was interesting most of the time, but Obi-Wan was the only
person on-screen who really held my interest. His emotions, for the
most part, seemed realistic for the setting. Most everyone else
seemed caught up in their own little world while the universe was
collapsing around them. But even Obi-Wan, at times, was a bit too
detached for his surroundings (such as when they land on the
Imperial ship to "rescue" Palpatine, and he's having an
almost-casual conversation with Anakin while a fierce battle is
going on outside *and* inside the ship).
>> 4) I hate it when Lucas betrays a character just out of plot
laziness.
>> Who believes Obi-wan would have left Anakin in the condition he
was in
>> without putting him out of his misery? But that would have
fouled up
>> Ep4, wouldn't it?
My reply: What comes around, goes around. We saw Anakin
burning, and later Anakin saw to it that the same fate came to
Luke's Aunt & Uncle. Upon re-watching Episode 4 (the original)
tonight, I feel that the scene where you see the two bodies not just
burnt down to the bone, but laid out in a way that just reeked of
agony... I don't think it was any less powerful than watching Anakin
burn, and perhaps more so... especially since we know Anakin will
survive. As we watch it, we're trying to figure out how they're
going to put him back together again, what it is that makes it
so he can only breathe through his mask etc. That takes away from
the spectacle of a man burning to death.
In my humble opinion, Lucas would make better movies if forced to
deal with a smaller budget. Just because you can do something, given
enough money, doesn't mean that you should do something. The
effects are so incredible in Ep3, and so continuous, that it tends
to overshadow the acting.
OK, I lied. While in general I'm trying to make a case that the
story is more important than the effects, and that the effects can
(and, with George Lucas, often do) get in the way, Yoda proves it
doesn't have to be that way. Yoda is nothing but special
effects, and everything about Yoda is real and interesting. Yoda is
truly the best of both worlds.
And, since this newsgroup is startrek.vs.starwars after all,
I'll toss in something else. Star Wars III wouldn't work without
spectacular special effects. The story and acting just don't seem
like they'd pull it off on their own; we care more about cool stuff
on the screen than we do the drama that's being played out. Contrast
that to Star Trek First Contact, and the relationships between
Picard, Data, Worf, Lily & the Borg Queen. Even the Enterprise. They
were all things that you (or some of us anyway) cared about, and we
watched, not wanting to see the next cool special effect, but to see
how nuts Picard would become, whether he could patch things up with
Worf, and how vulnerable Data was to the things that make us human.
I don't think people left the theater thinking "Geez, those were
cheesy special effects, I sure wish they had a bigger budget and
could have done more."
Lucas, on the other hand, can't leave well-enough alone and goes
back to doctor up his originals, adding in more effects that he
couldn't afford to do at the time. Does it really make the Spaceport
(in Episode IV, the "original") more real to have all sorts of
ridable creatures in town, as well as add in a bunch of traffic in
the air? For that matter, in Episode III (as well as Episodes I &
II, if I recall correctly), where are all those millions of people
flying back & forth from & to? Or is it a metaphor for
unsettledness, an inability to stay in any one place for a period of
time?
Overall, Episode III was a good, fun movie. But it wasn't a great
movie. Episode V/ Empire Strikes Back was a great movie, a
near-epic. It left you caring about the people in it. It left you
hanging with weighty questions.
Chain Reaction sells bicycles & accessories
from Trek, Gary Fisher, BikeFriday,Shimano, Pearl Izumi, Continental, Descente,
Sidi, Giro, Blackburn, Speedplay, Oakley, Saris, NiteRider, Bontrager,
Torelli, Look, DeFeet, Rock N Roll, Hammer, Cytomax,
Powerbar, Fox, Clif
Bar, CamelBak, Chris King, Profile Design, Craft, X-Lab and many more!
Select & join email lists
