Star Wars Episode II: Attack Of The Groans
Written: May 27 '02 (Updated Jun 08 '02)
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: Action; Special Effects; Yoda's ready for his close-up; Christopher Lee
Cons: Dialogue, acting, pacing
The Bottom Line: See Review - "The Empire Strikes Back" is still King!!
|
|
|
| green1's Full Review: Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones |
The films in the “Star Wars” series have had their share of dramatic, shocking revelations. The most famous and effective was Darth Vader’s disclosure to Luke Skywalker of his true lineage in 1980’s “The Empire Strikes Back”. It got a little ridiculous with “Return Of The Jedi” (1983), which revealed Princess Leia as Luke’s sister. And Chewbacca was his cousin, and R2-D2 was his ice cream maker, and...
In any event, George Lucas’s latest chapter in the franchise, “Episode II: Attack Of The Clones”, brings us perhaps the most outrageous, mind-blowing revelation of all. Are you sitting down? All those Jedi Knights were VIRGINS!! That’s right – one of the most solemn tenets in the Jedi creed is that you do not take lovers. You do not marry. Apparently, romance clouds the mind. At least they’re more productive than many of 21st Century America’s virgins who, instead of defending the Republic, prefer to sit at computers and type out a lot of run-on sentences (“hi my name is matt any hot females out there wanna chat im horny 4 U now!”). I suppose it’s no surprise that the galaxy has been so well protected by the Jedi so far: imagine all that pent-up energy.
That’s only one of the frustrations Jedi-in-training Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) faces in “Clones”. Ten years have passed since Anakin had his first adventure in 1999’s “The Phantom Menace”, and he’s now got the serious hots for Padme Amidala (Natalie Portman - who could blame him?) and is bristling under the tutelage of his mentor, Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan MacGregor). Anakin knows how strong in the Force he is, and is growing impatient with what he perceives as a slow training schedule. His own struggle with anger, impatience and his love for Padme take place in the shadow of a possible civil war in the Galactic Republic, with some kind of separatist group, headed by rouge Jedi Count Dooku (the legendary Christopher Lee), conducting a campaign of terror and attempted assassinations.
There’s lots of political stuff, and meetings, and scheming, yada, yada, yada. There was enough of that in the disappointing “Phantom Menace”. Fortunately, Lucas, in perhaps a round-about way of admitting he dropped the ball in ’99, cranks the action in “Clones” up considerably, showcasing some staggeringly exciting fight sequences. There’s a cool fight on a rain-soaked planet (but then again, fighting in the rain is always cool) between Obi-Wan and bounty hunter Jango Fett (Temuera Morrison) as well as a virtuoso finale (which pays homage to both “Gladiator” and “Saving Private Ryan”) in which hordes of robot troops take on hordes of clone troops on an open battlefield. My favorite part is a terrific scene in which Fett pursues Obi-Wan through an asteroid field.
There is, however, the matter of getting through all the stilted acting, wooden dialogue and zero chemistry between Christensen and Portman. Lucas seems to have lost either the ability or the will to inject any sort of human element into a story. Most of the dialogue exists solely to let the audience know what’s going on at any given moment; there’s almost nothing memorable, save for an occasional snippet here and there. There’s a scene in a bar in which Obi-Wan uses that Jedi hypnotism jazz to get rid of a drug dealer. This could have been a truly funny moment, but it seems rushed, as if Lucas just wants to cut to the next chase. Timing is a major weakness in this movie.
Comedy, regrettably, is infrequent; there is a wonderful little flash of humor where Obi-Wan hugs an old buddy, a chubby alien with four arms. He uses two hands to embrace the Jedi, and one to hike the back of his pants up over his butt crack. If you blink, you’ll miss the whole thing, but it’s very funny.
It’s frustrating to watch the actors, many of whom are normally fawned over by the critics, toil under such pretentious, clunky dialogue. Christensen may or may not be a capable actor; it’s hard to tell when all he’s given to work with are lines like, “I am haunted by the kiss you should never have given me.” He has one instance where he really emotes, in a scene with Padme where he describes how he murdered an entire tribe of Tusken Raiders to avenge his mother’s death. He tells her: “They were animals...and I slaughtered them like animals!!” In that moment, you completely feel his rage, and a foreboding of his dark future, but it’s fleeting. Then he starts to cry, and the fakeness of it is palpable.
MacGregor makes the most out of his role as Obi-Wan; with his beard and more relaxed manner, he really seems to have aged ten years since “Episode I”, and has more of an Alec Guinness air about him. Portman, whom one of our local critics once called “the greatest thing to happen to movies since Dolby Stereo”, says a lot with her eyes, but doesn’t appear to move the rest of her face, except for the occasional smile, at which point the rest of the screen disappears. Lucas, fortunately, gets her out of those massive robes and the kabuki makeup that rendered her virtually unrecognizable in the last film. She looks positively delicious in this chapter, with a generous amount of costume changes, which accent her beautifully. The great Samuel L. Jackson sat on his hands and was generally wasted in “Phantom Menace”; here, returning as Jedi Master Mace Windu, he gets a chance to strut his lightsaber stuff in the finale. Confronting Dooku, he says, “This party’s over”, and gives Lee the same look he gave that hapless drug dealer at the beginning of “Pulp Fiction” (1994). Feel the Force, mutherf**ker.
Oh, Yoda, Yoda, Yoda. How I have waited for your whoop-a$$ moment...for 22 years, to be exact. You do not disappoint. See Yoda spin. See Yoda do somersaults over his opponent. See Yoda wield a lightsaber and that blue lightning thing-a-ma-jig with equal proficiency.
The action and special effects are a huge improvement over the first three movies, but at the expense of engaging characters who endear themselves to you and advance the story by virtue of their personalities. The sense of fun and joy is clearly gone from the “Star Wars” franchise, and things aren’t likely to change with “Episode III”, which Lucas is already calling the darkest chapter ever. My advice, for die-hard fans, is to sit back and enjoy what’s available; crumbs from George Lucas’s table are still better than a feast from Michael Bay or Renny Harlin.
Recommended:
Yes
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
green1
|
|
Location: Annandale, Virginia
Reviews written: 75
Trusted by: 22 members
About Me:
Yes, I am a pig!!
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.