Review: Star Wars - Epsiode III

[dmp]

I saw this movie yesterday and was mildly surprised. I was surprised after the HORRIBLE first two (especially the 2nd) - that Lucas could make a BETTER film. Better, sorta. I mean, the first 30 minutes, and last 30 or so are good. The rest is 'eh? Okay...whatever.'

Chock-full of HORRIBLE cheesy, predictable lines:

"I love you..."
"NO!! I love YOU!!!"

:vomit3:

and who could forget the

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" at the end of the movie.

Stupid.

What is WITH Jedi who seem SO powerful and in-tune, yet get their butts kicked one minute, and do the ass-kicking the next.

Did I miss how the Jedi could NOT have known Padma was Preg, AND instantly sense 'the force' in the kids?

What the hell was up with Lucas? I mean...seriously, did that guy go to the trouble of building even ONE set for that movie? It seemed more cartoon than live-action at times. Geesh. Yes. We GET it. Lucas likes Animation.

Whatever.


As a whole the first three brought shame upon the 'last' three, which featured at LEAST real-live sets and at least MODERATELY-skilled actors and writers.



Two stars out of Five.

 

[Hagbard Celine]

Turbo nerd alert.

 

[insein]

Welcome to last year DMP, lol.

Anyway, the 3rd i felt was the 2nd best film overall IMO.

ESB
ROTS
ANH
ROTJ
AOTC
PM

 

[dmp]

One day I'll watch The Fast and the Furious, and give a review.

 

[Dan]

One day I'll watch The Fast and the Furious, and give a review.

Don't do it, man. Don't. Do it.

Actually, you'd probably like it. The first one had some genuinely cool car chases and stuff, it was just surrounded by a terrible plot and worse acting. I've never seen 2 Fast or Tokyo Drift, but I couldn't imagine they're much better. But, since you're a car guy, you'd probably get more into it. Clay would be able to give a better review than me, probably.

As for Ep. III, the first half hour was somewhat decent (far better than Ep. II, anyway), then it just steadily got worse and worse.

I don't know if it was on here, but somewhere someone made a good point, which is that these movies were originally made for kids. Everybody who truly appreciated the original trilogy appreciated it because they were little kids when they saw it. So, no matter how much Lucas and all the nerds would like to remember it differently, these movies are basically kids' movies. Well-made and thoroughly entertaining (the first three anyway), but kids' movies nonetheless. I'm not sure if kids liked the new trilogy or not, did they?

But, either way, none of them are exactly well-written. The dialogue never, in all six movies, rose above the level of your average soap opera. I guess it helps to have Harrison Ford selling those lines for you, though.

 

[insein]

Don't do it, man. Don't. Do it.

Actually, you'd probably like it. The first one had some genuinely cool car chases and stuff, it was just surrounded by a terrible plot and worse acting. I've never seen 2 Fast or Tokyo Drift, but I couldn't imagine they're much better. But, since you're a car guy, you'd probably get more into it. Clay would be able to give a better review than me, probably.

As for Ep. III, the first half hour was somewhat decent (far better than Ep. II, anyway), then it just steadily got worse and worse.

I don't know if it was on here, but somewhere someone made a good point, which is that these movies were originally made for kids. Everybody who truly appreciated the original trilogy appreciated it because they were little kids when they saw it. So, no matter how much Lucas and all the nerds would like to remember it differently, these movies are basically kids' movies. Well-made and thoroughly entertaining (the first three anyway), but kids' movies nonetheless. I'm not sure if kids liked the new trilogy or not, did they?

But, either way, none of them are exactly well-written. The dialogue never, in all six movies, rose above the level of your average soap opera. I guess it helps to have Harrison Ford selling those lines for you, though.

or Ewen McGregor. Definitely the 2 best actors out of the whole thing. No offense to Alec Guiness.

 

[Hobbit]

Don't do it, man. Don't. Do it.

Actually, you'd probably like it. The first one had some genuinely cool car chases and stuff, it was just surrounded by a terrible plot and worse acting. I've never seen 2 Fast or Tokyo Drift, but I couldn't imagine they're much better. But, since you're a car guy, you'd probably get more into it. Clay would be able to give a better review than me, probably.

As for Ep. III, the first half hour was somewhat decent (far better than Ep. II, anyway), then it just steadily got worse and worse.

I don't know if it was on here, but somewhere someone made a good point, which is that these movies were originally made for kids. Everybody who truly appreciated the original trilogy appreciated it because they were little kids when they saw it. So, no matter how much Lucas and all the nerds would like to remember it differently, these movies are basically kids' movies. Well-made and thoroughly entertaining (the first three anyway), but kids' movies nonetheless. I'm not sure if kids liked the new trilogy or not, did they?

But, either way, none of them are exactly well-written. The dialogue never, in all six movies, rose above the level of your average soap opera. I guess it helps to have Harrison Ford selling those lines for you, though.

My parents saw it when they were dating in their late 20s and they loved it and still love it, even to this day.

 

[Gunny]

Don't do it, man. Don't. Do it.

Actually, you'd probably like it. The first one had some genuinely cool car chases and stuff, it was just surrounded by a terrible plot and worse acting. I've never seen 2 Fast or Tokyo Drift, but I couldn't imagine they're much better. But, since you're a car guy, you'd probably get more into it. Clay would be able to give a better review than me, probably.

As for Ep. III, the first half hour was somewhat decent (far better than Ep. II, anyway), then it just steadily got worse and worse.

I don't know if it was on here, but somewhere someone made a good point, which is that these movies were originally made for kids. Everybody who truly appreciated the original trilogy appreciated it because they were little kids when they saw it. So, no matter how much Lucas and all the nerds would like to remember it differently, these movies are basically kids' movies. Well-made and thoroughly entertaining (the first three anyway), but kids' movies nonetheless. I'm not sure if kids liked the new trilogy or not, did they?

But, either way, none of them are exactly well-written. The dialogue never, in all six movies, rose above the level of your average soap opera. I guess it helps to have Harrison Ford selling those lines for you, though.

The movie wasn't really made for kids that I'm aware of. To put things in perspective, the best FX we had prior to Star Wars was the original Star Trek variety. There was nothing like it. And oddly enough, the first Star Wars has the least amount of FX. But every time I went and saw one of the movies the theaters were full of adults WITH their kids.

I think where the disservice was done was in making the last three episodes first. It's really hard to make the connection between episodes I-III then IV-VI because of the level of action and FX. For instance, the duel at the end of IV hardly compares to the duel at the end of III.

 

[insein]

The movie wasn't really made for kids that I'm aware of. To put things in perspective, the best FX we had prior to Star Wars was the original Star Trek variety. There was nothing like it. And oddly enough, the first Star Wars has the least amount of FX. But every time I went and saw one of the movies the theaters were full of adults WITH their kids.

I think where the disservice was done was in making the last three episodes first. It's really hard to make the connection between episodes I-III then IV-VI because of the level of action and FX. For instance, the duel at the end of IV hardly compares to the duel at the end of III.

Its the way it had to be done. Telling the story in order would have resulted in SW not existing the way it is today. Imagine if Phantom Menace was the first Star Wars movie back in 1977? People wouldnt have embraced it the same as episode 4. Episode 4 stood on its own right as a cool Sci-Fi action movie even if no other movie was ever made. Just the way it had to be done.

 

[Hobbit]

The movie wasn't really made for kids that I'm aware of. To put things in perspective, the best FX we had prior to Star Wars was the original Star Trek variety. There was nothing like it. And oddly enough, the first Star Wars has the least amount of FX. But every time I went and saw one of the movies the theaters were full of adults WITH their kids.

I think where the disservice was done was in making the last three episodes first. It's really hard to make the connection between episodes I-III then IV-VI because of the level of action and FX. For instance, the duel at the end of IV hardly compares to the duel at the end of III.

Well, originally, episodes 4-6 was the whole thing. The prequal was an afterthought. That being said, it was a great effect that Lucas was going for. According to interviews, he was trying to achieve the effect of a Kurasawa film in the western world and at the same time make it seem a little like the serial episodes from the old theatres, but make it seem as if you'd missed the first couple of episodes. When he was in film school, he had to watch Kurasawa, and he knew nothing of Samurai culture. Nobody in the films bothered to explain it, because the target audience was familiar with Samurai culture. Lucas was lost and had to poke his way through the culture as he went. At the same time, he loved the old serials, such as Flash Gordon, and also liked poking through the story after missing the first couple of episodes. Thus, when he made Star Wars, he came up with a backstory for the characters, and then started the epic without ever bothering to explain what's going on, allowing people to sort of feel their way through it.

The prequal trilogy, on the other hand, was an afterthought that was made not because it needed to be, but because it could be. It also could not have been filmed in 1977, because the effects necessary to creat entire armies of clone troops and the planet Coruscant did not exist.

As far as the duals in the movies, the level of skill makes sense. The duals in the prequal trilogy occur between young, strong Jedi trained in the art of the saber from the time they can walk. The progressively get faster and more intense as the level of emotion and the skill of the fighters progresses until it is a hate-filled Anakin and a very distresses Obi-Wan, the third and fourth most skilled Jedi in the galaxy, going at it with intensity. In the original trilogy, there's only 3 Jedi involved who have sabers. There's Obi-Wan, who is old and growing feeble, and he can't pull off the Yoda thing because he's not that bad***. There's Darth Vader/Anakin Skywalker, whose mobility is rather limited by the mechanical parts. Then there's Luke, who has not been trained to use the saber and thus isn't as skilled as the Jedi of old.

Oh, and my order of episodes from best to worst:

The Empire Strikes Back
TIE: A New Hope
Return of the Jedi
Revenge of the Sith
Attack of the Clones
The Phantom Menace
The One That Shall Not Be Named (it involved wookies with pet names and had nothing to do with Lucas

 

[Redhots]

Its the way it had to be done. Telling the story in order would have resulted in SW not existing the way it is today. Imagine if Phantom Menace was the first Star Wars movie back in 1977? People wouldnt have embraced it the same as episode 4. Episode 4 stood on its own right as a cool Sci-Fi action movie even if no other movie was ever made. Just the way it had to be done.

I sees yousa besa partada camp that doesn't think Lucas pulled the last three, which are acutally the first three, out of his ass to make even more money before he retires.

Lucas was on record long ago saying he never understood why fans liked Boba-Fett, he was a minor character with no lines and Lucas never liked him himself. But in the 2nd movie him and his dad are main characters...? Come on.

 

[Hobbit]

I sees yousa besa partada camp that doesn't think Lucas pulled the last three, which are acutally the first three, out of his ass to make even more money before he retires.

Lucas was on record long ago saying he never understood why fans liked Boba-Fett, he was a minor character with no lines and Lucas never liked him himself. But in the 2nd movie him and his dad are main characters...? Come on.

Yeah, he even admits it was an afterthought. I think his problem was not so much money-grubbing, but that he lost his focus. When he made the originals, he knew EXACTLY what he wanted and did his best to make it happen. When he made the prequal, which he never intended to do, it was due to fan pressure. Well, with that in mind, he didn't have a clear vision and let the fans shape the movie too much. When he made the originals and somebody said something to the effect of, "That's dumb. You should do this," he'd just blow them off. In the new ones, it looks like he bowed to pressure.

 

[insein]

I sees yousa besa partada camp that doesn't think Lucas pulled the last three, which are acutally the first three, out of his ass to make even more money before he retires.

Lucas was on record long ago saying he never understood why fans liked Boba-Fett, he was a minor character with no lines and Lucas never liked him himself. But in the 2nd movie him and his dad are main characters...? Come on.

Boba Fett was the shit though. He had lines. I hate the updated DVDs with the new guys voice as BF though. I loved the old menacing, NON Australian voice.

 

[KarlMarx]

I saw this movie yesterday and was mildly surprised. I was surprised after the HORRIBLE first two (especially the 2nd) - that Lucas could make a BETTER film. Better, sorta. I mean, the first 30 minutes, and last 30 or so are good. The rest is 'eh? Okay...whatever.'

Chock-full of HORRIBLE cheesy, predictable lines:

"I love you..."
"NO!! I love YOU!!!"

:vomit3:

and who could forget the

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" at the end of the movie.

Stupid.

What is WITH Jedi who seem SO powerful and in-tune, yet get their butts kicked one minute, and do the ass-kicking the next.

Did I miss how the Jedi could NOT have known Padma was Preg, AND instantly sense 'the force' in the kids?

What the hell was up with Lucas? I mean...seriously, did that guy go to the trouble of building even ONE set for that movie? It seemed more cartoon than live-action at times. Geesh. Yes. We GET it. Lucas likes Animation.

Whatever.


As a whole the first three brought shame upon the 'last' three, which featured at LEAST real-live sets and at least MODERATELY-skilled actors and writers.



Two stars out of Five.

Episode III was terrible (Darth Vader sells out because he doesn't want Natalie Portman to die, then he tries to kill her anyway.... yawn)

Episode II was OK (the actor that was supposed to be Annakin Skywalker... stunk... "I killed them all!!!! I hate them!!!!!!" Sounded more like a kid having a temper tantrum than Darth Vader going to the dark side)

Episode I was really terrible (Natalie Portman sucked, and not in a good way.... and those guys from the trade federation..... they reminded me of Charlie the Tuna with a Chinese accent)

Episode IV was great (BTW.... Alec Guiness wanted George Lucas to kill off his character at the end of this movie because he thought Star Wars was a silly movie.... good move on his part, considering that the sequels/prequals weren't as good. I almost believe that he died just so there was no chance of him ever having to be in those awful prequals!)

Episode V was OK

Episode VI was cheesy (Those ewoks were so retarded.... Why didn't they just go to the planet of the Care Bears instead?)

 

[insein]

Episode III was terrible (Darth Vader sells out because he doesn't want Natalie Portman to die, then he tries to kill her anyway.... yawn)

Episode II was OK (the actor that was supposed to be Annakin Skywalker... stunk... "I killed them all!!!! I hate them!!!!!!" Sounded more like a kid having a temper tantrum than Darth Vader going to the dark side)

Episode I was really terrible (Natalie Portman sucked, and not in a good way.... and those guys from the trade federation..... they reminded me of Charlie the Tuna with a Chinese accent)

Episode IV was great (BTW.... Alec Guiness wanted George Lucas to kill off his character at the end of this movie because he thought Star Wars was a silly movie.... good move on his part, considering that the sequels/prequals weren't as good. I almost believe that he died just so there was no chance of him ever having to be in those awful prequals!)

Episode V was OK

Episode VI was cheesy (Those ewoks were so retarded.... Why didn't they just go to the planet of the Care Bears instead?)

You know how much they charged for rent on the Care Bear planet? A backwater moon around Endor is way cheaper then there.

 

[Gunny]

Well, originally, episodes 4-6 was the whole thing. The prequal was an afterthought. That being said, it was a great effect that Lucas was going for. According to interviews, he was trying to achieve the effect of a Kurasawa film in the western world and at the same time make it seem a little like the serial episodes from the old theatres, but make it seem as if you'd missed the first couple of episodes. When he was in film school, he had to watch Kurasawa, and he knew nothing of Samurai culture. Nobody in the films bothered to explain it, because the target audience was familiar with Samurai culture. Lucas was lost and had to poke his way through the culture as he went. At the same time, he loved the old serials, such as Flash Gordon, and also liked poking through the story after missing the first couple of episodes. Thus, when he made Star Wars, he came up with a backstory for the characters, and then started the epic without ever bothering to explain what's going on, allowing people to sort of feel their way through it.

The prequal trilogy, on the other hand, was an afterthought that was made not because it needed to be, but because it could be. It also could not have been filmed in 1977, because the effects necessary to creat entire armies of clone troops and the planet Coruscant did not exist.

As far as the duals in the movies, the level of skill makes sense. The duals in the prequal trilogy occur between young, strong Jedi trained in the art of the saber from the time they can walk. The progressively get faster and more intense as the level of emotion and the skill of the fighters progresses until it is a hate-filled Anakin and a very distresses Obi-Wan, the third and fourth most skilled Jedi in the galaxy, going at it with intensity. In the original trilogy, there's only 3 Jedi involved who have sabers. There's Obi-Wan, who is old and growing feeble, and he can't pull off the Yoda thing because he's not that bad***. There's Darth Vader/Anakin Skywalker, whose mobility is rather limited by the mechanical parts. Then there's Luke, who has not been trained to use the saber and thus isn't as skilled as the Jedi of old.

Oh, and my order of episodes from best to worst:

The Empire Strikes Back
TIE: A New Hope
Return of the Jedi
Revenge of the Sith
Attack of the Clones
The Phantom Menace
The One That Shall Not Be Named (it involved wookies with pet names and had nothing to do with Lucas

The way I have always understood it is the complete story was the "redemption of Anniken Skywalker," and the prequel was always the first three episodes; hence, "A New Hope" being episode IV.

Making episodes I-III may have been the afterthought.

 

[Dan]

Making episodes I-III may have been the afterthought.

I thought that was what Hobbit was saying? Anyway, I agree with this sentiment. I think it had to do with a few things....

1) money, money, money

2) maybe (though I have no proof to back this up) Lucas realized that there was only one thing he ever did really successfully, and he went back to the well

3) technology caught up with Lucas's vision, though I do think that he went way too far with the CGI. No movie should ever have live actors with CG backgrounds, I've never seen it look realistic.

I really doubt that Lucas actually had the prequels planned out beyond "we'll call this one Episode IV in case I want to make more of these someday". This was proven a few times throughout the prequels, but it was most glaring to me in Ep. III, with the whole "well, C-3PO, time to erase your memory of these movies since you never mention anything that happens in IV-VI." If nothing else, that's really lazy writing.

Have they put out those original trilogy DVDs yet? I really lost all respect for Lucas with that whole debacle.

 

[KarlMarx]

The way I have always understood it is the complete story was the "redemption of Anniken Skywalker," and the prequel was always the first three episodes; hence, "A New Hope" being episode IV.

Making episodes I-III may have been the afterthought.

I remember a discussion with someone at work, in 1979, about George Lucas' plans to have 9 Star Wars movies. Three of the movies were going to be the ones we now know as Episodes IV-VI, three movies were going to occur before Episode IV and three were going to occur after Darth Vader's death.

Lucas was going to wait for technology to catch up with his ideas, because, apparently, he had some grand visions for his stories.

However, George Lucas decided in 1999 or thereabouts, that only 6 Star Wars movies were going to be produced. I remember that many fans were upset by his decision.

 

[BaronVonBigmeat]

I really wish Lucas had just written an outline for the prequels, and handed them off to a talented writer and a director, maybe Peter Jackson. He has some cool ideas but the devil is in the details as they say. He's also notorious for putting actors in front of a bluescreen, doing one take, and being satisfied with it. That's how you can see solid actors like Ewan McGregor, Liam Neeson, and Natalie Portman giving such lackluster performances, especially in Episode I. You're supposed to do multiple takes and guide the actors, but being an actor's coach has never been Lucas's thing.

Speaking of Ep.1, how can anyone say that it was better than 2? It wasn't even in the same ballpark. 2 had it's problems, but I wasn't looking at my watch the whole time. And the FX in 1 were noticeably worse, he should have waited about 4 years to make it. It also suffered from Trek-itis. Too much techno-mumbo-jumbo, and not enough mythic story structure like the originals. Midichlorians? Ugh.

Ep.3 was allright, but with some slight tweaking to the storyline it could have been a lot better. For one thing, it makes Anakin look like a retard (on top of looking like a whiney bitch in Ep.2). Oh hey, this man who is evil incarnate tells me he knows the secret to eternal life. He wouldn't be lying, would he? Oh hey, I just swore allegiance to him, and then he flatly told me that he doesn't actually know the magic spell but ahh...we'll figure it out! Oh well, off to slaughter children! It's freaking retarded. I predicted his turn to evil would be 100% right out of saturday morning cartoons, and that's exactly what George delivered.

I think it would have been more believable if Lucas went with his original idea of a love triangle. Yeah, I could see two lifelong friends at each others' throats for something like that. That's believable. Like, in Ep.2 Anakin goes off on a suicide mission to save the galaxy and everyone assumes he's dead at the end. (Again, playing up the mythic angle here. He is The Chosen One, but there is nothing to indicate that, other than an ambiguous prophecy.) Then in Ep.3 Obi-Wan has married Padme, when Anakin turns out to be alive. Uh oh. Palpatine then tells him that it was Obi-Wan's idea to send him off on an impossible mission, the Jedi are behind this, etc.

Eh, I better stop ranting before I write a novel. I'll just say this though: you can write a movie that's thoroughly entertaining to children, without pandering to them. Lucas lost his edge after ESB, when he adopted his kids, and ever since the movies have been marred by teddy bears, muppets, and fart jokes.

 

[Hobbit]

I remember a discussion with someone at work, in 1979, about George Lucas' plans to have 9 Star Wars movies. Three of the movies were going to be the ones we now know as Episodes IV-VI, three movies were going to occur before Episode IV and three were going to occur after Darth Vader's death.

Lucas was going to wait for technology to catch up with his ideas, because, apparently, he had some grand visions for his stories.

However, George Lucas decided in 1999 or thereabouts, that only 6 Star Wars movies were going to be produced. I remember that many fans were upset by his decision.

Originally, he only planned to make the original three. The other 6 were eventually made into books. The reason he started with Episode IV instead of calling it Episode I was because he wanted it to 'feel' like you had walked into the theater 3 weeks into a serial. For the young who are out of touch with the old, a serial was like a TV series, except instead of being on TV, it was shown before the movie at the movie theater, and there was a new one every week, just like a TV show. In comparison, he wanted to be like watching the first season of '24' from about 8 am on.