REVENGE OF THE SITH

You may have noticed that I have been exceptionally good this time around. My pants remained thoroughly unsoiled through both teaser and trailer, there’s been nary a notice about light sabers or spaceships here, and I would like to think my finely honed cynicism, sharpened upon the pestilent whetstones of Episodes 1 and 2, has remained intact. Until I read AO Scott’s review in the Times, where he confessed that he thought it was good. (Warning, spoilers ahead, yadda yadda)

No, impossible. No Star Wars movie can ever be good again, ever. And yet, the zombified corpse of hope manage to slip a worm-eaten finger above the ground, and palms moistened as hands closed around an imaginary light saber. I mean, what if? What if Tom Stoppard wrote the script, what if Spielberg secretly directed, what if Lucas finally recognized his limitations and restricted himself to the role of Visionary while others did the people work? Could it actually be that we have a fourth good Star Wars in our hands?

Yes, I do believe we do. Note that this is ‘good,’ not ‘great’ or spectacular or awe-inspiring or any of that. Just good. But that is still rather amazing given the past two steaming methanous cesspools of cinematic crap we lined up for and guzzled down with glee. Many of the faults are still there: poor acting, poor writing, enemy droids with annoying personalities, insanely heavy-handed political clap-trap (if I ever have to hear the word ‘democracy’ in a space fantasy again, my brain will disintegrate). Once again Natalie Portman (Natalie Portman, people) is actually made to look less than stunning in some scenes (no doubt Lucasfilm had to employ the height digital wizardry in that cause), and we get some leftovers from the fifth grade romance we suffered in Clones. But it doesn’t last long, and in fact, it was just enough to persuade me that Anakin really did love Padme, even though he was, er, unable to express it convincingly. This is important, because love ultimately ruins the day in true Star Wars fashion. Anakin’s need to protect his wife makes him pliable to Palpatine, with a little pride and ambition thrown in there for good measure. It’s Anakin’s downfall and ultimate physical and psychological disfiguration that truly drew me in. No checking the time, no watching the guy in front of me check his messages, I was just plain riveted until the heavy breathing, helmet-clad end.

Frankly, the action was actually less memorable that in the previous two movies, and that is a good thing. 1 and 2 had some truly spectacular light saber duels of the sort we hadn’t seen in Star Wars before, and for that they stick in my mind. 3 has plenty of light sabers, dog fights, mammoth space ships blowing up, etc, but at this point in the game, that’s all back drop. What’s sticking in my mind are Anakin’s slip, his first thoughts after putting on the helmet, Yoda’s failure to defeat the Emperor. You know, character stuff, story stuff. The real reasons we cough up $10 to go see these dang blasted talkies. I’m not going to go so far as to say this movie is actually better than the original trilogy, since it maintains the same cardboard characters completely devoid of humor and personality (can you see Han Solo anywhere in the new films?). But it is worth seeing.

You should also read Edelstein’s hilarious review at Slate.