TPM: Critical Weakness? (1 Viewer)

[PhilipW]

to go off to god knows where, to do god knows what, with god knows who!?!

I think he knew what he was wanting to do and with who. I mean just look at Natalie Portman in the new photos.

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[DaveF]

One more thing: in ANH and ESB, the effects characters (i.e. Chewbacca, R2D2, etc.) are serious and taken seriously, with the exception of C3PO, and so we the audience take them seriously.

I agree completely! The sidekicks were characters, not jokes, in the original trilogy. Jar Jar was just kiddie fodder. And even C3PO has his dramatic moments: ESB, when Chewie finds him disassembled in the 'junk' room. Chewie lets out the forlorn Wookie howl; we next see him toting C3PO in a mesh backpack. That was deft cinema, IMO, using both humor and dramatic emotion in a scene with a junked robot and a furry creature that doesn't speak English.

 

[Dan Hitchman]

Forget it guys. There just isn't enough good to sift through within all the bad to justify this film IMHO.
Gagging myself with a rusty coat hanger for two hours might have been more pleasurable.
If I hear of the same kind of awful reviews from my friends as for Episode One (and I was indeed one of the poor sods who waited three-four hours to watch TPM opening night) then I might give Ep. 2 a rent on DVD instead.
It would take a frickin' miracle for Lucas to suddenly become the director he was for American Graffiti after this "attempt." Big, heavy sigh.

Dan
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[Doug R]

Theo hit the nail on the head..
It's not really the acting that's horrid in TPM. Jake Lloyd, for his age, really isn't that bad. In fact, I think he has some excellent facial reactions and delivers his lines fairly well.
It's the dialogue that's terrible. Every cringing line he delivers isn't cause he delivered it poorly.. it's cause the line sucked. It's not just him, it's nearly everyone saddled with bland, dry dialogue.
According to the trailer reports for E2, Jonathan Hales receives a full "and" credit on the screenplay. Here's hoping he punched up the dialogue a bit. Too bad Lawrence Kasden wasn't allowed to assist (he wrote the ESB screenplay with Leigh Brackett).
I sigh everytime I read someone rip on Jake Lloyd. He is NOT the reason TPM is considered a failure. Dialogue and story elements. Just imagine if the movie was played more serious... Anakin doesn't "accidentally" destroy the driod ship... Jar Jar has 10x fewer clumsy scenes... the Gungun/droid battle is shown like the Hoth battle. You'd never worry about Jake Lloyd at that point.
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[Hubert]

It seems to me that people are waiting and itching to pick any SW movie apart, simply because people like tearing down extremely popular things, no matter how good or bad. Many of you have already decided that Episode II and III are gonna stink and you're gonna pick it apart. I like Episode I and see no reason to continually rip it apart. All it did was introduce us to the story and set up the trilogy for us. No, it wasn't earth shattering, but then again I didn't expect Citizen Kane either. As for the next two films, there's every reason to expect they'll be better, mainly because they'll delve deeper into the story and they'll be darker and much more serious. Plus, Lucas will have gotten back into the groove. You guys can continue to hate Lucas and Episode I, but I'm gonna expect to be entertained and have fun with it.

 

[Alex-C]

A lot of good points both good and bad have been brought up...my .02:
I loved it and hated it at the same time. I dont feel that way about any other movie. Love aspects: the obvious imaginiation explosion, production, some would call eye candy, yes, apt description but for me its imagination candy. I really do love them for what they can do, John Williams and Lucas et. al.
[rant on]
The bad, or aspects that detract for me; Star Wars is now a worldwide phenom, i mean Jedi is almost a certified religion in Britain (see recent news story)...anyway, the first series, the characters were brash esp. Leia and Solo, I dont care where the credit is for that, TPM lacks that sassyness, their cynical nature balanced with some humor. Its taken way too seriously now...Thinking about TPM, consider how everything is treated with so much overplayed dramatic emotion, not so in ANH; I mean it was there just not overdone. I dunno...cant explain it too well.
The main TPM characters could have used some faults, some warts to make them more appealing. You can still be my hero and not be perfect...
I may be alone on this, but the voice acting was particularly bad. Very first scene,the pilot on the left saying "Yes Sir" - now that is the Force. The Queens poor british accent. The Viceroys also bothered me. Again, at the risk of offending, speaking english with a thick asian accent is destracting to me, in a movie. It sounds forced. the pilot of the main Viceroy ship with the golfballs on the eyes, ack! it tears me up. Jake Lloyd cant pull off some of his lines. The only ones who didnt wear on me were Liam, Ian and Watto.
you could plainly see from all the documentaries that it is GL's dream, GL's script, his everything. In the screening room, someone is explaining how poor a choice it is to have the main character die, then a funeral, then a celebration scene all within 3 mins. This happens at the rough cut ????
This should have happened 4 years previous....during the script stage.
[rant off]
Last thought, would it have been funny to see The Beginning, the very last scene where GL sits down and starts writing the script for ep 2: Fade In. Jar-Jar is dying.....
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[Carlo_M]

It's the dialogue that's terrible. Every cringing line he delivers isn't cause he delivered it poorly.. it's cause the line sucked. It's not just him, it's nearly everyone saddled with bland, dry dialogue.

Exactly. I liked H.J. Osment, I liked the kid from Searching for Bobby Fisher even more--might be my favorite performance from a child actor. But even he couldn't have done anything with those lines as written (even putting aside the fact that he's 10 years older now, I mean back when he was at the SFBF age).

 

[Alex-C]

Max Pomerac was great in SFBF...one of the main reasons that I own that DVD, and of course, Ben Kingsley....who to keep this on topic would be a great addition somewhere in the Star Wars movies.
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