star wars never took itself seriously, which is why we never had to, so when it wowed us in the original movies, it was a bonus. it made us think, it showed us a vision we'd never imagined or thought could be captured on film, it was the birth of modern sci fi on film in a way everyone could relate to (mixing humanity and technology, rather than alienating humanity with technology) and on a massive scale.
from that, what it's become is nothing near what it once was. i'm not even a major star wars freak but i AM a sci fi fan. yes, technology can give us all kinds of great special affects, but they don't MAKE the story. and the story in this latest was extremely shaky. i buy the actual plot line, but the script sucked, and so did a lot of the acting. not just on the part of our lovers.
samuel L jackson is the man - but his lines are dry, and he sits around wide-eyed and serious. there is no sense of him as a wise man, as a person, as a being with any Force in him at all. Yoda I buy, and it's because his persona is so specific, and the voice, etc., that there's really no pressure to have good "acting" in his case. even the evil guys were slightly duller.
i think my overall sense is that these people were never pressured to really ACT. i mean, these are actors, but it's like they went in and did a rehearsal on a saturday and it was recorded and now it's there for all to see. it's not like the REAL thing somehow and ALL of them could have done better. they all feel slightly dampened, slightly boring, a bit dull. no one gets emotional. no one screams (except anakin). no one curses, or seems to. no one seems REAL.
i have nothing against CGI, but lucas was intent on cleaning everything up to the point that i feel reality was lost. humanity was lost. the trick to sci fi is making unreal things seem real. in this movie, unreal things stayed unreal. you didn't see rust on the machines. the closest they got was C3PO. remember back in the day, people were dirty, clothes were tattered, you could FEEL the grime. You FELT the world, which made it seem real. in this movie, we have Padme rolling on some red sand and her suit remaining completely white. what gives?
but in PARTICULAR - our lovers. natalie portman is just a nice girl next door who happens to be slightly stubborn. she has no personality. princess leia has more personality than that. but she isn't major. i basically felt she fell in love with dude cuz he was cute, she was lonely, they knew each other, and were facing the same big scary issues. nothing bonds like confusion and fear.
anakin, however - i ONLY bought him in the "i hate them all" scene, just when he's crying and screaming. that ONE spot, not even the whole rant. you're right, chris, his lip trembled. but ANYONE can do insane anger. true acting skill allows you to convey true emotion without the same 3 tone levels. variation and how you physically move and how you express things with your face - dude had pretty much the same facial expression the whole movie, and i agree with the idea he says everything pretty much the same way. other than that one scene.
WARNING: "starwars" spoilers below
and the love story - come on, padme is not the type of girl to hear someone say, "i slaughtered the women and children" and fall in love. that'd be a scene where she goes, "you horrible boy, a real man doesn't do that, a spoiled angry child does" and then run off, upset that the boy she's falling for has anger management issues.
and the love story - come on, padme is not the type of girl to hear someone say, "i slaughtered the women and children" and fall in love. that'd be a scene where she goes, "you horrible boy, a real man doesn't do that, a spoiled angry child does" and then run off, upset that the boy she's falling for has anger management issues.
i agree, in the future dude is going to, i think, both hurt padme and be hurt by whatever happens between them/to her, which will fuel him. he'll probably get all angry with her and stomp off and say terrible things to her but always love her, and they'll go their separate ways or be separated and he'll have it in his head that she's the ideal and it's everybody else's fault things don't go his way with her and life in general. it's clear he's a selfish type. they had a tussle in the movie and she won, but it's because she outranked him. in future, with his arrogance, he may choose to disregard her wishes like he's disregarded obi wan's. he's aware of what people want but cares more about his own wants and needs. the only reason he concurred with padme's decision not to get jiggy with it is because it takes two to get jiggy with it. a moment of hesitation obviously and you saw him feeling her up on the balcony.
ok. me done now. bottom line - this feels like an airbrushed, glossy magazine feature. i don't buy the article, even if it featured people i care about and think DO have skill. i enjoyed watching the CGI and stuff but felt very little for it or the film as a whole. i squirmed through all parts involving the romance. and shook my head at the bad jokes. it was like the film wanted to recapture that irreverence of the first films while also taking itself too seriously with all the glorious settings and various races, showing off the technology.
and yes, Yoda kicked all kinds of ass.
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