Is That A Light Saber in Your Pocket?

Movie: Episode II: Atack of the Clones
Director: George Lucas

By: Carly Berard (Lawrencerock.com Movie Editor)

Once upon a time in a galaxy far, far away -1976 to be exact- there was a man named George Lucas who wrote a little movie called STAR WARS that while no means perfect was imbued with equal parts heart and grit and did nothing less than change the landscape of popular cinema as we know it. It launched some careers, it revolutionized special effects, it pioneered cross-marketing and it spawned many a ham-fisted copy, (The Last Starfighter, I'm looking at you), eventually giving rise to some prequels of such embarrassing disrepute that they cast a tainted pall of darkness over all that whence was good.

Ladies and Gentlemen: Attack of the Clones. In this outing Jedi Knights Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker (Ewan Mcgregor and Hayden Christensen) have been called on once again to protect the Republic but not before Obi-Wan can discover a secret cover-up, Anakin can have a forbidden love affair with Amidala (Natalie Portman) and Yoda can kick a little Sith Lord ass. This time Anakin's a brunette instead of a blond, Amidala's a senator instead of a queen (even though her "job" seems pretty much the same) and Obi-Wan (because someone doubtless paid a lotta bills to ensure Hayden comes out the heartthrob) is saddled with some awful truck-driver hair AND a beard. Rounding out the cast are Samuel L. Jackson as Mace Windu and the he-can-do-no-wrong Christopher Lee as Count Dooku.

I think this film was intended to provide a lot of answers but it just left me with a lot more questions. If Amidala was only a queen for one term, how is her daughter a princess? How did Jar Jar manage not to be killed by those around him, much less become a SENATOR? How come some characters FLY who didn't used to? Why are the good Jedi so weak compared to the bad ones and at which point exactly, does one gain the ability to shoot lightening from one's hand? Is this process sped up by being eeevil? Why is Samuel L. Jackson's capacity for bad assness so under utilized? And when does Ewan sing to me?

The biggest question on my mind, however, is why for the love of little apples George Lucas insists on doing things that go back and subsume the greatness of the originals? The most treasonous example of which is his bizarre desire to diminish Darth Vader as a villain. Like, he's EVIL don't show me his teen angst. And he's supposed to be SCARY which isn't helped much by the whole Judd Nelson in The Breakfast Club routine. I don't know if it's the dialogue or Hayden's acting or an unholy union of the both but his simmering anger and "glimmers of evil" come off as little more than brooding teenage petulance that make me wish Obi-Wan would just send him to his room and take away his communicator privileges.

The dialogue really hampers this film every which way you slice it. Absent are such timeless and quotable one-liners as "patience young Jedi" or "these are not the droids you're looking for" and instead are ridiculously trite movie platitudes such as Ewan's "I hate it when he does that" and Sam's "this party's over." The only thing missing was Yoda saying, "too old for this shit, getting I am." It's as if after getting bitched out for the Phantom Menace screenplay George said to himself, "hmm...I guess I have a lot to learn about writing good dialogue" and then went to the Lethal Weapon franchise for some spiritual guidance. Ewan does a good job of channeling Alec Guinness and Sam does the most with what he's given but it's all these guys can do not to wince after each of their lines, to say nothing of what becomes of the less dramatically endowed.

Unfortunately a full third of this movie is given over to the badly acted, horribly scripted, clumsy mating dance of Anakin & Amidala, whose story could have only been more cliche if they'd fallen in love after realizing they have the same favorite poem. These two have a shocking dearth of chemistry. I can see better bad teen acting on Dawson's Creek and I don't have to wait in line for an hour and shell out ten sinatras for my trouble. Maybe it's a testament to George's utter lack of human understanding or the fact that I screened this film at the 1200-seat Ziegfeld in Manhattan with a particularly unforgiving New York audience, but we laughed, yes outright laughed at ALL of what were intended to be "touching moments." George gives them From Here to Eternity dive rolls for God's sweet sake! AND he quotes Chicken Run with a conveyor belt scene in which the lovebirds try desperately not to be made into pies. Didn't a conveyor belt figure prominently in Temple of Doom? Come ON.

Even worse, many of the familiar plot devices are some of the most poorly executed I've ever seen. There's a death scene -I won't say whose- that is so ridiculous, so opportune, and so badly acted, (some hacking followed by an unceremonious plop on the ground) that again the audience laughed at what was intended to be a serious moment. Hayden also treats us to a particularly awful "I'm having a bad fevered dream in which I writhe in my sleep and repeatedly say 'no!'" sequence. If you want to see this done well, go watch Denzel Washington in Philadelphia. If not I've got just the movie for you... I don't know what George's problem is with casting this role. At least Jake Lloyd's performance could be written off to youthful inexperience but this kid's got no excuse. If only George had cast Johnathan Jackson (of General Hospital fame who I once met at O'Hare airport) like he was SUPPOSED TO then we wouldn't be in this mess AND I could say I knew him but NO.

My main problem, however, was that this movie lacked something character-wise. There was just no good hero to hang your hat on. Anakin's a brat and Obi-Wan's a square. Where's a little of that roguish Han Solo charisma when you need it? Couldn't we have at least been treated to a throwaway scene of a five year old Han making mischief in a back alley somewhere? I have an idea, how about in the next film Ben Affleck stars as a young Han Solo? Anybody? Or, or Ben Affleck as a young Indiana Jones? Ben Affleck as a young Bladerunner? Hello?

I suppose the Amidala character was okaaay. She's knows which end of a blaster is up, but she's no Princess Leia -not by a long shot- and I really have to question the wisdom behind those hip-hugger Britney pants she wears in the last act because I think they're really going to date the film in ten years time. I mean, what if Leia had worn bell-bottoms? And while I understand that 'Clones is a film that falls under the "sci-fi/fantasy" label and that a fair amount of disbelief suspending is the order of the day, I have to say what up with her third act hair? Army of docile clones secretly cultivated on a planet made of water? Sure. Ridiculously impossible -even for a Jedi- speeder chase in which Anakin falls 1000 feet and just-so-happens to land in the car of his target? Fine. But Natalie sporting an upswept hairdo of such rococo intricacy -that it could have only been achieved by a convoy of stylists and handmaidens- after having SPENT THE NIGHT IN A DUNGEON? Well I'm sorry folks, but that's where I draw the line.

That said there are some things 'Clones does well. I saw this film projected on a digital screen and the visuals were stunning and the sound was even better. There's one scene, especially, in which Obi-Wan is dog-fighting in an asteroid field and has to dodge these sonic boom depth charges that have to be one of the best audio effects of all time. The vistas are amazing and beautiful, but in a way almost too stylistically rendered because they give the impression that the characters are just walking around in a big CGI cartoon...which they are. I realize that computer effects are the way of the future but I have to take one nostalgic minute to lament the lost arts of puppetry and monster make-up and small-scale model ships. Maybe these things don't look as slick but at least they have weight and you can touch them and they exist in real space, not as a bunch of ones and zeros on somebody's hard drive. Even if you can get an actor's eyes to match up to the computer graphic he's talking to, there's still something not quite right. And I've watched enough Inside the Actor's Studio to know that a large part of one's performance is what they take from the actors around them by listening and reacting naturally and it just makes their job that much harder when they have to pretend that they're not talking to the wall. Alec Guinness was nominated for an OSCAR for his turn in Star Wars and did he have to act opposite a blue screen? No. No, he didn't.

It's not an exaggeration to say that an entire generation of people have grown up with the Star Wars series as a constant in their childhood. So perhaps there is no way that this movie could have lived up to the expectations of all the kids who slept in Star Wars jammies on Star Wars sheets but even with that in mind, George Lucas still drops the ball. This movie wasn't a victim of too-high expectations (especially after the debacle of 'Menace) so much as it's own lack of merit. A lot of people have said that at least it's better than Episode I -and I would be inclined to agree- but shouldn't George aim just a tad bit higher than that? All I get from this film is that he just doesn't care anymore. He brought back Jar Jar for Pete's sake. If you don't want to listen to the critics, fine but don't turn a deaf ear to the fans. We all know the only reason you left him there was because you didn't want to admit you were wrong.

Yes, the scene in which Yoda finally busts out his moves is satisfying to the core and will make you smile in places you didn't know you had. Yes the fight scenes are pretty all around good, and yes it was cool to see a big battle with eleventy billion light sabers all waving at once and MAYBE that's enough for the nerds and true-believers to throw their collective panties at the screen but not me and not the majority of people who are going to shell out for this film and we ALL deserve better. Once upon a time this franchise had cultural relevance what with the Hitler parallels and Arthurian legend light-saber-in-the-stone space opera as modern day myth for the post Vietnam era stuff...but not today. Not yesterday and not tomorrow either so climb on top of that heap of flannel shirts you own, you arrogant, out-of touch, old man and GET. OVER. YOURSELF.

Was it worth it? No. Will I see the next one? Of course. Confound you George Lucas! Now if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go watch Moulin Rouge...