One word: overkill.
Sometimes good, sometimes bad. But that’s the single most precice and concise description I can come up with to summarize Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones.
Candice and I just got back from seeing the 11:15pm show of SWII:AotC at the Pacific Place Cinemas. I walked there as soon as I got off the bus from work and joined Candice, who’d shown up about 20 minutes before I did and staked us a place in line. We’d planned this out earlier in the week, as we were expecting a fairly full house on opening night. As it turns out, we ended up being within the first 20 people in line. I was worried at first that there hadn’t been much need for us to show up as early as we did — nearly an hour before the film — but the line quickly grew behind us, and I’m actually glad we showed up early enough to get good seats.
The crowd was fairly good for the most part, with nearly a full house by the time the movie started. My only momentary snit was just at the beginning of the movie, when someone behind me felt the need to read the opening scroll out loud…but a quick glace behind me shushed him (after a moment of grumbling).
As far as the movie itself — entertaining, certainly…but I have to admit to some fairly strong reservations. It’s certainly no Phantom Menace (thank goodness!), but it’s not the original trilogy, either. I’ll start with the bad points that spring to mind, and finish with the good.
Downsides: I’d say that Lucas really should have learned from various reactions to the prior films and made two major changes to his approach to AotC — brought in someone to make one final touchup on the script (primarily the dialogue and character interactions), and found another director (as he did on The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi). His vision is the guiding force behind the series, but as good as that is, it’s definitely that vision that is his strength, and not his writing or directing skills. I know that many of the actors in AotC are quite good (for instance, I generally enjoy Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman, and Samuel Jackson, and while I haven’t seen him in much, Christopher Lee did a wonderful job as Saruman in The Fellowship of the Ring), however the performances were so flat that it was almost laughable — in fact, it was laughable for quite a bit of the audience, who couldn’t keep from laughing at quite a few of the romantic scenes between Anakin and Amidala.
The plot itself, at least for the first 2/3 of the film, didn’t grab me either, for many of the same reasons that the plot for TPM fails to grab me. Star Wars and its original sequels had a fairly simple (but not necessarily simplistic) plot, with clearly dileniated ‘good guys’ and ‘bad guys’ forming the struggle. With this new prequel trilogy, however, Lucas has framed the potentially compelling story of Anakin Skywalker’s downfall and the rise of the Empire with an incredbly muddled and confusing political struggle that makes it very difficult to track on just what’s happening to whom, and why exactly we should even care about it at all. It’s more clear just what the situation is by the end of AotC, but I really believe that it is this framing story of Republics and Trade Federations that hinders the majority of TPM and the first 2/3 of AotC. It’s only at the end of AotC that you really begin to see the rise of the Empire and the seeds of what will eventually become the Rebellion, and by the time you make it to the end of the film, you’re more caught up by the action sequences (which, as I’ll get to, are well worth paying attention to) than by the political maneuvering that has comprised so much of these first two episodes in the Star Wars saga.
Having said that, however….
Upsides: Firstly, and least surprisingly, the visuals and special effects. As amazing as TPM was when it came out three years ago, there were still many who thought that Lucas may have tried too much too soon — for every seamless effect that looked natural, there was another that looked jarringly false. However, three years is a long time for technology to advance, and AotC, while still not entirely perfect, is leaps and bounds above its predecessor. More new worlds, ships, and aliens, all interacting with the flesh-and-blood actors, and in the majority of instances, it works well. Not all the time — but enough that it’s quite incredible to watch. Of course, the flip side to this is that when it doesn’t work, it’s that that much more jarring (to my eyes, at least). Still, I’m definitely looking forward to what the next episode will bring us in three years.
Secondly, Ewan McGregor is Obi-Wan Kenobi — and I’d almost swear that he isn’t actually an actor in his own right, but in actuality a clone of Alec Guinness himself! I was already impressed with how much he was able to take on Guinness’ vocal and physical characteristics in TPM, and it’s only more present and impressive now, as his character grows closer in age to when we saw Obi-Wan in the original film. He’s also one of the few actors who seems able to rise above Lucas’ direction and make you care about and believe in his character — which, judging by the performances of the rest of the cast, may be a feat in and of itself.
Lastly — the action. Finally breaking away from his penchant to try and run three or more major conflicts at once, constantly switching among them (most evidenced in the climaxes of RotJ and TPM), Lucas manages to pull off the last 1/3 of AotC in strong style. While a single major conflict still isn’t enough for him, this time he strings them one after another, each time building upon the one before, until the screen explodes in a frenzy of action. This is the section of the movie that is the most worth watching. Jedi everywhere, lightsaber battles that put even the duel from the end of TPM to shame, and in a major coup, Yoda kicks ass!!! There’s a reason Yoda is seen as one of the foremost Jedi, and actually being able to see the little guy in action, deflecting and neutralizing lightning bolts and even engaging Count Dooku in a lightsaber fight was, in a word, incredible.
All in all, an entertaining, though flawed film, that, to my mind, tries to do too much. While much closer in spirit and feel to the originals (which gives one hope for the third and final installment in a few years), it’s still not quite to their level. Here’s hoping that once Episode III comes along, the third time really will be the charm.
Postscript: Other pros and cons I wanted to mention quickly. Cons: the ‘Super Mario Brothers’ sequence in the droid producton facility on Geonosis; C-3PO’s head problems during the final battle. Pros: Jango and Boba Fett, the aliens in charge of the cloning facilities (cool design and animation there), Amidala’s Leia-esque outfit during the final third of the film (not only is it a nice visual tie to the original, but my lord that girl is yummy!), Anakin losing his arm (this actually took me by surprise — I’d always assumed that that injury was sustained along with the rest that put Anakin into the life-support suit during his upcoming battle with Obi-Wan), and the training line of the most prominent Jedi (Yoda trained Dooku trained Qwai-Gon trained Obi-Wan trained Anakin). Okay, that’s it. ;)