I'll say it: the Star Wars prequels were artistic triumphs

[DerekG]

As someone who fancies the Lazenby entry "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" to be the best of the Bond films and "The Godfather: Part III" criminally underrated, it should be obvious I don't care a whit for what the status quo thinks.

I love the Star Wars prequels. In lieu of the omnipresent "bad acting" charges, we've been given several of the finest performances of the series (Neeson, McDiarmid) as well as the best ensemble effort in "Revenge of the Sith." True, the dialogue rarely pleases (stately, but bereft of elegance), but it's certainly no worse than the nuggets found in the screenplays to the first three.

What's more, Lucas has crafted three of the most politically daring and labyrinthine big-budget blockbusters ever devised. And I think that's what irked so many fans--the Manichean flavor is almost entirely jettisoned in the PT. Instead of the simplicity of the OT galaxy, in which freedom fighters grapple with a totalitarian state, we're presented with warring factions that are all morally compromised: a republic that is crumbling under the influence of bureaucrats; an idealistic secessionist movement that, in actuality, is a front for corporatists; a cadre of arrogant, dogmatic monks who sacrifice their principles to become soldiers in a phony war; and finally, at the center of it all, a deranged cultist, who has his fingers in everything.

There's a mad grandeur to these films, and I wouldn't be surprised if they are at least somewhat vindicated in the years to come.

(And if Jar Jar really bothers you that much, try to remember this is a franchise that also showcases a giant monkey and dancing teddy bears.)

[PittPoliSci]

1. Well said!

thanks for finally saying what i've been thinking, but failed to articulate!

[elshiva]

2. Thanks!

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

3. What about the crappy acting and dialogue though n/t

[DerekG]

4. To expound on the points I made in the OP

Most of the performances in TPM were perfectly fine: Neeson and McDiarmid assayed their roles superbly; McGregor and August were more than adequate; only Portman and Lloyd left mixed impressions (they hit the right notes in some scenes, and have flat readings in others). And "Sith" boasts what is arguably the finest ensemble effort in the series (even Samuel L. Jackson finally makes his character his own). Keeping in mind that this is space opera, and not a Scorsese production, only "Clones" suffers from what could be called "crappy acting." Unfortunately, the romance between Christensen and Portman inspires little pathos; and Lee isn't given the screentime to be the haunting pall Lucas was aiming for.

Still, Lucas has never been an actor's director, or a master wordsmith. He is a visual storyteller--one of the very best we've ever had--and the imagery and thematic tapestries/motifs that bolster his narratives have only grown more sophisticated.

(Coincidentally, the writing was never much to write home about, or did you forget "I don't know where you get your delusions, laser-brain?" from ESB?)

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

28. I'm sorry to disagree, but Peter Jackson stole the crown in visual

directing (IMHO).

On the other hand, I'll rewatch the prequels with your comments in mind.

:hi:

[northzax]

5. er, did you see the first three?

it's not like the acting and snappy dialogue in Star Wars, ESB or ROTJ were any good either.

[DerekG]

6. This brings to mind a William Goldman quote

"A word here about movie dialogue: It is among the least important parts of a screenplay. Sure, intelligent talk is always better than dumb stuff. And sure, dialogue matters more in some kinds of movies -- wit comedies, such as As Good As It Gets, or intelligent dramas -- than in others. But for the most part, the public and critics have come to believe that screenplays are dialogue.

Wrong. If movies are story, and they are, then screenplays are structure."

-William Goldman, "Rocking the Boat", The Big Picture: "Who Killed Hollywood?" and Other Essays.

[philosophie_en_rose]

27. Exactly. It's the cinematic equivalent of dogs playing poker.

Is it interesting to look at dogs playing poker? Sure. Especially if the dogs are computer generated and fight wookies.

The prequels lacked the heart of the originals. Padme was a waste of a character, who - as a Senator and a former Queen - ought to have been smart enough not to wander around in a fugue state when she could have lead a resistance or something.

Annakin was a jackass. I didn't believe that his character actually cared about anything. He seemed much more mature in the first movie.

:shrug:

[Cats Against Frist]

44. A+ for critical analysis, my friend

My boyfriend and son watch this shite, all the time. Every time Annakin speaks in II, I want to punch him. Thank you.

[Mutley]

7. My biggest complaint was the romance between Anakin and Padme.

She was supposed to be the biggest reason why Anakin was vulnerable to the darkside, and the chemistry between the actors just sucked. But I agree. Overall I was very pleased with the prequels, and I think Lucas could have done much worse.

[BigMcLargehuge]

8. I'll have to disagree with you on every point there

and include that the original three films were crap too. Purile black and white mythmaking with scenes, dialogue, and plot stolen from other, much better films. Lucas has succeeded in only one thing, forever fusing toy marketing with action film making.

[DerekG]

12. This excerpt will at least counter your "puerile" accusation

David Begor's "Defense of the Clones" is a perceptive counter-argument.

http://www.brightlightsfilm.com/38/clones1.htm

--snip--

"As the vast majority of popular reviews attest, the allegorical and symbolic subtext of Attack is so unobtrusive that it is possible to view (and judge) it without once noticing its remarkable sophistication. But how fair is that? Blithely ignoring the intellectual rigor of Attack of the Clones leads not surprisingly to self-fulfilling claims about its status as lowbrow cinema. Perhaps nowhere is this more obvious than in the popular tendency to dismiss Lucas' cinematic allusions as uncreative pastiche, with some critics even accusing him of unconscious plagiarism.14 Although most reviewers caught the reference, for instance, few realized the pod-racing sequence in The Phantom Menace did more than simply pay homage to the chariot race in Ben Hur. As a film whose dominant themes include the corrupting nature of power and the ultimate emptiness of vengeance, William Wyler's biblical classic told the story of a man driven to violence to avenge the suffering of his family at the hands of another Empire. Lucas’ allusion worked on both thematic and narrative levels. It not only confirmed the pivotal role Anakin's mother would play in his transformation but also laid out his trajectory of character development through the entire saga, hinting that like Ben Hur's, Anakin's fall would come through his desire for vengeance and his eventual redemption through his embrace of self-sacrificial love.

"If anything, Attack of the Clones is rich with such allusions. References to futurist noir classics including Blade Runner and Metropolis abound in the night visuals of Coruscant, casually reinforcing the film’s dominant theme of moral decay in the city. Lucas also plays with the themes of human mechanization prominent in both of these classics. The multiple references to The Searchers in Anakin's rescue of his mother draw a tight parallel between Anakin and Luke while also suggesting that Anakin's quest, like Luke's, is a quest for family and love. The meaning of other prominent allusions, which range from Gladiator to Lawrence of Arabia, should be self-evident to those even superficially familiar with these films. To those aware of the overarching plot of the saga, for instance, the clear reference to The Sound of Music in the pastoral romance between Anakin and Amidala hints at the encroachment of the Empire on their love, and foreshadows Amidala's flight from it with her children in Episode III."

--snip--

http://www.brightlightsfilm.com/38/clones1.htm

[kwassa]

18. Intellectual rigor? funniest thing I read all week

"Blithely ignoring the intellectual rigor of Attack of the Clones leads not surprisingly to self-fulfilling claims about its status as lowbrow cinema. Perhaps nowhere is this more obvious than in the popular tendency to dismiss Lucas' cinematic allusions as uncreative pastiche, with some critics even accusing him of unconscious plagiarism."

Oh, I would never do that. I would accuse him of conscious plagarism. Lucas doesn't have an original bone in his body, he simply recycles other peoples movies.

I almost read this review as tongue-in-cheek. But alas, quoting other people's art does not make one an artist.

[Deja Q]

14. Star Wars has always been lax on character depth...

Which where "Blake's 7" steps in. It may not have the budget, but for 1970s standards (and even today's) the plots and use of characters can be quite astonishing at times.

[kwassa]

16. The entire Star Wars franchise is just commercial crap film-making

There is no art in any of it, just cartoonish action, simplistic characterization, often leaden acting.

And, as BMLH pointed out, it is virtually all stolen from much better films.

Just because Lucas admired Joseph Campbell doesn't mean he understood Campbell.

[Nevernose]

19. Never make the mistake of confusing "commercial" w/ "crap"

"Huck Finn" was a sequel trying to capitalize on the unexpected success of "Tom Sawyer," and Shakespeare was just trying to sell tickets to what was just another play in an overcrowded market. Shakespeare, also, was an almost comulsive plagarist (though I'll give you the point that it wasn't often from better sources, as GL is wont to do).

GL is no where near Twain or Shakespeare, of course, and I'm not trying to compare Lucas to them. To do so would be ridiculous.

However, the Star Wars films were entertainment at its finest: they made me laugh, they made me cry, they had me on the edge of my seat, and occasionally they even made me think. And in the end, what more do you want from "art" than to provoke an emotional response from the viewer?

[kwassa]

20. I wanted the emotional response, and I didn't get it.

Just lots of manipulation and special defects.

[Nevernose]

24. I got it.

Okay, it certainly wasn't a "masterpiece of cinema" or whatever the OP claimed, but it was, IMO, a heck of a lot better than "ConAir."

As far as my premise that commercial doesn't = art, I refer you to AFI's top one hundred list, or at least the top thirty. It's very difficult to make an argument that none of these films are among the best ever made; however, they were certainly commercially successful.
1. CITIZEN KANE (1941)

2. CASABLANCA (1942)

3. THE GODFATHER (1972)

4. GONE WITH THE WIND (1939)

5. LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (1962)

6. THE WIZARD OF OZ (1939)

7. THE GRADUATE (1967)

8. ON THE WATERFRONT (1954)

9. SCHINDLER'S LIST (1993)

10. SINGIN' IN THE RAIN (1952)

11. IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946)

12. SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950)

13. THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI (1957)

14. SOME LIKE IT HOT (1959)

15. STAR WARS (1977)

16. ALL ABOUT EVE (1950)

17. THE AFRICAN QUEEN (1951)

18. PSYCHO (1960)

19. CHINATOWN (1974)

20. ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST (1975)

21. THE GRAPES OF WRATH (1940)

22. 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (1968)

23. THE MALTESE FALCON (1941)

24. RAGING BULL (1980)

25. E.T. THE EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL (1982)

26. DR. STRANGELOVE (1964)

27. BONNIE AND CLYDE (1967)

28. APOCALYPSE NOW (1979)

29. MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON (1939)

30. THE TREASURE OF THE SIERRA MADRE (1948)

I guess what I'm saying is to be careful when swinging the hammer of "commerciality" at something.

[kwassa]

39. Oh, I agree with you completely, commercial can be artistic

in fact it is required to a large degree because movies are so prohibitedly expensive to make. They have to be a popular art form, or that film-maker is soon out of business.

I mean commercial in the sense of highly commercial, re-using pop formulas, rather than covering new ground, something extremely rare in cinema.

[BigMcLargehuge]

21. my emotional response was "amazement" but I was 8

when I saw Star Wars in the theater for the first time. Then I became and adult, and a writer, now the only emotion it (and by it I mean all 6 films) engenders is anger.

[DerekG]

30. Campbell certainly didn't think so

In the recent DVD documentary for the original trilogy, Bill Moyers recounted an interview wherein Campbell called Lucas his best student.

[henslee]

32. Luther Campbell???

[DerekG]

33. Joseph Campbell--the deceased anthropologist/storyteller

Who on earth is Luther Campbell?

[nytemare]

9. I agree about Revenge of the Sith.

I have to say I was disappointed in the first two. Although they were entertaining, I really didn't find them very engaging. Jake Lloyd blew eggs. I know he was just a kid, but I have seen plenty of kids that can act. And to add to that, the dialogue they gave him sucked too. "Yippee". "I'll spin, that's a neat trick."

Yes, there was corny dialogue in the original trilogy, but nothing as bad as "I hate sand". I will say that Mark Hamill was a whiner in Episode 4, though.

I found myself thinking that in watching the first two movies, they were solely meant to lead up to the Original Trilogy. I didn't really care about the characters. The main redeeming quality to Episodes 1 and 2 was the politcal subplot.

Thankfully, Episode III gave more dialogue to an actor who played around with it a little bit to get something that sounded more natural. I wasn't expecting III to be as good as it was. Ewan McGregor was good, and Hayden Christensen was much better.

I will be buying the DVD when it comes out.

[LostinVA]

10. I LOVED "Sith"... it made me feel sorry for Darth Vader

They should have made Padme's death closer to what was in the nevelization... it made it a bit less bogus, a bit more poignant....

[CatholicEdHead]

11. Plot ==> No, Eye Candy ==> yes

The scripts sucked beyond belief. The computer artistary were very, very good for all the movies.

[Deja Q]

13. OHMSS had good writing, good characters, and good actors to compensate for

Lazenby.

The prequel trio has... nothing. Except "effects gone wild" which seem to be the focus of the movie rather than the actual plot.

I've yet to see ep 3.

[DerekG]

15. See post #12

Even the most shallow analysis exposes that "style over substance" argument as fallacious...if one is willing to read between the (pixel) lines.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

17. You take a fallacious position that someone's analysis can "prove" that a

movie is not crappy, when others in fact believe it to be crappy. :hi:

[DerekG]

29. No, I used the citation to challenge the nothing-but-FX remark

As I've stated in previous posts, there is some validity to the acting/script qualms, but there is a tapestry to this pop art saga all but denied in many circles. It seems a bit unfair to liken these films to a Nintendo product.

[Threedifferentones]

22. I hated those movies.

Firstly because I found many of the characters flat and uninteresting and lots of the dialogue sub-par.

But really I think it was because Anakin and Padme were so awful, both the characters in general and the dialogue between them especially. Anakin was a whiny brat who never seemed to think anything through. Padme's character was fine, even cool, until she, a GALACTIC SENATOR, fell in love with a high-school kid who was immature for his age. Add some emberassingly bad dialogue on top of that ("you're not coarse like sand"), throw in Jar-Jar Binks, and you have some disastrous attempts at script-writing.

On the other hand these new three, like the first movies, are visually stunning and the worlds are wonderfuly designed. But I don't think that makes up for the terrible scripts.

Of course this is just IMO B-)

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

34. I agree, Anakin and Padme were awful. In particular, the worst part

is that the most important role (Anakin/Darth) was cast with a total stiff, Hayden C.

[jpgray]

23. I won't. But I did find the films entertaining.

[democracyindanger]

25. Brittney Spears has fans, too.

[Fox Mulder]

41. .

:rofl:

I was just thinking the same thing!

[NNadir]

26. More power to you. I found the entire Starwars series boring and dull.

Harrison Ford barely made the first several in the series bearable but it helps if your kind of sleepy or otherwise have had your senses dulled.

I never got any of it.

I had to take my kids to one of the prequels, and slept part of the way through, but woke up in time to shield his young eyes from some awful violence, if memory serves me well. The kids fortunately had zero interest in the second one.

[Celeborn Skywalker]

31. I agree with you about ROTS

I wouldn't call the first two artistic triumphs but they certainly were entertaining.

[Neil Lisst]

35. Well, if you like Star Wars ...

Well, if you like Star Wars ...

Here are a few uses of SW in our comic.





You know Darth Cheney will be back.

[Broken_Hero]

36. The series...

As a whole, weren't bad, and they weren't all that great...visually stunning, the characters, padme/anakin were weak as hell...the Attack of the Clones was by far, the biggest snooze fest of the whole shebang...i hated that movie, when i was done watching it, i wanted my money back, but to each their own opinion. I would buy episode II but only if its in the five dollar/less rack ....

[nemo137]

37. I have to agree. I loved the hell out of Eps II and III.

I would at MacGregor to your list of finest performances of the franchise, though.

[MrScorpio]

38. I'm with you on all counts

"On Her Majesty's Secret Service" IS my favorite Bond movie (No shit)

And Godfather three has been unfairly dissed.

I loved the prequels too

Bravo

[LynneSin]

40. I have to agree

After seeing Sith, I decided to rewatch the first 2 in the triology and I found that I enjoyed them even more than I expected. I actually have all the Star Wars on DVD cept Sith - which I'll get on Tuesday. I plan on watching all 3 back-to-back-to-back to appreciate the experience.

But I have to say this - Sith saved the triology. It wrapped everything up tightly with an extremely rewarding ending

[Dukkha]

42. I'm taking the day off tomorrow for the DVD release

I'm entertaining the crowds at a Suncoast store here in costume.

For me the Saga is all about escapism. I like to just to just forget all about the problems of this god awful shitty world and escape back to my blissful 70's childhood remembering the excitement and thrills of this glorious space epic. The prequels could never match the level of impact the OT has because we all saw it as children and the cynicism of our adult world cannot suspend disbelief as it once did. Not to mention A New Hope was one of the most groundbreaking achievements in film history while the new films are just new films. But enjoy them I will and all the pretentious criticism wont stop that.

I'm really looking forward to seeing the deleted scenes from ROTS which include Qui-Gon Jinn's appearance, The Rebel Alliance formation, and Yoda's arrival on Dagobah.

[melissinha]

43. Favorite character Palpatine

I agree with you, I think that George is a good storyteller not a screenwriter.... many an actor has complained about his dialogue... but wow... the whole political scene from Ep I to III was really telling and frankly history based. I think Padme's death scene was lame however but had one of the BEST scenes in the movie:


So this is how liberty dies - with thunderous applause....

Its how we felt when Chimpo was elected TWICE.... and we knew we had been fooled just like she was realizing...