So, The Phantom Menace eh?
You do realise that to ask any discerning fan of the Star Wars franchise to look at the Phantom Menace is like inviting a bulimia sufferer to an eating contest. Grossly Inappropriate and completely unfair…..
Yes Mr. Lucas did indeed Face Rape our childhoods with this Cess pool of an instalment, and now you want us to revisit the experience?
Oh……Ok, go on then as it’s you guys – Hey, It’s got Lightsabers in it and I haven’t seen it for a year or two. I’ve got a new TV and my 360 upscales to HD, so it may be worth taking another crack at.
So, notepad in hand, I fire up the movie
BADAAAAAA!!!!!! – Opening sting of the theme in glorious surround!
Awesome, Star Wars!! I love it!!!
Bring on the opening paragraph of the crawl………..
“Turmoil has engulfed the galactic republic, the taxation of trade routes to outlying star systems is in dispute.”…… erm – okay…….
The opening crawl continues in this fashion over another two paragraphs and makes absolutely no sense; it’s a completely shambolic grouping of political jargon that takes two or three readings in order to garner any real kind of understanding about what’s happening at the start of the film.
So begins my first bone of contention with The Phantom menace, it is completely contradictory throughout – it’s trying to tell a convoluted and fragmented story in a simple way, it’s a cruelly successful attempt at undermining the entire extended universe that popped up during the “dry period” between ROTJ and Phantom Menace. Yet it was trying to make the story simple and accessible to children and fans alike, essentially rebooting story…
In fairness you have to admire Lucas’ stones, he took on a huge challenge by even attempting to make the prequels and even more for actually allowing his name to be on the credits, after all he could have done a David Lynch who I’m sure all Black Doggers are aware took his name off Dune in the 80’s because it was rubbish, but then….. Dune did have something that the Phantom Menace doesn’t – a protagonist!!!
Who is the central focal character in this film? It can’t be Anakin, you don’t meet him until 45 minutes into proceedings and by then you’ve been bombarded with a million FX shots for no better reason than Lucas saying “LOOK!! Look what we can do, aren’t these amazing?” – and even after Anakin does come into the story, he wins the pod race and is pretty much ignored until he, for no logical reason goes into a firefight and hides in a fighter and …well need I go on with how terrible his character arc is in this film? The Jedi are boring, Amidala is inconsequential and Palpatine’s the bad guy.
Back to the effects then I suppose… You’re constantly being prodded and reminded that they can do amazing things with CG. This intense desire to ram as much imagery into our minds, completely devalues the opening of “A New Hope” – a relatively low tech technique that instilled in the viewer a sense of drama and filled the screen with so much symbolism that even now, it has never been topped for dramatic openings. Let’s be honest it’s text book perfect as an opener.
The Phantom Menace failed on so many grounds that to go into them all here would take you guys hours to read out and I’m sure you’ll have tons of feedback to sift through.
The main problem with The Phantom Menace becomes glaringly evident when watching the documentary on the DVD. None of the cast, or the crew will dare say NO to Lucas, his script is rubbish, his choices of actors are for the most part, rubbish and the people around Lucas are blatantly aware of this fact but continue to allow the man to destroy the mythology they're supposed to be enriching.
Hell when they’re all sat watching the screening of the rough cut, Lucas himself admits he “may have gone too far” – No shit George!
Let’s go through the list shall we…
1. He made a film with no plot
- And put in JAR JAR BINKS
2. He had characters with no charisma
- And put in JAR JAR BINKS
3. He had no clear Protagonist
- And put in JAR JAR BINKS
4. He killed off Darth Maul before he could actually become a threat
- And he put in JAR JAR fucking BINKs!!!!!
Shame on Lucas!!!, he should have started the story at the point where Attack of the clones began, cast an “actor” in the role of Anakin, stayed away from the politics (as he clearly can’t write it) and gotten a team of writers in to actually write a cohesive screenplay with some sensible character development.
I think that Lucas is his own and all Star Wars fans’ worst enemy and need I have anymore proof than: Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace…
I rest my case.... (I need a drink)
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