Yes, the first new review is for the new Star Wars prequal the Phantom Menace. You have to remember, I'm a Star Wars FREAK, much like Chupacabra. Now, I'm sure that I'm like most everybody on the planet in that I was incredibly eager to see this movie when it was announced that it was being made.
|
Now that it out on video, you can sit down and watch everything with a lot more scrutiny. Which isn't necessarily a good thing. I really liked this movie, but it was nothing compared to the originals, especially with that evil menace Jar Jar Binks. I hate that jerky bastard.
The movie itself isn't that bad, especially if you aren't a big Star Wars fan or if your one of those unlucky few who've never seen the movie (like my ex-girlfriend, she hated star wars). If you are a geek like me, then this movie will piss you off so much, which is actually kinda cool. Like, you sit there and Jar Jar Binks is ruining the movie and you're screaming at him and cursing George Lucas's name.
The greatest part of this movie is all the great toys that they advertise in it. Oh, you don't know what I mean? Look at the old Star Wars toys. There are action figures for character's that were in the movie for less than a second. You know that guy that asks Jar Jar if he has any money to pay for the frog? It's when they first get to Tatooine. Well, I'll bet anybody Twenty Five Bucks that they have an action figure for that guy. Star Wars has become a Saturday morning cartoon, which in turn is just giant advertisements for toys.
|
The greatest part of this movie is the lightsaber duels. Ray Park kicks so much @$$ in this movie as Darth Maul. The lightsaber duels are fast and furious. Though, they lack the drama of the old duels between Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader. It's not a bad thing, necessarily, just a different style.
My question is this: What happened to everybody since the time of this movie. It really doesn't make any sense at all that the old Jedi fought all fast and did a bunch of flips and spins, where Darth Vader, who was trained by Obi Wan and Emperor Palpatine (Darth Siduous in Phantom Menace), fought so slow?
I think the downfall of this movie is that George Lucas and his creative crew tried too hard to bring out a bunch of special effects and computer graphics to the movie that they didn't concentrate on the story. It just doesn't fit together as well as the other ones.
|
As far as the character's and the actors go, this movie had a lot of skilled and gifted actors and actresses, but also had that little bastard who played Anikin Skywalker. Everyone in this movie was so good, until we meet Anikin and his mother, who are both pretty bad in the acting area. Don't know if it was just me or what, but I personally think that they sucked.
The guy who played Jar Jar Binks, though he got stuck with the world's most hated character, was pretty damned good. He did all the acting for Jar Jar, including the voice and the motion capture stuff for the computer animation.
One thing that distracted me throughout the movie was that people from Naboo are called Nubian. Every time I hear that, I wondered why the Nubian Queen wasn't black. The only black guy that was Nubian was Captain Panaka, who's name is too similar to Banaka (the breath spray) to be ignored. All the time I kept thinking of the Nubian Captain Banaka. Maybe I just have problems.
To sum it up, this movie is a must see. Despite the many problems that plagued the movie in my opinion, I still watch this movie just about once a week. If you haven't seen this movie yet, you have to go rent it today.
Rating: 7 out of 10 severed Jar Jar BINKS (not Jar Jar Schmoke) heads
Web Sites:
The Official Star Wars Website
There are about a billion others, which aren't hard to find. If you find any that are good, let me know, cause all the ones I found were kinda ass-ish. You can contact me at jarjarschmoke@penis.com
