The short review:
Why, young Padawan, lack of patience you have! Still if know you must what to do then let me advise you. See the movie, you must. A great event, it is. Now go your way, you can. May the force be with you!
The ’’fan in me’’ version:
Go, go to your theatres immediately. Watch the movie make Lucas richer. The movie is great; in fact it is stupendous in its scope of the Star Wars Universe. Well worth the watch. Well worth buying the DVD. So what are you waiting for!!!
The long version:
Story:
Well no great surprises here! The story is exactly as we expect it to be. However there is one problem. At times it feels that the movie could easily have become two movies. Many parts of the movie seem to have been rushed through. Maybe some of it should have been put into Attack Of The Clones (Part II). Well! Whatever! The end result is that the story sticks to the canon, is not overtly complicated and is as expected. So it gets a 5/10. {After seeing all the parts I think story-wise the best movie seems to be The Empire Strikes Back - especially with it’s ’’I Am Your Father’’ twist in the tail.}
Technical:
This is where the movie really shines. Were you amazed by Coruscant, the Kamiya system and the Gungans underwater city in the last version? You have not seen anything yet. This time around Coruscant really comes to life. The buildings, the vehicles, the space battles, the opera everything is at a completely different scale. I give this a score of 9/10
Sound/Music:
As expected the sound is Superlative. The background score is rich as ever. Add to that the climatic sounds and you have a winner.
This gets an easy 8/10
Action:
The space battle scenes are very well detailed and executed. Please watch out for the cannons firing on the battleships, reminds you of pirate movies. All the action sequences are a pleasure to watch. I would give it an 8/10
Lightsaber action:
Action scenes of lightsaber duels deserve a rating of its own in any SW movie. This movie has some of the best one-one action sequences. Easily takes the rating of 9/10
Script:
Not the greatest! There are some cool lines for Yoda and Obi Wan Kenobi has some humorous stuff but on the whole not the best of scripts. I give it a tepid 5/10.
Acting:
I cringe to write about this. Yoda is cool and Palapatine is great. But that about 90% of the acting right there, surprising, considering that Lucas had Samuel L Jackson, Ewan McGregor and Jimmy Smits to work with. Granted Ewan has his moments, some of them really funny but he has largely been reduced to an action figure. Also granted that Jimmy Smits really did not have much screen time but what happened to Samuel L Jackson? The only time he seemed to have some life was when he went into his Shaft overdrive to whoop some Sith Ass. Mace Windu’s character was a disappointment to me.
However all of the above were still acting. Which brings us to people who weren’t? Spot Quiz: What is more boring then watching grass grow? Answer: Watching Hayden Christensen and Natalie Portman ’’act’’!!! They were appalling. Considering that the whole movie revolved around them it is a wonder that Lucas managed to captivate us in spite of their poor acting skills.
Of course all is not bad. R2-D2 and C3PO are excellent as always. I must say I have sorely missed a figure like Han Solo in the prequels.
So for overall acting the movie gets 5/10 thanks largely due to the animators of Yoda and to Ian McDermid as Palaptine.
Conclusion:
Despite the bad acting and the hasty script the movie still rocks. As a Star Wars fan(atic) I really love this movie. For those of you who are not Star Wars fans, I will still recommend watching the movie. Just make sure you do see it in a good theatre and don’t buy tickets in black. Approach it as an action movie and you will not be disappointed.
Now having taken a very measured look as a normal person I can now revert back to the fanatic that I am. The question though is how to convince my better half to see the movie once again? Any advice? :)