Review - 3D Star Wars
Mar. 4th, 2012 11:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rich_jackoDon't go to see 3D Star Wars for the 3D. It's pretty good for a film converted afterwards, but it's nowhere near the quality of a film shot that way. The 3D is most effective in the space scenes. It's amazing the difference that simply putting the star field a long way behind the action makes. In other scenes it's mostly okay, although there's a few jarringly bad bits where 3D-ing the foreground but not the background just makes the background look flat and fake.
No, the reason you should see 3D Star Wars is that it's a chance to see The Phantom Menace on the big screen again. Aside from being big and loud and spectacular, it helps you to properly appreciate all the amazing design work that went into the worlds, creatures, costumes and machinery in this film. I'm once again boggled at how it failed to win any awards for this.
From a nerdy spot-the-difference perspective, Yoda has taken time out from selling mobile phones to re-shoot his scenes in CGI. This is an improvement, as the previous puppet just didn't look like the Yoda from Empire and Jedi. This is also the DVD cut rather than the original theatrical cut of the film, which means slightly more podrace and a slightly extended arrival on Coruscant.
Aside from that, it's The Phantom Menace as you know and love / loathe it. What was great before is still great - Qui-Gon Jinn (the archetypal Jedi), the lightsaber battles, Palpatine's machinations, Watto (still my favourite SW minor character), the podrace, BRIAN BLESSED. Its faults are still faults - some of the dialogue remains cringe-worthy ("Are you an angel?"), several main characters could do with being less serious and wisecracking a bit more, and the final battle set-up is over-complicated and disjointed. It is, and always has been, a work of flawed genius.
I was pleased to see that, much as people like to knock this film, it still managed to pull in almost a full audience mid-week, despite being nearly 13 years old and a fortnight into its re-release. I think most people like it really, whether or not they like to admit it ;o)
On a related, sadder note, Ralph McQuarrie has died. He was responsible for so much of the original look of Star Wars and lots of other sci-fi favourites, and will be missed.
No, the reason you should see 3D Star Wars is that it's a chance to see The Phantom Menace on the big screen again. Aside from being big and loud and spectacular, it helps you to properly appreciate all the amazing design work that went into the worlds, creatures, costumes and machinery in this film. I'm once again boggled at how it failed to win any awards for this.
From a nerdy spot-the-difference perspective, Yoda has taken time out from selling mobile phones to re-shoot his scenes in CGI. This is an improvement, as the previous puppet just didn't look like the Yoda from Empire and Jedi. This is also the DVD cut rather than the original theatrical cut of the film, which means slightly more podrace and a slightly extended arrival on Coruscant.
Aside from that, it's The Phantom Menace as you know and love / loathe it. What was great before is still great - Qui-Gon Jinn (the archetypal Jedi), the lightsaber battles, Palpatine's machinations, Watto (still my favourite SW minor character), the podrace, BRIAN BLESSED. Its faults are still faults - some of the dialogue remains cringe-worthy ("Are you an angel?"), several main characters could do with being less serious and wisecracking a bit more, and the final battle set-up is over-complicated and disjointed. It is, and always has been, a work of flawed genius.
I was pleased to see that, much as people like to knock this film, it still managed to pull in almost a full audience mid-week, despite being nearly 13 years old and a fortnight into its re-release. I think most people like it really, whether or not they like to admit it ;o)
On a related, sadder note, Ralph McQuarrie has died. He was responsible for so much of the original look of Star Wars and lots of other sci-fi favourites, and will be missed.
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Date: 2012-03-05 01:32 pm (UTC)The script is horrible, Jar Jar is horrible, midichlroians are horrible, the pod race is horrible (it serves two purposes: one, to retrofit in a justification for Obi Wan's "already a great pilot" comment in Star Wars, and two, to sell computer games). In fact I'd say the only thing that remotely saves this film is Palpatine.
The second and third prequels have better action scenes and retain great plots but have even worse acting and even worse scripts than the first.
I'm neither the first to say this nor the last. If George Lucas had plotted these prequels, and produced them, and overseen design and look and feel, and delegated the screenplay and direction to someone else, then there could've been three great films made. But there weren't and that's a real shame to me.
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Date: 2012-03-05 07:36 pm (UTC)> it serves two purposes: one, to retrofit in a justification for Obi Wan's "already a great pilot" comment in Star Wars, and two, to sell computer games
The asteroid chase in Empire and the speeder bike chase in Jedi - both mid-film chase scenes that arguably do nothing to advance the plot and could easily be edited out. Were they just put in to sell computer games too? Or is it only since the advent of more advanced computer games that that sort of scene has become inexcusable?
The podrace is there partly because the flow of the film needs another action scene at that point; partly for Lucas to indulge his childhood nostalgia of cart racing; and partly because he just likes showing lots of big machines flying around really fast. But it's also there for plot reasons. Yes, it shows Anakin was "already a great pilot", but Episode I itself needs that in order to set up his being able to fly the Naboo fighter at the end.
More than that, the film needs both the podrace and the end space battle to give Anakin something to do. They ensure he plays a major part in helping our heroes get to Coruscant and in helping to win the day at the end. They show his strength in the Force, why Qui-Gon has faith in him and why the Jedi agree to train him. They also show his recklessness and stubborn belief that he knows best, both of which will be important character traits later on.
The final reason why the podrace needs to be there is because it's made of awesome :op