Star Wars; Revenge of the Sith (SW;ROTS)

By Allan Yap & Nigel A. Skelchy

Star Wars; Revenge of the Sith 

Cheesy. Corny. Over the top. No character development. Bad acting. Clumsy script.

I have seen, read, and heard all these comments regarding SW;ROTS.

Loved it anyway, I did!

Precisely because it carried on the tradition of the Star Wars genre. It is a B movie script and acting garbed in A list movie production values.

Sratch that.

Quintuple A-list production values.

Visually, it is by far the most stunning film I have ever seen. Bar none. I’m sorry Legolas. But even your fleet of foot feat in Lord of the Rings; The Fellowship of the Ring can’t take on the sheer virtuosity of the experience of SW; ROTS.

It is a movie made to be seen twice, thrice…ah what the heck, as many times as you can cram it into a day.

For that very reason, I felt overwhelmed when I left the cinema and found that I cannot remember much of it. You are so inundated with visual information in every scene that you need to suspend thought and channel the force just to process it all in one sitting.

George Lucas certainly does not like having his actors act a role if he could put words in their mouths instead. C3PO, after Anakin leaves Padme who’s looking distraught; “oh dear, I feel so helpless.” Really now! Or Anakin’s “if you’re not with me, you’re my enemy!” Really?!

Having said that, special kudos to Ian Mcdiarmid as the Emperor. No one on SW;ROTS rolls his ‘Rs’ more effectively or has such screen presence. Chilling!

Cool, detached, and practically devoid of emotion, Yoda was. But that fight scene…wow!


Ewan 

Ewan…how can you not love Ewan. Noble, flawed, not the strongest Jedi around, nor the wisest, but he played it with his usual nuanced elegance. I have a feeling that George reined in his acting instincts and got him to flatten out any 3 dimensionality that he might have invested in Obi-wan.

And Hayden…little Hayden has grown up. What a rippling torso you have… All the better to smother you with…oops, sorry, where was I?...oh yes. Acting. For all that he was supposed to be this indie film actor plucked from obscurity, there is still a very vague quality about his acting. He spent most of the time sulking. His expressions seemed to range from almost sulking to incredible sulk to pouting with intent to sulk!

And unfortunately, Natalie Portman’s Padme, who had more balls than most of the Jedi, throughout SW1 & 2, has had them surgically retracted back into her body and fed egregious amounts of oestrogen so that she plays the “Damsel In Distress” to the hilt.

Sam Jackson as Mace Windu. In a word. Cool! But then he’s Samuel Jackson.

Cliched. Corny. Call it what you will But SW;ROTS is in the best operatic tradition of extremes without the singing but with all the lush sets and conflicted emotional content. Love, lust, greed, anger moving to rage, crushing sadness, simpering ineffectual women, simpering effete men, caricatures of creatures, heroic larger than life heroes, the ideal man (complete with noble and regal bearing and obviously large penises – Go Ewan!), the ideal woman (complete with perky breasts).

Add towering sets to the mix, special effects which immerse you more fully than full body baptism, intricately choreographed fight cum dance scenes, light saber duels of monolithic proportions…nothing is left to chance or the imagination. It’s as if George Lucas intended to reach inside peoples heads, yank out their imagination, and translate that visually into film.

The rise and swell of John William’s score adds to that experience. The heroic but ominous march of Darth Vader, the fiendish deviousness of the Emperors score, the chaotic but heroic themes of the fledgling (say it with me) RrrreBelllion!

George Lucas has kept the faith and the force was with him!