journal features

movie review - The Empire Strikes Back

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

Vancouver, 2002.03.31

I've always thought that this was the best of the original "Star Wars" movies. The story is the richest, the dialog and acting the strongest, and there are no ewoks or animated characters. It's also the one in which the heroes constantly take it in the teeth.

In this movie, our heroes are first forced to flee their base when it is discovered and attacked (badly) by the Empire. When they try to take refuge with a supposed friend, they get betrayed. There are other complications along the way, but I can hardly believe anyone reading this hasn't seen it.

Ultimately, it ends on a slight up note, just because everyone is nominally alive at the end.

Strongly recommended. Still.

rand()m quote

It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by the dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions and spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who, at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly; so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat.

—Theodore Roosevelt, Jr.