journal features

movie review - Star Wars Episode II - Attack of the Clones

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-eight years and a million words

Calgary, 2002.05.16

I went and saw the first showing of the new Star Wars movie last night. It was an improvement. Quite different from the previous one, and substantially different from the first trilogy, too. I have to say, I'm not sure that anything from "Episode I" matters to this movie, however. Maybe the meeting of Padme and Anakin? Did Qui-Gon ever matter?

Movie making has certainly changed in the last 25 years.

I found myself grinning like one of the kids from South Park for half of this movie and struggling to pay attention to the other half. As far as the series goes: the dialogue in this one (particularly in the weird love story between the psychotic teenage Vader and the (much) older Amidala) was about as bad as Lucas has come up with, which is saying something. I still give it the highest rating in the series since "The Empire Strikes Back". "The Phantom Menace" seems like a dry run up to a movie series, or a pre-prequel. Crazily pointless and just there to please the fans. This feels like the series is going somewhere.

Recommended.

rand()m quote

If I had my life to live over, I'd try to make more mistakes next time. I would relax, I would limber up, I would be crazier than I've been on this trip. I know very few things I'd take seriously any more. I'd certainly be less hygenic... I would take more chances, I would take more trips, I would scale more mountains, I would swim more rivers, and I would watch more sunsets. I would eat more ice cream and fewer beans. I would have more actual troubles and fewer imaginary ones. Oh, I've had my moments, and if I had to do it all over again, I'd have many more of them, in fact I'd try not to have anything else, just moments, one after another, instead of living so many years ahead of my day. If I had it to do all over again, I'd travel lighter, much lighter than I have. I would start barefoot earlier in the spring, and I'd stay that way later in the fall. And I would ride more merry-go-rounds, and catch more gold rings, and greet more people and pick more flowers and dance more often. If I had it to do all over again - but you see, I don't.

—Jorge Luis Borges