There's a lot going on in the film but not a lot actually happening.
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When George Lucas premiered the very first installment of his "Star Wars" outer-space shoot-em-up saga in 1977, most critics like it and, of course, audiences went wild. When he released his second installment, "The Empire Strikes Back" three years later, critics liked it even more, and audiences were equally if not more enthusiastic. The trouble began with the third segment, "The Return of the Jedi" in 1983, and you'd have thought Lucas would have figured out the problem by the time the fourth installment, "The Phantom Menace," rolled around some sixteen years later. Alas, the latest in the series, 2002's "The Attack of the Clones," only exacerbates the issue.
So, what's going on, and what went wrong? "Phantom Menace" and "Clones" are certainly recommendable films, but they possess nowhere near the charms of the first two or three "Star Wars" outings. Let me suggest four possible reasons for the series' diminishing returns: Excessive cuteness, insufficient family, relatively weak characters, and an overreliance on special effects. The first is self-evident. With the appearance of the Ewoks in "Jedi," audiences began to balk. They were cuddly little teddy bear critters that sang and danced and played in the trees. The Wife-O-Meter practically went through the floor as Mrs. Puccio began to gag at their antics; fortunately, the Ewoks showed up late enough in the film to do minimum damage. The same could not, unfortunately, be said of Jar Jar Binks in "The Phantom Menace," and he almost single-handedly sabotaged that picture for many viewers.
But cuteness alone was not enough to lose the day. The other deficiencies were more damaging. The first three "Star Wars" entries introduced us to a group of characters who became like family to one another and a second family to most of the movie's fans. Luke, Han, Leia, Obi-Wan, C3-PO, R2-D2, Yoda, all became our friends, our buds, our kindred. Heck, we even learned to like Darth Vader and the evil Emperor. Ditto for Lucas's earlier "American Graffiti," where the teens were a close-knit family of friends we came to love. But what did "The Phantom Menace" bring us but characters with whom we could never get involved. And the ones we did begin to like, Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson) and Darth Maul (Ray Park), for instance, were killed off! It was as though Lucas were taunting us with his new technological wizardry by saying, See, you didn't need characterizations after all, did you, now that you've seen such grand visuals? But, of course, he was wrong, and "The Phantom Menace" and "Clones" are the worse for having almost no one in them worthy of our attention.
To illustrate, the main character in "The Attack of the Clones" is the young Anakin Skywalker, presently in his late teens and soon to become the most hated man in the universe. Now, LUKE Skywalker we could identify with and root for. But how can you take a liking to a guy whom you know before long will turn into a monster, not just destroying armies or countries but entire planets? More damaging, how can you like a character when he's played by so awkward and wooden an actor as Hayden Christensen? Just listening to him talk is sometimes painful, and the character he plays seems more of a spoiled, whiny, sometimes recalcitrant child than a maturing Jedi Knight. And his love interest, Natalie Portman as Senator Padmé Amidala, fares only slightly better. Ewan McGregor as a young Obi-Wan is perhaps the best hero of the lot, but, surprisingly for the amount of screen time he has, his character is never fully realized or emphasized enough to make him much of a factor in the picture. It's a trip to watch Master Yoda kick some serious butt, but that is only a fleeting diversion. Further hurt is done by practically throwing away Samuel L. Jackson, a fine actor, as the Jedi Master, Mace Windu. This leaves only Christopher Lee as Count Dooku, also known as Darth Tyranus, to care about, a villain in the best old-time tradition. It's terrific to watch Lee in action (both here and in "The Lord of the Rings"), still in good dastardly form after close to half a century of this sort of thing, even if his character is introduced relatively late in the picture. Thankfully, too, Jar Jar makes only a few token appearances.
It seems to me that Lucas is saving an awful lot of his best material for the third installment of this second trilogy and hoping it will make up for the deficits of the past. What I'm saying is, he allowed us in Episodes 1 and 2 only glimpses of the evil Emperor-to-be and Count Dooku, and we have yet to see but hints of the dramatic changeover of Anakin to the Dark Side. When criticized about the relative lack of character development in Episodes 1 and 2, Lucas suggested that these were only introductions, so to speak, to the main story, which would come later. I wonder if he isn't putting too many eggs into that one final basket and getting the public's expectations a little too high for what he may not be able to deliver. We'll see. In the meantime, we have in "Clones" yet another episode in a series that appears to be all preface and little body.
What "Attack of the Clones" does have in its favor, its special effects, is also one of its downfalls. If "The Lord of the Rings" was one of the most beautiful films of the last few years, certainly "Clones" is one of the most spectacular. In fact, there is no question in my mind that the movie is one of the most stunning visual attractions ever produced, the screen constantly filled with the ravishing and the bizarre, from wondrous alien cities to serene, mythological landscapes; from lovely ladies and handsome heroes to dark lords and grotesque demons. One cannot help be fascinated by the CGI graphics and fabulous makeup and costumes, yet in the end they are all show, momentarily distracting the viewer from the fact that there is little underneath. Still, just looking at this wonder of an entertainment is enough to justify its watching.
Anyway, there may be two or three of you out there wondering what this second episode is all about and whether the plot, if not the characters, is any better than that of the first installment. The scene is set a decade after "The Phantom Menace," and young Anakin Skywalker (Christensen) has grown up. Mysteriously, Padmé Amidala (Portman) has remained the same, so now they're both about the same age. Well, maybe people age differently on different planets. Besides, it's convenient. Skywalker is the apprentice of Obi-Wan, and together they are assigned the duty of guarding Padmé, whose life is threatened by a sinister but as-yet unknown party of separatists led by Count Dooku. While war threatens, Skywalker and Amidala fall in love. I mean, how else would we have gotten Luke and Princess Leia? I wish I could say any of this was as interesting as the special effects that accompany it, but again Lucas seems more fascinated by the look of the film than the storytelling. No harm done. It's still fun, and the special effects are stunning.
There's more derring-do this time out, and several chase and fight scenes are quite thrilling. The computer-generated armies of clones and droids are staggering to behold, although many of the individual alien creatures retain the cartoonish appearance so common to Lucas's imagination. I suppose it's to make them seem less threatening and, thus, more appealing to children, but it might also undermine the film's credibility among serious sci-fi fans. Most of the heroics are left to Obi-Wan, while Anakin is engaged in the romance department, and the film often crosscuts between the two components. Some people I've talked to liked this style; others did not. I would have preferred more action and less of Hayden Christensen, but that's a personal bias. I also found it odd that a Jedi Master like Obi-Wan, with all of his mystical powers, has such a hard time defeating a mere bounty hunter, but, then again, maybe I just missed something. In any event, the film has enough visual splendor, enough flair, and enough stuff happening to engage most viewers, especially old diehard "Star Wars" fans like me.
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[release]10496[/release]