Late opinions on Star Wars III (just saw it)

[Laurence Maher]

Okay, well,

See I had come to the point with good'ol george that it simply wasn't worth paying full price to see him do stupid stuff on a large screen, so I didn't see it until the dollar theater, which it just came to and . . .

I agree with this general statement I've heard; it's the best of the last III films, but still a bad movie. The worst had to be the first 30 minutes with R2-D2 flying around and roasting robots like RAMBO-D2 or something. Secondly worse were the robots that would die at the end of a cool scene and then make some dumb cartoon-like sigh as they fizzled out. Third was probably Obi-wan who always gets his butt kicked/man that was lame that he gets knocked unconcious and then Anakin has to save him like he's a school girl or something (of course the whole first 30 min could have been cut out and it would have brought the movie up at least 2 points out of 10). Boy that was some great filmmaking though when the emperor suddenly pulls out his sabre for the first time, and INSTANTLY kills 3 jedi . . . just kidding. Man, my grandmother could have fought better than those 3/so lame. Then of course, since Samuel J. got paid a sum, he had to get some fight time on screen, so then he and he alone manages to get the emperor almost dead? Oh, and after all that, what stops him is Anakin walks in the door and cuts off his hand, and then this ALMOST DEAD emperor suddenly lightning bolts Sammuel out the window. (???????) And surely since Yoda has always been the weakest of the Jedi, he doesn't come nearly as close as Sammuel to killing the emperor. (????????) Wow, I knew Lucas was going to have to write himself out of the corner he was in with Yoda later being in hiding and all, and I always feared he'd do it by Yoda losing to the Emperor, but, man, did he REALLY have to do it? After all this time Yoda's just a wuss. I mean, if he HAD to do it, he did it as best he could I think, but . . . wuss. Well, but I guess maybe it was right for him to later send Luke to do the job . . . ummmm . . . I guess, uh. Obi-wan fights a 4 sabred robot king who learned from Count Dooko; mmmmmstupid. Then he almost loses, and still gets Anakin at the end; mmmmmstupid. But he got his butt kicked by Dokoo right off the bat and Anakin took dokoo with little problem then gets his but kicked by Obi-wan . . . mmmmmmstupid.

Other bad flaws include that Lucas ever made another movie after Episode I. Worst flaw of the whole series was that Lucas made money off all the films.

Now.

Good stuff. Performances were good. Well, I don't know about Sammuel J. I kind of expected a veggie burger to pop out or somehing, with everyone in space speaking Brittish accents but him. (He was actually ok, just didn't like what they did with him).

Ummm, really the good stuff was with Anakin though. Hayden Christenson or whatever actually pulled it off reasonably well, a task very hard to do after being directed by Lucas, or coming off as VERY annoying and in need of puberty in episode II. Killing all the kids was cool. Killing off the Jedi at the Jedi fort was cool. A little underplayed, maybe. Best scene was undoubtedly the surprisingly violent lava-man. Quite shocked by Lucas' choice there. And then Obi-wan was a surprise when he just walked off and left Anikin there to die! Burning alive!!!! I hate to say I was impressed by anything Lucas did after Raiders, but, well, that scene and building up to it was good. Gave the Frankenvader breaking out of the shackles later a little more validity I guess.

Frankenvader would have been the cheeziest scene in existence if it had not been so dark earlier. Felt for the guy suddenly becomming this shell of a man and all. Still a bit cheezy. But because of lavaman, frankenvader went from 10 on the cheese scale to maybe a 4 or 5. It was surely better than RAMBO-D2. Only Jar-Jar can compete with that.

Over all a piece of Junk, but one with enjoyable surprises.

Rating 1-10 for Episode I was 1, II was 2 and III I think was 3.

Not good, but . . . okay, not good.

Comments?

[Duane Smith]

(Warning: full of spoilers, since initial post did the same):

Basically, I suffered through 3 pretty terrible movies just to see the climactic lava scene and to actually witness Obi Wan chop Anakin's arms-and-legs off and then see him burn alive. It was grotesque and horrifying. It actually gave me a nightmare that evening I saw it. The "I hate you!" scream from the burning, chopped-up Anakin haunted me for weeks.

It was worth it. :-)

[Steven White]

That's another thing... you couldn't really see him chop the arms and legs off in that nonsensical final moment of the duel. The filming of all the duels was terrible in this, with the possible exception of Yoda vs. Sidious... which was mostly CG anyway.

Thankfully, Ong Bak is coming out on DVD this month, and Tom Yung Goong later.

-Steve

[Michael Gibbons]

I have vowed not to see epIII. this thread further validates this choice.

[John Hudson]

My sentiments exactly. It's been ages since suffering through the Ewoks introduction but that one was the closing episode on a wonderful trilogy; I could take Wicket with a grain (hard to swallow them turnjing Han Solo into a nanacy dawson though)

And then there were 3 more................

And they all have just outright sucked. Yes; this third one was better than the last 2 but still horrible.

I don't know how many CGI backgrounds I can take; or cartoony sounding droids or just plaine lame filmmkaing.

Lucas ruined the SW mystique.

[Joshua Starnes]

Originally Posted by Laurence Maher

Wow, I knew Lucas was going to have to write himself out of the corner he was in with Yoda later being in hiding and all, and I always feared he'd do it by Yoda losing to the Emperor, but, man, did he REALLY have to do it? After all this time Yoda's just a wuss. I mean, if he HAD to do it, he did it as best he could I think, but . . . wuss.

That's pretty cynical. Anyone that loses in a fight is automatically a wuss? If Yoda can't beat everyone in a fight, then he's lessened as a character?

[John Hudson]

No

He is saying that Yoda running away into exhile is weak (wuss). Yoda should have been hell bent on coming back.

In fact; now that I think about it; why was Ben hiding on some desert planet?

Both of them are wusses.

[Marco Leavitt]

Jeez. I liked it.

[Chris Hurd]

Er, Ben wasn't hiding on just *any* desert planet, but a very particular one.

[Krystian Ramlogan]

Sigh. I must say I, like most here, though Episode III sucked.

I had to go see it, along with the other 2, simply because I wanted to see how the technology would affect the story on screen, which it obviously did.

The first trilogy had so much more scope, there were bonafide scenes where you thought you were seeing another planet man, VISTAS man. Then, we get some HD and things shrink considerably and we forget we are experiencing a galactic story man. Where was the scope? Lost I say, Lost in the thrill of playing with new toys!

Ok, so now that my moment of madness has, almost passed :-), I can be a bit more serious.

I think Episode I sucked with no redeeming qualities. Episode II sucked, but the ending fight scene was cool. Episode III was better put together and gave some closure, but I thought the chemistry between Anakin and Padme sucked. The fight between Palpatine and Yoda really did suck: Yoda was supposed to be better than everyone man, even Mace-Windu, so how could he get his butt whupped like that? It would have been more exicting for Palpatine and Anakin to beat him - but, c'est la vie.

Do I think, Yoda or Obi-wan are wusses? Hmmm...not really. I think they had no choice; if they attacked they ran the risk of being eliminated totally, so they decided retreat was the better part of valor.

HOWEVER, I'm not liking that fall-back on the prophecy to be realized through Anakins offspring thing that happened at the end - poor writing to me (not saying poor writing wasn't a weakness throughout all).

It could have been so much better, sigh, much like the Matrix sequels, sigh.

If we ever see episodes 7, 8, and 9 I hope we get good writers and directors.

[Laurence Maher]

Wow! I guess I forget I'm on the dvinfo threads and not some sci-fi geek thread. It catches me off guard when so many people agree with me.

Shame about the whole thing, huh?

And I've got no more hope for the next Indiana Jones flick, because, I've heard that after Lucas tried out screenwriters like M. Night Shamalyn (is that how you spell it?) and a few promising others, he came to the conclusion that it would be best if he himself wrote the screenplay because none of the writers that tried for it really "knew the Indy character".

Please.

Even after creating him, if Temple of Doom or Last Crusade were any indication of Lucas' idea of Indy's character, I'd say we're in for another promising cameo from Jar Jar Binx.

. . . oh wait . . . You didn't know the Indy universe collided with the Star Wars universe? Hey, get a load of this man. Ok, Indy, being chastized so much from the barage of "Junior! Junior! Junior"s from his stupid dad, finds a time machine and travels forward in time to the Star Wars universe, only to find out that Marcus has slowly evolved over centuries into Jar Jar Binx. Here, I'll let you read you a quote from the screenplay . . . .

ahem . . .

. . . INDY---Hey Marcus! Your not gonna act as stupid as you did in Last Crusade now are you? I mean, after all, you were pretty cool in Raiders!

MARCUS---Meeeesa Say, Meeeesa Say, I not lika at all de way I be from Raiders! Now my ears be all floppy and we all treat your friend Salla like a slave instead of your good friend! Meeeesa try to get Sean Connery a new umbrella though. Last time he flop away seagulls and save Indy's butt a whole bunch!

. . . ?

. . . Whatchya guys think? Sounds promising to me.

Yes, I'm cynical. But at least some of you see the light with me.

[Boyd Ostroff]

Originally Posted by Laurence Maher

finds a time machine and travels forward in time to the Star Wars universe

Wait a minute.... I thought Star Wars was "long ago in a galaxy far away?" Or maybe I've got that wrong, I forget....

I would have gone to see episode 3 out of curiousity, but I was busy and never got around to it. All these spoilers tend to bring me around to Michael's way of thinking, but I'm sure I'll watch the DVD someday when I'm looking for a bit of escapist entertainment.

[Mathieu Ghekiere]

Laurence, although I too thought Episode III sucked (well, the complete new trilogy actually), but I don't agree with what you are saying about the Indiana Jones movies.
First I thought the two sequels were very good, especially the Last Crusade which I actually found to be the best of the three - my personal opinion.
But why I'm not agreeing with what you are saying is because you forget... SPIELBERG!!

Sorry, but I haven't lost my trust in Spielberg.
The man uses his special fx in service of his story and not the other way around.

[John Hudson]

Whoa whoa whoa

Indiana Jones. Heres' the problem with Indiana Jones.

Raiders of the Lost Ark was so epic and wonderful beyond words it was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture. In fact it was nominated for:

Art Direction - WIN
Cinematography
Director
Editing - WIN
Picture
Score
Sound - WIN
Visual Effects - WIN
Special Achievement - WIN

AFI calls it one of 100 Greatest American Movies

It won Best Director at the Golden Globes, the DGA, the British Academy Awards and Library of Congress selected it as well for the U.S. National Film Registry.

That's how cool RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK is. The other 2 don't and did not come close to this level of achievement. To this day I cannot believe they gave the Best Picture to CHARIOTS OF FIRE. Maybe ON GOLDEN POND but not CHARIOTS over RAIDERS. And giving Beatty the nod over Steven man; aye yae yae.... (and how can you give the Best Film and Best Director away to two different projects anyway?)

I'm 100% with Laurence Maher on this issue. I am so concerned they are going to scrw up part 4. They already screwed up INDY III which was so bad and absurd it reduced the series to one big f***** joke. "Junior!? Junior!?" and Marcus being a complete nincompoop; how do you go from the coolness that was Marcus in Raiders to a complete moron? The entire film is just one big bad dream and caters towards the 8 year olds; and that's the problem.

This new one is probally going to suck and Geroge get's far to much credit for Indiana Jones as it is; good or bad.

I think INDY 4 should be taken down to it's roots and shot legit and not for some childrens comedy hour. I say bring in a story about the bomb and Imperial Japanese Forces. Yeah baby. GIve me the Pacific Theatre. The NAZI story has gotten old.

[Keith Loh]

I'm with John on this.

"Raiders of the Lost Ark" still holds up to repeated viewings. To me it belongs in the pantheon of nearly flawless adventure pictures. Exciting, tight with memorable set pieces.

Each sequel was several statures below Raiders. "The Last Crusade" I thought was mediocre and poorly-made whereas "Temple of Doom" was competent but didn't really have an interesting concept or conflict.

I believe a good Indy film could still be made but I'm not holding my breath.