Yikes! What an awful movie. I hear that the next one my actually be better. Episode one didn't have the whole star wars feel to it. It was more like Power-Puff girls.
I've actually done a lot of thinking on this, on why. I didn't like Jar-Jar, he seemed put there for the kids more than as a serious though humorous character. Take the "atmosphere and environmental feel" of the first 3 movies. Would it have been possible for them to make Phantom Menace with this same feel? Impossible? Why? If possible, why didn't Lucas do so, considering how well the formula worked with the first 3 movies? And how much of Phantom Menace seeming different from the first 3 was because all of the actors / characters that we'd been used to in the first 3 movies were no longer there? Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Chewbacca, Lando Calrissian, Darth Vader... What if the fourth movie made had been the 7th movie in the chronology, instead of the 1st, so that some of these actors / characters would have been in it? How much more enjoyable would it have been than Phantom Menace was, even if it had been made similarly to how P.M. was? Or would it have seemed even less enjoyable than P.M. because of how much it would have contrasted with the feel of the first 3 movies even while having the same actors / characters?
Like a virgin On the one hand, he was. To the other, Lucas doing some necessary showing off. Everybody knows that if he can eliminate actors entirely, he will. This is just another occasion to pause and examine what he's doing. The updated Episode IV footage of Solo talking to Jabba is worth considering here. That footage was filmed with the original and has sat aside until Lucas knew how to make everything he wanted appear in frame. But Jabba is comparatively easy to animate when you look to the amount of detail and motion in Jar-Jar binks. Furthermore, Lucas' typical mishmash languages of the species' wouldn't work because Jar-Jar, in order to pull off the demonstration, had to be a major character. That is, he had to speak and be intelligible in order to be relevant and avoid subtitles. Eventually, Lucas won't be skinning over actors; he'll just be compiling films from the computer. And then, he will truly have control over all factors of the picture. A number of considerations here. • The first trilogy was limited. That is, Lucas could not do everything he wanted to do in the films. Hence we see the updated versions, e.g. the Jabba/Solo scene at Mos Eisley. • Episode I has more of what Lucas wants. I consider it significant that most of the people I know who criticized the FX as not being riche enough had no clue what they were actually seeing. When the Trade Federation landed its troops on Naboo and lost the field to the ... well, to Jar-Jar's people. Would anyone like to tell me how many real objects appeared in that scene? This is a little more what it's supposed to look like, according to Lucas' will. If he wanted the films to look dated, he would have done so. • Likewise, Lucas wanted a different visual motif. One of craftsmanship versus industry. Thus the attractive, sleek spacecraft instead of the modular, quickly-assembled X-wings or the efficiently (?!) designed star destroyers. I can even put it directly for you. Watch American Graffiti. Look at the cars in that film. Go out onto the street and look there. Compare a 1950 Merc or Buick, or a 30's Dusenberg or Mercedes with the modern incarnations. In that sense, I would point out that a few years ago, Porsche enthusiasts threw a hissy-fit all over the company when both the Boxster and the 911 featured the same headlights. Industrial, interchangeable, practical. Like an X-Wing or a TIE fighter. Heck, compare old hood ornaments to modern insignia. That difference of motif is huge, and plays also toward the psychology of the Star Wars universe as relates to the chronology of the stories. • I was disappointed when I heard of the casting of Jackson, MacGregor, and Portman. Star Wars should rest entirely on unknowns, or nearly so. But come on ... Samuel L Jackson as a Jedi? When you stopped and thought about it, it was a good call. I remember reading an interview with MacGregor once that settled me on the choice. He said something to the effect of "How can I complain? I'm Obi-Wan Kenobi." Everybody did well. Neeson and Portman, however, could have been done by anyone. An excellent question. Nearest I can figure is that as Lucas works forward, if he really and truly decides to finish the series (he may not finish at all, and there have existed rumors that after this trilogy, he'll hand the project to someone else, but I don't hold with that) it might be that what he is working toward with his need for the digital working environment is well beyond the scope of the present trilogy. Some things we get to see, though: • Yoda with a lightsabre. • "The Jedi are all but extinct; you, my friend, are all that remains ...." We get to see the moment Moff Tarkin spoke of. And, to judge by the trailer, it looks like Lucas is delivering us a frame from a comic book. I pause that in the playback every time I watch it. Amazing. • A massive army of troops; has anyone seen the film adaptation of Gunga Din, or the sci-fi classic This Island Earth? I guarantee you that both of those films are known to Lucas. Gunga Din has a great scene, an overhead shot, when Gunga blows the bugle, and the British company falls into a battle line across the floor of a canyon barely in time to meet the coming ambush. I thought of that the first time I saw the troop deployment in Episode I. And there's a deployment of thousands of Stormtroopers in Episode II. A number of things in the first trilogy point to This Island Earth: TIE fighters, and there is a scale in Island that keeps coming back to me, a large-scale battle scene taking place in a window behind two people who are having a dramatic confrontation. The look of it reminds me of the gray plains of the Death Star in Episode IV, but the action is distant and looks much like Luke and the Emperor watching the fleets engage in Episode VI. I'm absolutely stoked to see the scale of things. The battle on Naboo was spectacular in its own right, but this promises to make Episode I look like Gunga Din in comparison. Given what Lucas has done to the sense of scale relative to these obvious influences, I expect the new presentations to be humongous. • Did I mention that Yoda fights with a lightsabre? • Something about Yoda and a lightsabre .... (I'm so effing stoked.) Hmm ... well, I'll take it from a different angle. I think we might lose something in the translation if he went that direction. Who are the central characters in Star Wars? There are only two main characters. Episode I made that clear. In fact, it explained much to me about why those two characters argue the way they do. The center of this sweeping, romantic, swashbuckling epic, from beginning to end, appears to be two droids. R2D2 and C3P0 are the actual center of the story. In order to track through a story that goes beyond any one lifetime, and in order to make that story consistently relevant to itself, the only characters you can have for episodes 1-9 are the droids. Consider how in episodes 4-6, we got a lot of subtitled translations but we never know exactly what R2 is saying. Did you ever wonder what he was saying to 3P0 in order to piss him off like that? What is the other half of those arguments? Bongs to the rescue, apparently. We were talking about this a few months ago over much dope and I'm now convinced that 3P0 has had his memory erased several times. How would that factor into, say, Episode IV, and the immediacy of R2's flight from Uncle Owen's? Because tomorrow the droids would have their memory erased and R2 has been through too much to put up with either his own erasure or rescuing 3P0 yet again. What if R2 keeps referring back to episodes 1-3 and confusing 3P0? But they are the center of the story, and their characters need to develop now, before they can take part in the final episodes. I can't tell if it was intended from the start, or just brilliant exploitation of a convenient opportunity to nail down part of the structure. As a final comment: what made the FX in, say, The Matrix cool was that people hadn't seen such effects before. This is a little like the Star Wars dazzle. But Episode I demonstrated that the power of FX come not in overt presentation or overload, but in the subtleties of the frame. People were disappointed, and some of the FX criticisms pertaining to LOTR gave me insight to this. I'm not a huge fan of Fellowship, and even bitched about the lighting in a couple of FX sequences. But most of the people I know and whom I 've read who were disappointed in the FX of LOTR don't seem to realize--even remotely--what they're actually seeing. But really--how many real objects did we see in either film? More, to be sure, in LOTR than PM, but that's actually beside the point. We're about to see a clone war. I would say that the reason we're here instead of there is twofold--backstories for the characters (e.g. the Jedi, the Republic, the Senate, and the whole situation of the rebellion) already, in some cases, existed out of necessity. To the other, it's possible that the end won't make sense without these episodes, and how pissed would you be if Lucas gave us 7-9 and either never got back to 1-3, or waited another 20+ years to tell us what it means, or if he died in age and, say, Roger Christian was called in to do the 1-3? Right now we have a happily ever after ending for Episode VI. But we have no real beginning to Episode IV, because we join the story in media res, which is a fine way to do it, but when you're looking at this large of a project, it's an awfully rough chunk to just leave sitting there. Did I mention Yoda? And a lightsabre? No matter how hard Lucas tries, though, he can't do to me what he did with Episode IV. Really, that's the problem. He popped our cherries with that film, and now we all want to feel like virgins every time he courts us. two cents and then some, thanx, Tiassa Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
yeah anikan was dissapointing in episode one i would have liked the "i see dead people" kid better maybe if anikan had killed some one with his bare hands, or crushed small animals for fun....
I would surgest you people hire epoisode on DVD It has the ability to change the sound track to a comentry by Gorge and otheres It explanes WHY Ankikan is so GOOD in eposode one
I have the dvd, never did that option. Excellent reply, tiassa. That whole R2 thing and the drugs is heaaavy, heaavy maan. But everyone who's seen the movie keeps saying that TPM seemed to be a much better movie because it all made sense. We'll just have to see what happens in SIX DAYS!!!!
oedipus, Than, the whole story wouldn't have made any sense... it would blow up the other episodes... I "like" Jar-jar... I can even imitate him walking... Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! But, yes... Much better the first three... Those had pretty good stuff on them... But the Phantom Menace had at least a couple of good lines... Love, Nelson
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Wow, no kidding, that doesn't suprise me at all. But I think you all fail to realize the full potential of Tiassa's remarks. YODA WITH A FREAKIN LIGHTSABRE! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! YES! YES! YES! YES! YES! YES! YES! YES!
It's unbelievable how many people didn't understand Episode I. Some people didn't even understand Sidious and Palpatine being the same person, which would leave them having no sense of what actually went on. Personally, I liked TPM... it was mediocre the first time I saw it, but later as I understood it and noticed all the subtle manipulation I've come to like it a lot. I'd have to say TPM is a deeper movie than both ROTJ and ANH. Having watched all 500 trailers and commercials (here), I feel like I've already seen episode II. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Plus, there's http://www.holonetnews.com for all the latest news around the galaxy.
Episode 1 was really hurt by the cheesiness of that underwater CG-puke fest. "Always a bigger fish?" oh damn, this jedi master is about as wise as a fortune cookie. and Darth Maul?!? Darth Maul was the biggest disappointment in Ep1. He hardly does anything, let alone provide evil foreshadowing. I mean c'mon, Vader chokes subordinates, plans to torture Leia with a flying ball-of-S&M-fun, and then kills Obiwan. Stupid Maul chases two bumbleheaded Jedi (one as wise as a fortune cookie) to tantooine and needs DROIDS to help him!?! DROIDS!!! I didnt even think you'd be worthy of the Sith-title "Darth" if you needed DROIDS to help you. And he still fails! Darth Maul and all his droids fail! whata bafoon! and then he gets cut in half?!? complete 'tard. Darth Maul ruined Ep1 for me worse than Jar-jar. now, last weekend I saw Ep2 and I must say I was impressed. As will you all be when you see it! Much better foreshadowing. Much better pacing. Far less cheese. And a finale/battlescene that'll blow your mind! SPOILER*** seeing Yoda swooping down in that Dropship gave me goosebumps!!!
