FILM REVIEW STAR WARS
EPISODE TWO - ATTACK OF THE CLONES
As a Clone War deserter, who fled the battlefield to shouts
via Yoda of "The yellow Side of the Force is Strong with this one, Obi Wan"... I can say that this docudrama soap opera take on the battles I engaged in only briefly, is far more accurate than the Phantom menace
episode..... Anikin, called Ani throughout goes on to lose his Mum in effect becoming little Orphan Ani, who will one day take over the Galaxy.
This is much more of a n action flick, and as such has future cityscapes derived from Bladerunner, Metropolis and countless other SF movies, the
battle arena full of monsters looks like a homage to a Harryhausen epic, and there are some clearly old fashioned looks and feels to the style of this one, the robot making foundry plant that seems to just pound and crush metal, in a style parodied heavily by Galaxy Quest, - definitely working conditions the HSE would have reservations about, even if they turn a blind eye to the crumbling environment I work in.
There are flaws a plenty here, R2D2 flies, a feat that he seems to forget in the later films when such activity could have been useful to him. Everyone, C3PO especially seems to forget knowing Ani, in later films, but that could yet be explained in episode three... worse however is the whole love story of Ani and Amadala, he has grown she looks essentially as she did in his childhood yippee days, Jedi are not to fall in love, but a couple of randy adolescents are sent off alone to play together on a romantic lush planet.
Ani’s political ideas should be a real turn off to a champion of democracy and fair rights like Amadala, so his desire for a great ruler to make al the decisions for us should really put her off him,... but she loves him anyway... His massacre of the sand People Tribe (OK, upset about Mummy but come on....) should equally warn her he is not exactly taking things too benevolently but the marriage is destined anyway...
Obi Wand's loss of the planet and interrupting Yoda’s school class to ask the blindingly obvious seems incredibly inept, as Yoda in effect gets the class to tell him the answer, to a matter of grave intergalactic political sensitivity. It’s a bit like James Bond asking a teacher of a class of 7 year olds if they happen to know where the bomb that will blow up London in ten minutes might be hidden, and the kids are encouraged to reply "Bakerloo Underground station isn’t some hidden code - that’s the actual place Blolfeld put it" before getting back to some Geography.....
The pursuit and battle with Jago Fett, taking his son out on the job like Vinnie Jones in Lock Stock and Two Smoking Light Sabers is very well done, and the battle sequences with Obi and Fett and later Windu and Fett are cool. I particularly like the near submarine chase sequence through the asteroid belt with the depth charge like explosive devises Jago uses to try to throw Obi of the trail.....
Chris Lee’s Dooku is wonderful, so close to Sarumen in spirit and behavior, and the fight with Ani and then Obi wan is well staged if looking forced and contrived, as he pushes each one aside... literally disarming Ani in a very prophetic moment on what will come later with the loss of a hand for Luke and Vader’s own final downfall. Perhaps it is seeing Dooku using the blue electricity trick on Obi Wan that will later trigger a return to sanity and scruples when he sees the Emperor try to kill Luke that way.....
Given Lee’s age it’s not as well choreographed a fight scene as the battle with Darth Maul but then Yoda turns up and that is one of the great battle scenes going, - love the way Yoda briefly forgets his infirmities and walking stick to kick serious ass and then gets the stick again,. There’s lots of great moments, C3PO apologizing for turning into a battle droid, R2 reassembling him as he laments "I’m not feeling myself...." and other terrible puns, the final rise of the imperial army juxtaposed on Ani-Amadala’s wedding, (illegitimacy not for us then) the shock that it is the good guys and Yoda in particular who deploy the clone army.
Of the clone army... are the people who make this really so stupidly lacking in security consciousness as to let a complete stranger (obi Wan) arrive to talk to them.... he asks lots of impertinent questions, gets to see the hole operation, and only provokes suspicion in the Fett Family with whom he fights loudly without the clone makers coming to investigate. Did Hitler accidentally get his hands on the armies of the Reich so easily? happening to pop over to a castle for a cup of sugar and coming back with 200 panzer divisions meant for someone else who died years before....
All looks promising for episode three. (Having seen 3 I so wish I hadn't written that).
Arthur Chappell