Daily Archives: May 28, 2005

Star Wars Epsiode III: Revenge of the Sith

Leticia and I went to see this movie this Friday, and we loved it.

Apparently, Spielberg and many others cried during episode 3 of Star Wars. It is a very moving, very sad tale of the demise of the Jedi, and Anakin and Padme in particular.

I’ve read that many people don’t like it. I don’t understand why. I think it’s because of “old fogey” syndrome–a tendency to romanticize the past to be greater than it was, and to denegrate the present as not living up to it. I could be wrong, but that’s how it seems to me.

I loved the fighting, the drama, the music, the introspective scenes, and all the rest. It is easily the best of the current three, and may be as good as the original, IMHO. Although, I didn’t think that Episodes I and II were all that bad either. I think there are fundamental differences in the types of stories that needed to be told, and George Lucas pulled it off pretty well.

People like to complain about Hayden Christensen. I don’t think he’s that bad of an actor: he was exactly what the part required (and very similar to Mark Hammill, it seems). I think the problem is Natalie Portman and Hayden Christensen together: they don’t mesh on-screen at all. Natalie doesn’t seem quite comfortable in the role. However, her final scenes in Episode 3 were absolutely wonderful.

It didn’t make me cry, but it was close. If we didn’t know that it was all going to turn out OK in the end, I think this movie would be even sadder and harder to watch.