Subject: Review of Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999)

From: [email-masked] (Jerry Saravia)
Date: 29 May 1999 16:51:37 GMT

Review of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace

By Jerry Saravia

I can't even begin to tell you what a big Star Wars fan I used to be. The "Star
Wars" movies were terrific entertainments, full of sound and fury and
encompassing great characters, who by the end of "Return of the Jedi" became
our own best friends - we knew them as if they were family. Han Solo, Princess
Leia, Luke Skywalker and those two witty robots have become a permanent fixture
in our pop culture psyche. "Star Wars: The Phantom Menace" has to be the most
anticipated blockbuster event in the last decade or so. The prognosis: It's
thrilling but never truly involving. 
	Episode I marks the beginning of the Star Wars saga, and it is a world only
Lucas could have conceived. During the rousing title sequence following the
familiar 20th Century Fox logo, we learn that the Trade Federation wants Queen
Amidala (Natalie Portman), ruler of the planet Naboo, to sign a peace treaty.
Her refusal sparks a war between her planet, which includes the Galactic
Republic, and an Empire-of-sorts regime ruled by Darth Sidious and his
apprentice, a red-faced, anti-Jedi named Darth Maul (Ray Park). It is up to two
freelance ambassadors (!) named Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson), a Jedi master, and
his apprentice, good old Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) with a ponytail, to
rescue the Queen and take her to the relatively safe planet of Tatooine. It is
there where the fate of the Jedi lies with a young, precocious boy named Anakin
Skywalker (Jake Lloyd), the future Darth Vader, who has a way of repairing
machines such as pod racers, and creating droids like the unfinished C-3PO! He
also has this dream of becoming a Jedi.
	The movie unfolds with one amazing sequence after another. We see vast
landscapes of different planets and underwater cities. We watch in extreme
derision an explosive pod race, presided by good old Jabba the Hutt, where
these flying race machines make accelerated turns through rock formations and
narrow tunnels resembling Monument Valley - they are too fast for the eye to
catch. We see dozens of digitally created creatures, including wildly ferocious
sea animals, and there are the bland-looking battle droids that easily come
apart. The most distracting of the creatures is a floppy-eared, amphibious
Gungan animal named Jar-Jar Binks, who speaks with a Jamaican accent. We
witness many battle sequences, and the most electrifying is a lightsaber duel
between Darth Maul and the two Jedis that is pulse-pounding and superbly staged
and edited. 
	George Lucas certainly went out of his way to create a world unlike anything
we have ever seen before, even as far as the previous "Star Wars" films. This
time, however, he has invested less interest in the human characters. Lucas may
have never been a great storyteller but he always paid great attention to
character details and subtleties. The most profound and memorable character is
the Jedi Master Qui-Gon, nicely underplayed by Liam Neeson, who resorts to
having too much faith in the young Anakin - he wants to train him despite the
Jedi Council's objections. MacGregor's Obi-Wan mostly nods and obeys his
master, but he may be a more prominent character in Episode II since he
reluctantly becomes Anakin's trainer in the Jedi arts. Portman's Queen Amidala
is to be the future mother to Luke and Leia, yet here she seems cold and
distant - very uncharacteristic of her future daughter's stubbornness or sex
appeal. And there are fleeting cameos by Samuel L. Jackson as Jedi council
member, Mace Windu; Ian McDiamid as Senator Palpatine, the future evil Emperor;
Terence Stamp as a Supreme Chancellor; and the exquisitely restrained Pernilla
August (from "The Best Intentions") as Anakin's mother, a slave to some
floating bug named Watto. These characters are so noble and fascinating that
you wish Lucas gave them more screen time, and less to all the sluggish,
superficial exposition given to the Trade Federation and their plans. And I
would have loved to seen more of the nefarious Darth Maul - one of the best,
most enigmatic villains since Boba Fett. 
	"The Phantom Menace" is still one helluva show and definitely a treat for all
Star Wars fans, including myself. I loved the experience of watching it, and it
was great to see brief appearances by C-3PO and R2-D2 again, not to mention the
great Yoda and the hysterical cameo by Jabba the Hutt. But the movie does not
have the freshness, sense of wonder or magic that the other films had - some of
it is too plodding and superfluous. You'll come away wanting more (and wish
there was less of Jar-Jar Binks). Perhaps that is what Lucas had in mind all
along.

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