Attack of the Clones is the most schizophrenic of all the Star Wars movies and the one whose flaws most negatively affect its viewing. While the movie has some really fun and thrilling sequences-the Obi-Wan/Jango fight, Anakin's search for his mother, the Yoda versus Dooku showdown, and the insanely action-packed Geonosis battle, to name a few, it also has a handful of scenes that are astonishingly, jaw-droppingly bad. These scenes are much worse than anything else in Star Wars including all Jar Jar and Ewok scenes and mar what is otherwise a really fun movie which gleefully embraces its Space Opera elements and which amps up the action and adventure factor considerably from the slower and more plotty Episode I.
Of course, the objectionable scenes I am referring to are the "love story" scenes between Anakin and Padme which are tortuously melodramatic and overwritten. A lot of the blame for this gets placed on Hayden Christensen and he gets unfairly accused of being a bad actor but the real problem is with the script and direction. That these scenes are even watchable is a testament to Christensen and Natalie Portman's heroic efforts. Christensen seems to have been directed into playing Anakin as some sort of James Dean-in-Space kind of character and it makes Anakin a little goofy at times. He does however have some really nice moments (mostly when he isn't forced to mouth George Lucas' word salad) particularly when the story takes him and Padme back to Tattooine. His discovery of his mother and subsequent slaughter of the Sand People is very effective and firmly puts him on the path to Vader-dom. Unfortunately for Portman, without the stylized character and fun identity switch in The Phantom Menace, she has little to do in this movie other than be an ambivalent love interest. She also straddles things. She really straddles a lot of things in this movie.
Despite the awfulness of most of their sceenes, Anakin and Padme do share a couple of worthwhile moments in the movie. First, as the two are carted out into the Geonosis area, they share a silent silhouetted kiss.that really tells you all the things about them that a half dozen interminable dialogue scenes could not. It's odd that a visual maestro like Lucas could not tone back the dialogue and tell more of this story in a purely visual way. Secondly, in the otherwise unwatchable series of Naboo romance scenes, Anakin and Padme talk briefly about politics and Anakin lets it slip that his ideal political system is a kind of dictatorship, which gives Padme a moment's pause while she figures out if he's kidding or not (he's not.) This is one of the rare scenes between them that is skillfully written and illustrates their points of view and future conflict. It is very revealing about Anakin and the fact that one of his greatest character flaws is that he sees things in a simplistic way. Our hero is not very bright, and that's okay.
In fact, people are quick to point out all sorts of things about Anakin in the prequels such as his whininess, the fact that he is arrogant, his creepiness, the fact that he's a mama's boy, as though these are problems with the movies. Those are not problems, those are character traits that doom Anakin Skywalker to his fate. He's not really supposed to be a likable character. It is more important that you feel for him and understand his downfall than that you like him.
The other half of the movie deals with Obi-Wan's attempts to investigate the attempted murder of Padme and plays like a detective story, which is a new and interesting genre for Star Wars. This is the more fun half of the movie and takes Obi-Wan (and his space mullet) from the gritty underbelly of the urban world Coruscant, to a mysterious cloning operation on rainy Kamino, to Geonosis where he stumbles upon a plot that threatens to kickstart the Clone Wars. One thing I will say about these scenes is that perhaps we see a little too much of the Star Wars galaxy which starts to look a little mundane when you are spending time in libraries, sports bars, and diners. There's a fine line between Star Wars and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
Once we get to Geonosis, though, the movie moves into high gear and Attack of the Clones ends with a half hour of straight action as we witness the first battle of the Clone Wars. First, we see something that we desperately wanted to see in the Prequels: a full on Jedi Power Battle as Mace Windu leads a squad of Jedi in an all out assault on Geonosis. The movie keep layering cool stuff on top of this: Yoda coming to the rescue with an army of clone troopers, Jango Fett battling Mace Windu, an EPIC ground and air assault, Anakin and Obi-Wan teaming up to duel Dooku, and ultimately, we get to see Yoda finally engage in not only a battle of force powers but a lightsaber (!) duel as well in a sequence that was so awesome that essentially the whole after release marketing plant resting on it (Yo-da man!) While people like to snigger about Yoda's acrobatic lightsaber moves, I remember people watching the movie in the theater went NUTS during the scene when I watched it.
With all of the Star Wars movies there is a distinct brilliant to crappy ratio with which to contend and Attack of the Clones is the most dramatic example of this. With Clones, one has to wonder if it would have been possible to make it a better movie with some selective editing. For example, would drastically cutting down the Anakin and Padme Naboo scenes and selectively pruning dialogue throughout, make this a better movie? It might be worth tracking down one of those turn-of-the-century fan edits to find out.
Join me next time for Episode IV (I had already recently recapped Revenge of the Sith here.)
Patrick Garone
Follow Me on Twitter
Despite the awfulness of most of their sceenes, Anakin and Padme do share a couple of worthwhile moments in the movie. First, as the two are carted out into the Geonosis area, they share a silent silhouetted kiss.that really tells you all the things about them that a half dozen interminable dialogue scenes could not. It's odd that a visual maestro like Lucas could not tone back the dialogue and tell more of this story in a purely visual way. Secondly, in the otherwise unwatchable series of Naboo romance scenes, Anakin and Padme talk briefly about politics and Anakin lets it slip that his ideal political system is a kind of dictatorship, which gives Padme a moment's pause while she figures out if he's kidding or not (he's not.) This is one of the rare scenes between them that is skillfully written and illustrates their points of view and future conflict. It is very revealing about Anakin and the fact that one of his greatest character flaws is that he sees things in a simplistic way. Our hero is not very bright, and that's okay.
In fact, people are quick to point out all sorts of things about Anakin in the prequels such as his whininess, the fact that he is arrogant, his creepiness, the fact that he's a mama's boy, as though these are problems with the movies. Those are not problems, those are character traits that doom Anakin Skywalker to his fate. He's not really supposed to be a likable character. It is more important that you feel for him and understand his downfall than that you like him.
The other half of the movie deals with Obi-Wan's attempts to investigate the attempted murder of Padme and plays like a detective story, which is a new and interesting genre for Star Wars. This is the more fun half of the movie and takes Obi-Wan (and his space mullet) from the gritty underbelly of the urban world Coruscant, to a mysterious cloning operation on rainy Kamino, to Geonosis where he stumbles upon a plot that threatens to kickstart the Clone Wars. One thing I will say about these scenes is that perhaps we see a little too much of the Star Wars galaxy which starts to look a little mundane when you are spending time in libraries, sports bars, and diners. There's a fine line between Star Wars and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
Once we get to Geonosis, though, the movie moves into high gear and Attack of the Clones ends with a half hour of straight action as we witness the first battle of the Clone Wars. First, we see something that we desperately wanted to see in the Prequels: a full on Jedi Power Battle as Mace Windu leads a squad of Jedi in an all out assault on Geonosis. The movie keep layering cool stuff on top of this: Yoda coming to the rescue with an army of clone troopers, Jango Fett battling Mace Windu, an EPIC ground and air assault, Anakin and Obi-Wan teaming up to duel Dooku, and ultimately, we get to see Yoda finally engage in not only a battle of force powers but a lightsaber (!) duel as well in a sequence that was so awesome that essentially the whole after release marketing plant resting on it (Yo-da man!) While people like to snigger about Yoda's acrobatic lightsaber moves, I remember people watching the movie in the theater went NUTS during the scene when I watched it.
With all of the Star Wars movies there is a distinct brilliant to crappy ratio with which to contend and Attack of the Clones is the most dramatic example of this. With Clones, one has to wonder if it would have been possible to make it a better movie with some selective editing. For example, would drastically cutting down the Anakin and Padme Naboo scenes and selectively pruning dialogue throughout, make this a better movie? It might be worth tracking down one of those turn-of-the-century fan edits to find out.
Join me next time for Episode IV (I had already recently recapped Revenge of the Sith here.)
Patrick Garone
Follow Me on Twitter
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