•
Rating: If there is one thing that made me not regret having shelled out money for the cinema to watch "Attack of the Clones," it is definitely the scene of the "young" Yoda duel.
I had been waiting 30 years to see the "master" in action. He had bewildered poor Luke for 3 consecutive movies with speeches about the Force (or the effort, as Mel Brooks would have said) without ever showing us a shred of potential. He annoyed him, made him carry him on his shoulders, stole his food, spoke in Sardinian, and always had something to say about any choice our good Luke made, but in fact, nada de nada.
The year of our Lord 2002. The theater is packed. The little ones are already asleep, and the movie hasn't even started yet.
The lights dim, and the big title on screen announces that yes, after so many years, we are still here. Going through mental gymnastics together with the Jedi knights.
Two hours later, I am exhausted. I am exhausted from the enormous amount of special effects that the good Lucas and his ILM bombard upon me. Now, I don’t know who makes the ILM guys undergo such a trial (I can only imagine it), but I believe it must be terrifying to create the effects for a film like this. I believe those who worked on it must not have seen the light of day for at least 3 months.
The result, as mentioned, concerning the technical part is sumptuous and fascinating.
The battle between the Clones and the Jedi is something absurd, an explosion of effects and choreography that leaves you open-mouthed.
But a movie isn’t made up of only special effects. We are not talking about a video game. There has to be at least a shred of an interesting storyline. Attack of the Clones, in this respect, fails for several reasons.
The first and most important is making a film almost exclusively focused on the love of the two lovebirds Anakin and Padmé. A deadly bore.
It is inconceivable to structure a film solely around the love between the two which, although important for the saga, is told in such a syrupy and cloying manner that not even the movies of the 50s were like this. To make matters worse, the good Lucas pairs the talented (and beautiful) Natalie Portman with an actor who is as expressive as Darth Vader’s mask in the first movie, so the final result is indeed not good. Watching Hayden Whatever-his-name-is act for more than two hours is, in a word, excruciating.
The second reason is attributed to the actual screenplay. We know that dialogues are not Lucas's strong point. Fine.
One thing I cannot accept, however, are the plot holes and surreal situations. The most glaring example is when the Good Obi-wan heads to the planet Krimino. An alien greets him with a cunning :"Ah! You are the one there...we were expecting you...surely you are here for that stuff...right?" and Obi-Wan confidently jumps in:"Uh....Of course! Yes, I'm that one....show me that thing you are talking about...."
To summarize: These guys have prepared an army of clones and invite the first stranger that passes by to come in and give him a sort of tour of the factory. A terrible thing.
After 2 hours, as mentioned, I am exhausted.
Here, in the presence of Count Dooku, appears a shadow, quite short. The shadow advances decisively. It is Master Yoda, of course. With a look like Morpheus in The Matrix. With a magic number, he extracts his lightsaber, green, of course. In a few seconds, our hero lunges at Count Dooku. Spectacular, one of my favorite scenes. Unfortunately, however, the scene lasts a few minutes, frankly too short to uplift a film that turned out to be a half-dud.
In short, if you did not like "The Phantom Menace," you’ll probably like this one even less. If the first chapter of the new trilogy inserted here and there scenes for children and obscene characters (me me call Jar Jar Binks) frankly useless, this second chapter takes itself too seriously, ending up being unintentionally comical in some scenes.
Music as always grand by John Williams, splendid special effects, an excellent Samuel Jackson, and a good Ewan McGregor and let me also add the scene of the duel between Yoda and Dooku, keep this film afloat which otherwise would have truly been an insult to the saga.
The final scene shows our Anakin managing to marry Portman by the lake of Como (?). However, the question arises spontaneously, was it necessary to make a movie?
Loading comments slowly
