As this is now the oficial Star Wars Episode II thread (stickified), I think it's a good place to post my review, so here goes...
***SPOILER ALERT***
Yeah, if you haven't seen the movie there might be spoilers here.
I saw the movie last night at 9:30. The movie theatre was packed. As the movie started there were the typical cheers and such, but everything quieted down when we got to reading the opening words fo the movie. The first part of the movie was mostly politics again as Amidala comes to Coruscant, and the lines said here were appropriately stiff and formal. However, Amidala and the Jedis protecting her never really get out of that stiff formal speech pattern, and all throughout the love story that follows Anakin and Padme they stay true to their formal, stiff, uppity speech patterns and never really express themselves. Anakin's advances are obvious to everyone in the theatre except for Amidala, and when he professes his love she gasps slightly (which is about the biggest emotional gap she could accomplish, methinks) then goes back to the stiff speech saying they can't pursue a relationship because they're not allowed. I wonder how these two ever could fall in love when they hardly say two words to each other. It almost reminds me of how some 'net geeks fall in love with people they talk to over AIM but never see, then meet one day and profess their undying love for each other. These two haven't seen each other in ten years, then spend a few days together and suddenly are madly in love? And what about the marriage scene at the end? Come on Ani, hit it and walk away...
As for Anakin's character, Hayden Christiansen was probably a good choice. I'm still not sure he was, but I think if I see the movie a few more times he'll start to grow on me. He's appropriately formal to the elders of the Jedi council, but a little bit irreverant to Obi-Wan, and kind of a spoiled prick sometimes. You get the feeling that he knows he's the chosen one, the one that will bring balance. He's not very emotional, simply because he has a sort of bland expression for most of the movie, so when he gets angry you can see it. I loved the anger and hatred he showed towards the sand people, then almost regret and bewilderment at his actions when describing them to Padme, yet you could see he still would have done the same thing if he had the choice again.
Padme, Natalie Portman, can be summed up in a few words. She's very attractive, and gets to show it more in this movie as her attire is a little less formal than when she was queen. She seems to enjoy showing a little skin, and the predominantly male audience seems to enjoy it too. Other than that, her character is basically just there, not really contributing a whole lot to the story. She's sure fun to look at, though
Obi-Wan Kenobi has grown up quite a bit in this movie. He is the master now, not Qui-Gon's apprentice, and he shows it. He is probably the most expressive character in the movie, aside from Jar Jar Binks, Mace Windu, and Yoda. Ewan McGregor brings life to the character, and is beginning to show how he will become the same character we all came to know and love who was played by Alec Guinness. Obi-Wan provides a little comic relief, plus bring us the flashes of brilliance with the lightsaber that we all saw in Episode I against Darth Maul. You can see the pain he feels as he can see his apprentice slipping away from him, away towards the dark side of the force. I give credit to Ewan here that although his lines are written in the same formal style as the rest of the characters, unlike Hayden and Natalis he brings life to the words and doesn't just spout them verbatim from the page.
The battle scene was phenomenal. Lucas throws the audience a curveball as we first see just Anakin, Padme and Obi-Wan in the Geonosis arena agains the creatures in a gladitorial style battle. They look like they're going to lose the battle, then the Jedi step in (which totally rocked, BTW), then when the Jedi look lost, Yoda arrives with the clone army. Wow. The battle scene was just amazing, detailed, powerful, and any number of adjectives that can describe the sheer magnitude of computer graphics displayed in one scene. Seeing so many Jedi in one area at once, all fighting, was so very cool I don't even have words. But that wasn't all - the best scene was Yoda fighting Dooku. Oh man, Yoda was bouncing off the walls, fighting faster than anyone ever before, using powerful force powers, oh man I was impressed.
It seems hard to believe that George Lucas crammed so much story into so short a movie. Sometimes, especially at the beginning of the movie, it felt rushed, some of the scenes could have been longer, more detailed. It seemed like they were rushing through this part of the movie to get to the battle. I think if the movie was about five hours long it scould have done justice to all the story that was shown in two hours. BTW, I feel exactly the same about The Fellowship of the Ring. I guess two hours is the extreme stretch limit of the typical American person's attention span. Overall, I give it two thumbs up, and if I had a third thumb, that one would be up as well. I know this review is scatter brained, but it's been written over a period of a few hours while I worked this morning, so sorry.
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