The year is 1971 and Malcolm Smith (Kyle MacLachlan) has just started working as a prison guard at Attica Correctional Facility. Even though his father (Harry Dean Stanton) was a prison guard, Malcolm does not fit in with the other guards at Attica. Malcolm is younger than them and is disgusted by the inhumane treatment of the prisoners. If not for his wife (Anne Heche) and the child that they are expecting, Malcolm would just quit but he needs the money. He fears that he is going to eventually turn into just another sadistic guard.
When a prison riot breaks out, Malcolm is one of the guards taken hostage. While the psychotic Chaka (Clarence Williams III) wants to kill all of the guards, Jamaal X (Samuel L. Jackson) realizes that killing the hostages will sacrifice what little leverage that prisoners have. If the guards are killed, Jamaal X reasons, the state police will have no reason not to storm the prison and violently restore order. Over the course of the four-day riot, Jamaal and Malcolm become unlikely friends and allies but it turns out that, even with the guards being held hostage, the government has no interest in negotiating with the prisoners.
This moving, thought-provoking, and well-acted docudrama originally aired on HBO and it won John Frankenheimer a well-deserved Emmy. Samuel L. Jackson is powerful as Jamaal X and this is one of the few times that Kyle MacLachlan got to play a thoroughly normal person with no dark secrets or weird quirks. Malcolm Smith is just a regular everyman who finds himself in the middle of a history-making event.
For fans of Twin Peaks, Against the Wall features three alumni of the show. Kyle MacLachlan, of course, starred as Dale Cooper while Clarence Williams III appeared in one episode as Roger Hardy. Finally, Harry Dean Stanton, a longtime favorite of David Lynch, appeared in Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me.
The Rev. Fred Sultan (Samuel L. Jackson) has a problem. He is the richest and the best known fight promoter in America but the current (and undefeated) heavyweight champion is just too good. No one is paying to watch James “The Grim Reaper” Roper (Damon Wayans) fight because Roper always wins. Sultan has a plan, though. Before Roper turned professional, he lost a fight to Terry Conklin (Peter Berg). Conklin has long since retired from boxing and is now a heavy metal, progressive musician. Sultan convinces Conklin to come out of retirement and face Roper in a rematch. Since Conklin is white and Roper is black, Sultan stands to make a killing as white boxing fans get swept up in all the hype about Conklin being the latest “great white hope.”
In the days leading up to the fight, crusading journalist Mitchell Kane (Jeff Goldblum) attempts to expose the crooked Sultan before getting seduced into his inner circle. Meanwhile, boxer Marvin Shabazz (Michael Jace) and his manager, Hassan El Rukk’n (Jamie Foxx), unsuccessfully pursue a match with Roper. Conklin gets back into shape while Roper eats ice cream and watches Dolemite.
In its attempt to satirize boxing, The Great White Hype runs into a huge problem. The fight game is already so shady that it is beyond satire. This was especially true in the 90s, when the The Great White Hype was first released. (Even more than the famous Larry Holmes/Gerry Cooney title fight, The Great White Hype’s obvious inspiration was the heavily promoted, two-minute fight between Mike Tyson and Peter McNeeley.) The Great White Hype is a very busy film but nothing in it can match Oliver McCall’s mental breakdown in the middle of his fight with Lennox Lewis, Andrew Golota twice fighting Riddick Bowe and twice getting disqualified for low blows, or Mike Tyson biting off Evander Holyfield’s ear.
The Great White Hype has an only in the 90s supporting cast, featuring everyone from Jon Lovitz to Cheech Marin to, for some reason, Corbin Bernsen. Damon Wayans is the least convincing heavyweight champion since Tommy Morrison essentially played himself in Rocky V. The Rev. Sultan was meant to be a take on Don King and Samuel L. Jackson was a good pick for the role but the real Don King is so openly corrupt and flamboyant that he’s almost immune to parody.
When it comes to trying to take down Don King, I think Duke puts it best.
Continuing my look back at the films of 2016, here are four mini-reviews of some films that really didn’t make enough of an impression to demand a full review.
The Accountant (dir by Gavin O’Connor)
2016 was a mixed year for Ben Affleck. Batman v. Superman may have been a box office success but it was also such a critical disaster that it may have done more harm to Affleck’s legacy than good. If nothing else, Affleck will spend the rest of his life being subjected to jokes about Martha. While Ben’s younger brother has become an Oscar front runner as a result of his performance in Manchester By The Sea, Ben’s latest Oscar effort, Live By Night, has been released to critical scorn and audience indifference.
At the same time, Ben Affleck also gave perhaps his best performance ever in The Accountant. Affleck plays an autistic accountant who exclusively works for criminals and who has been raised to be an expert in all forms of self-defense. The film’s plot is overly complicated and director Gavin O’Connor struggles to maintain a consistent tone but Affleck gives a really great performance and Anna Kendrick reminds audiences that she’s capable of more than just starring in the Pitch Perfect franchise.
Carnage Park (dir by Mickey Keating)
I really wanted to like Carnage Park, because it was specifically advertised as being an homage to the grindhouse films of the 1970s and y’all know how much I love those! Ashley Bell plays a woman who gets kidnapped twice, once by two bank robbers and then by a psycho named Wyatt (Pat Healy). Healy chases Bell through the desert, hunting her Most Dangerous Game-style. There are some intense scenes and both Bell and Healy are well-cast but, ultimately, it’s just kind of blah.
The Choice(dir by Ross Katz)
The Choice was last year’s Nicholas Sparks adaptation. It came out, as all Nichols Sparks adaptations do, just in time for Valentine’s Day and it got reviews that were so negative that a lot of people will never admit that they actually saw it. Benjamin Walker and Teresa Palmer play two people who meet, fall in love, and marry in North Carolina. But then Palmer is in a car accident, ends up in a coma, and Walker has to decide whether or not to turn off the life support.
As I said, The Choice got terrible reviews and it’s certainly not subtle movie but it’s actually better than a lot of films adapted from the work of Nicholas Sparks. Walker and Palmer are a likable couple and, at the very least, The Choice deserves some credit for having the courage not to embrace the currently trendy cause of euthanasia. That alone makes The Choice better than Me Before You.
The Legend of Tarzan (dir by David Yates)
Alexander Skarsgard looks good without his shirt on and Samuel L. Jackson is always a fun to watch and that’s really all that matters as far as The Legend of Tarzan is concerned. It’s an enjoyable enough adventure film but you won’t remember much about it afterward. Christoph Waltz is a good actor but he’s played so many villains that it’s hard to get excited over it anymore.
I’m writing this review from memory so you’re going to have to bear with me. 187 is one of those films that seems to show up on late night cable constantly, which is how I saw it. I probably should rewatch it for this review but … no. I don’t want to have to sit through it again.
See, here’s the thing with 187. It’s a film where Samuel L. Jackson plays a high school science teacher and, just by definition, that should make it the greatest film ever and yet it isn’t.
Originally, Jackson’s working in New York but then he ends up failing one of his students (played by Method Man). Method Man ends up giving Jackson a textbook on which he has written 187 on every single page. Jackson immediately realizes that 187 is the name of the movie that he’s in. “Always good to meet a fan,” he thinks but then suddenly, it dawns on him that 187 is also police code for homicide! Jackson asks the school administration for help. They ignore him (probably because everyone knows that Samuel L. Jackson is too much of a badass to be scared by some numbers in a textbook) and he ends up getting stabbed several times in the back.
Agck!
We jump forward 15 months. Jackson has recovered from nearly being killed and he’s still determined to teach. He wants to make a difference! But he’s decided that New York kids are too homicidal so he transfers to a school in Los Angeles. Surprise! It turns out that students in Los Angeles are just as dangerous as the ones in New York. During his first day as a substitute teacher, Jackson is writing his name on a chalk board. Someone throws a crumpled ball of paper at him. Jackson flinches as it hits his back.
FLASHBACK TIME!
Now, here’s the thing: the idea of Samuel L. Jackson teaching in an inner city high school and taking on a bunch of gang members sounds totally kickass. And you spend this entire two-hour movie waiting for Samuel L. Jackson to have one of those wonderful Samuel L. Jackson moments when he fixes someone with that powerful glare and suddenly speaks in the voice of angry and vengeful God. You keep waiting but, with the exception of a few moments, it never seems to happen.
I mean, don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t expecting Jackson to say, “I’m sick of these motherfucking gangstas in this motherfucking classroom!” It would have been great if he had said that but, after a few minutes of watching the movie, I realized that he probably wouldn’t. 187 is obviously meant to be a serious movie about America’s educational crisis. Watching it, you get the feeling that 187‘s director, Kevin “I know Kevin Costner” Reynolds, woke up every morning and said, “I am making the most important film ever today!”
But whatever good intentions that the filmmakers may have had, it’s no excuse for totally wasting Samuel L. Jackson. When you’ve got a powerful actor like Samuel L. Jackson, why do you waste him in such a thinly written role? When you finally do allow him to do something big and Samuel L. Jackson-like, why do you waste so much dramatic potential by having him do almost all of it off-screen? Jackson finally does get a great Samuel L. Jackson moment towards the end of the film but that’s just because there’s a big plot twist that doesn’t make any sense. The end of 187 reminds the viewer that an ironic ending has to be earned. It just can’t be slapped onto the film.
I mean, I don’t want to toss out any spoilers because, for all I know, 187 is going to be on Cinemax tonight. If you’re up at 3 in the morning, you might end up watching it and God knows, I don’t want to be accused of giving away the ending. But let me ask you this — if you’ve finally captured someone who you’ve spent an entire two-hour film trying to kill, would you then suddenly decide to play a game of Russian roulette?
Anyway, 187 should be avoided because it totally wastes Samuel L. Jackson and that’s kind of unforgivable.
Remember how I said that it was intimidating to admit that The Big Short didn’t do much for me as a viewer? Well, it’s even more intimidating for me to admit that I felt much the same way about The Hateful Eight as well.
Nearly everyone I know loves The Hateful Eight and, going into it, I really wanted to love it as well. After all, this is — as the opening credits remind us — Quentin Tarantino’s 8th film! Tarantino is one of my favorite directors. I thought his last film, Django Unchained, was a masterpiece and one of the most important films ever made about slavery. Like many of you, I’ve followed all the details of the making of The Hateful Eight, from the initial script leak to the controversy over Tarantino’s comments on the police. I was excited because the cast looked great and was full of veteran actors — like Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Bruce Dern — who all seemed likely to benefit from the Tarantino touch. (Say what you will about Quentin Tarantino, it cannot be denied that he’s given good roles to talented actors who are rarely given the opportunities that they deserve.) When I heard that Ennio Morricone was going to be providing the score, I got even more excited. Morricone and Tarantino; it seemed like the perfect combination for greatness.
Well, Morricone’s score is spectacular. There’s talk that Morricone might finally win an Oscar for his work on The Hateful Eight and I certainly don’t have a problem with that. (Hopefully, Morricone will have learned a lesson from the Golden Globes and, if he is nominated, he will either come to the ceremony himself or arrange for someone other than Tarantino to accept for him.) And Jennifer Jason Leigh takes full advantage of her role, giving a truly ferocious performance.
But otherwise, The Hateful Eight just didn’t do much for me. It’s not that I disliked the film. There was a lot that worked but, for whatever reason, The Hateful Eight never enthralled me the way that past Tarantino films have. The Hateful Eight left me saying, “Is that it?”
A lot of my reaction to The Hateful Eight has to do with the film’s length. Taking place, for the most part, in only one location and structured more like a play than a film, The Hateful Eight would be a great 90 minute murder mystery. Instead, it lasts nearly 3 hours and, at times, the film drags interminably. As usual, Tarantino plays with time and, at one point, stops the action so that we can see what happened earlier in the day. Unfortunately, as opposed to other Tarantino films, we don’t really learn anything new from this flashback and you get the feeling that it was included most because flaskbacks are a Tarantino trademark and because he wanted to find a way to work a somewhat pointless Zoe Bell cameo into the film.
As for Tarantino’s widely acclaimed script, I have to admit that I got kind of bored with this talky film. Yes, the actors were all good and it’s always fun to listen to Samuel L. Jackson be a badass but the dialogue itself was largely repetitive and occasionally, the film itself threatened to turn into Tarantino-on-autopilot.
(Interestingly enough, Tarantino’s script features several creative euphemisms for oral sex and the characters come up with a handful of different ways to point out that Jackson is black but, when it comes to Jennifer Jason Leigh’s character, nobody can come up with anything more imaginative than repeatedly calling her a bitch. While, unlike some critics, I don’t think The Hateful Eight is a misogynistic movie, I do have to admit that I was rolling my eyes around the fifth time that Leigh’s character was called a bitch and kept rolling them for the entire movie. For a writer well-known for his ability to come up with colorful and memorable insults, Tarantino’s refusal to come up with anything more imaginative than “bitch” just felt lazy.)
What can I say? The Hateful Eight just didn’t do much for me. However, I do think that the film looked great and I certainly hope that Morricone and Leigh are at least nominated for their excellent work. I look forward to Tarantino’s next film but I doubt I’ll be revisiting The Hateful Eight any time soon.
(By the way, with this review, I am now officially caught up on reviewing the films of 2015!)
The Seattle Film Critics Survey announced their nominees for the best of 2015 earlier today and I have to say, their nominations are pretty interesting! (Also interesting to note is that they did not nominate Oscar front runner Spotlight.) Way to go, Seattle!
Here are 6 more reviews of 6 other films that I watched this year. Why six? Because Lisa doesn’t do odd numbers, that’s why.
The Big Game (dir by Jalmari Helander)
In The Big Game, Samuel L. Jackson plays the President of the United States and you would think that fact alone would make this film an instant classic. Unfortunately, this film never really takes advantage of the inherent coolness of Samuel L. Jackson playing the leader of the free world. When Air Force One is sabotaged and crashes in the wilderness of Finland, President Jackson has to rely on a young hunter (Onni Tommila) from a group of CIA agents disguised as terrorists. Tommila does a pretty good job and the scenery looks great but at no point does Samuel L. Jackson says, “Check out this executive action, motherfucker,” and that’s a huge missed opportunity. As for the rest of the film, it takes itself a bit too seriously and if you can’t figure out the big twist from the minute the movie starts, you obviously haven’t seen enough movies.
The Connection (dir by Cedric Jiminez)
Taking place over the 1970s, the French crime thriller tells the largely true story of the efforts of a French judge (played by Jean Dujardin) to take down a ruthless gangster (Gilles Lellouche) who is the head of one of the biggest drug cartels in the world. The Connection run for a bit too long but, ultimately, it’s a stylish thriller that does a very good job of creating a world where literally no one can be trusted. Dujardin, best known here in the States for his Oscar-winning role in The Artist, does a great job playing an honest man who is nearly driven to the point of insanity by the corruption all around him.
Graduation Day (dir by Chris Stokes)
Hey, it’s another found footage horror film! Bleh! Now, I should admit that this horror film — which is NOT a remake of that classic 1980s slasher — does have a fairly clever twist towards the end, that goes a long way towards explaining a lot of the inconsistencies that, up until that point, had pretty much dominated the film. But, even with that in mind and admitting that Unfriended and Devil’s Due worked wonders with the concept, it’s still hard to feel any enthusiasm about yet another found footage horror film.
McFarland USA (dir by Niki Caro)
McFarland USA is an extremely predictable but likable movie. Kevin Costner plays a former football coach who, while teaching at a mostly Latino high school, organizes a cross country team that goes on to win the state championship. It’s based on a true story and, at the end of the film, all of the real people appear alongside the actors who played them. There’s nothing about this film that will surprise you but it’s still fairly well-done. Even Kevin Costner, who usually gets on my last nerve, gives a good performance.
Taken 3 (dir by Olivier Megaton)
Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) is back and he’s killing even more people! Fortunately, they’re all bad people but you really do have to wonder what type of dreams Bryan has whenever he goes to sleep. In Taken 3, Bryan’s wife (Famke Janssen) has been murdered and Bryan has been framed. He has to solve the case and kill the bad guys while staying one step ahead of the police (represented by a bored-looking Forest Whitaker). Neeson does all of his usual Taken stuff — the intense phone conversation, the steely glare, and all the rest — but at this point, it has literally been parodied to death. If you’re into watching Liam Neeson kill ugly people, Taken 3 will provide you with adequate entertainment but, for the most part, it’s but a shadow of the first Taken.
War Room (dir by Alex Kendrick)
I saw the War Room in Oklahoma. It was being shown as part of a double feature with The Martian, of all things! Anyway, this film is about an upper middle class family that hits rock bottom but they’re saved by the power of prayer! Lots and lots of prayer! Seriously, this film almost qualifies as “prayer porn.” Anyway, the film was badly acted, badly written, incredibly heavy-handed, and ran on way too long but, on the plus side, it did eventually end.
The year 2005 was a dark time to be a fan of Star Wars.
The first two parts of the highly anticipated prequel trilogy had been released and had left fans feeling as if millions of voices had cried out in terror and suddenly been silenced. No sooner had fans started to recover from the trauma of The Phantom Menace then Attack of the Clones was unleashed and they were stunned to learn that a movie could be even more pointless than The Phantom Menace.
The summer of 2005 promised the release of Star Wars Episode III: The Revenge of the Sith. Fans were excited because they knew that Anakin Skywalker would finally be transformed into Darth Vader but they also knew that he would still be played by Hayden Christensen. Many of us who went to see the movie on its opening weekend did so with low expectations and mixed feelings.
“WAR!” the opening title crawl of Revenge of the Sith declared, as if it was trying to reassure those of us in the audience that it would not be another boring Star Wars prequel. There was nothing in the crawl about taxation or trade routes. Instead, it was all about how the Galactic Republic was at war with separatists and how Chancellor Palpatine was being held prisoner by General Grievous. After an exciting battle on Grievous’s flagship, Anakin not only rescued Palpatine but also decapitated Christopher Lee’s Count Dooku, despite the fact that Dooku had surrendered and was unarmed. That’s when those of us watching knew that Revenge of the Sith was not going to be like the other two prequels. Revenge of the Sith was going to be darker and edgier and not just for kids. A headless Count Dooku action figure would not be sold at your local toy store.
Looking back, it is easy to forget how relieved many of us were that Revenge of the Sith was not terrible. After the bitter disappointment of the first two prequels, we were happy that Jar Jar Binks only appeared during one shot towards the end of the film and he did not speak. We were happy that Ewan McGregor and Natalie Portman both finally got to give performances that justified casting actors of their caliber as Obi-Wan and Amidala. We were happy that, since Anakin and Amidala were secretly married between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, we did not have to sit through any more scenes of them falling in love. Many of us had found Hayden Christensen’s performance to be petulant in Attack of the Clones and, intentionally or not, Revenge of the Sith seemed to validate our suspicions by having both Yoda and Mace Windu say the same thing about Anakin. After the embarrassment of Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones, this was a prequel that we felt we could get behind.
And we were really happy with the climatic battle between Obi-Wan and Anakin. After Anakin had gone over to the dark side, he and Obi-Wan dueled on a volcanic planet. “You were supposed to be the chosen one!” Obi-Wan shouted after chopping off Anakin’s legs. After being left to die by Obi-Wan, Anakin was rescued by Emperor Palpatine. It was only after being encased in that famous black armor that Palpatine told the new Darth Vader that Amidala had died. Darth Vader’s “Nooooooooo!” would go down in history.
At the end of the film, Jimmy Smits was seen giving an infant Luke to Owen and Beru Lars and Darth Vader and the Emperor were seen standing on the bridge of an imperial ship and looking out at the skeleton of the Death Star. For the first time since the prequels were first released, some of us applauded at the end of a Star Wars film.
When, ten years later, I rewatched Revenge of the Sith for the first time in a long while, my immediate impression was that it was nowhere close to being as good as I remembered. Without a doubt, it was still the best of the prequels but how much was that really saying? Of all the prequels, it came the closest to capturing the sense of awe and excitement that made the original trilogy (even Return of the Jedi) so entertaining but, at the same time, it still had many of the same flaws that afflicted Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones. Hayden Christensen was as stiff and inexpressive as ever, as was George Lucas’s dialogue. (When Obi-Wan tells Anakin that Palpatine is evil, Anakin actually replies, “From my point of view, the Jedis are evil!” He shouts this in the middle of a light saber duel.) Even the movie’s most shocking moment, when Anakin murdered a group of children, was no longer effective because everyone in the movie insisted on calling the children “younglings.”
Throughout the entire prequel ordeal, George Lucas would insist that it was necessary to see all three of the prequels to really understand the story he was trying to tell and how it fit in with the original trilogy. However, of all the prequels, Revenge of the Sith is the only one that feels as if it adds anything to what we had already learned from watching the original trilogy. Nor is there anything to be gained from having seen the first two prequels before watching Revenge of the Sith for the first time. The main accomplishment of Revenge of the Sith was to prove that The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones were entirely unnecessary. (Revenge of the Sith actually works better if you have never seen Phantom Menace because there is no way that the Anakin played by Jake Lloyd could have grown up to be the Anakin played by Hayden Christensen.)
Why, when we originally watched Revenge of the Sith, did so many of us think that it was so much better than it actually was?
In the year 2005, we were just happy to have a Star Wars film that did not totally suck.
Attack of the Clones is, at least in my opinion, the worst Star Wars film ever made. Hands down. That is not to say it’s not mildly entertaining, but it demands a great deal of good will from its viewer to keep him from sneering at the movie constantly, especially if said viewer is a fan.
Christ, where do I even begin.
It’s important to note that Episode II is a transition movie. If that’s not clear enough, what I mean is that it’s a movie that exists to connect both the childish, yet potentially endearing Episode I, and the much darker and edgier Episode III. Episode II is somewhere inbetween these two moods, trying to make the transition smoother, disastrously so. It’s catastrophic in many levels, but mostly because of Hayden Christensen’s Anakin Skywalker. We’ll get there soon.
Episode II starts as a movie about politics. Now, I like fictional world politics as much as the next person. I honestly do. Especially in a space opera setting. But in Star Wars the politics are dull and barely explained. Padmé Amidala’s two terms as democratically elected Queen of Naboo (wait, what?) are now over, and she continues her career as a politician by becoming a senator. The story begins by trying to make it interesting that people are trying to kill Amidala, on what appears to be politically motivated crimes. We don’t get much context, except that she opposes some other senators. Palpatine, being the super trustworthy guy everyone always knew he was, assigns the Jedi Order to protect her, and finds that Obi-Wan is a suitable bodyguard for Padmé, considering their friendship way back in Episode I. Of course, Obi-Wan must take his apprentice, Anakin Skywalker, with him. And hilarity ensues.
Now, you’re probably familiar with whom Anakin is to become, and you probably know whose father he is, so this movie must establish one very important thing; an origin to the affection between future Lord Vader and an unwitting woman, so that we can learn whose womb was it that those guys from the original trilogy came from. Therefore, in addition to being about lackluster politics, this is a movie about love.
DAMN SON.
Now, I have to agree with Padmé. You can preach all you want about how you have a massive crush on Hayden Christensen’s mini braid, but that piercing sex offender gaze made me uncomfortable. Throughout the first act, Anakin goes from flirting with the poor woman to actively doing stuff very similar to sexual harassment. I mean, seriously, look at this lecherous, leering asshole.
Darth Vader has always been regarded as one of the greatest villains of cinema, but I never figured that he was also one of the sleaziest.
I wish this was the only problem with Anakin. Maybe it’s not Mr. Christensen’s acting, but the poor writing (though I suspect that, considering his absence in major movies this decade, his acting was definitely a factor). Young Skywalker is a very gifted Jedi, being immaculately conceived by midi-chlorians and all (I can’t stop laughing), and he is painfully aware of his skills, which he shows through an overpowering arrogance. Now, arrogance when done right can be charming, and perhaps that was the intention; to make Darth Vader a badass even as a teenager, a daredevil, someone who just barely succeeds, but does it with style. Anakin, however, comes across as impudent, annoying, and exceedingly stupid. It seems Anakin can’t go two scenes without doing something that would displease the Jedi council, and entirely aware of it too. ‘Cause that’s just how he rolls. James Dean from a galaxy far far away.
Second act comes. Anakin grows more and more adolescent and fascist. More politics happen. Then there are some cool action scenes that seem to save the film. Obi-Wan is written as barely having a personality, aside from comments that try to make it evident that he is growing older and grumpier, even though he can’t be much more than 30. Regardless, he is arguably the saving grace in the main cast, at the very least as far as really cool fights go. He pilots fighter ships, he fights with a lightsaber; the man sees some action. It’s almost depressing to see an actor of Ewan McGregor’s caliber being reduced to action hero and grumpy mentor to an angsty teenager.
Their dynamic is oddly reminiscent of Gran Torino
Jar Jar also appears. Fan favourite Jar Jar. I feel this is worth mentioning because in an extremely important scene he proposes (as stand-in senator for Amidala) to convey supreme power to Chancellor Palpatine. Yes, that Chancellor Palpatine, and I have to wonder why they couldn’t task this burden to an unnamed senator. Don’t people hate the poor gungan enough? It’s as if George Lucas is just fucking with his public to see how far they can go, at this point.
And then, in the third act, we are introduced to the big bad: Count Dooku, played by the late Sir Christopher Lee. You’d think that bringing this legend of acting might infer that this character is the highlight of the cast. Might have been. Dooku is a character full of potential. He’s obviously evil, but with just the right amount of idealism to seem more shades of grey than the cruel, pure black villains the series are accostumed to. But apparently all he does is some exposition, then pave the way for the epic arena fight scene that kind of defines this movie as a Star Wars film (perhaps one of the only things that defines this as a Star Wars film), some more exposition, a lightsaber duel (a really cool one, wrapping up the whole two things that make this a Star Wars film), and then he’s gone, apparently having started a war. The movie is over, without fully explaining why things escalated, and who exactly Count Dooku represents that the Republic is at war with.
WAR AGAINST WHOM???
I’m serious when I say this can be an entertaining movie. The fight scenes can be fun and you can laugh at what ridiculous situations the actors are subjected to. But it’s mostly incredibly dull. It’s a film that throws you into an extended torrent of politics you need to understand beforehand to appreciate, and that lead to Clone Wars, a pretty cool spin-off that most people never got to see and that might as well have been properly included as crucial to the continuity since it’s much better than this. As a standalone film, the story is a confusing, rushed mess even at two hours long. As a Star Wars film, Attack of the Clones makes it obvious that the series is not infallible. Horribly, gapingly, obviously not infallible.
The time was May of 1999. The place was a movie theater in Baltimore, Maryland. The theater was packed with people waiting to see the most anticipated film of their lifetime. The film was The Phantom Menace, the first prequel to the original Star Wars trilogy. For two years, the people in the audience had followed every detail of the film’s production. Some of them had gone to showings of Meet Joe Black and Wing Commander, just so they could see the first trailers for the film.
Sitting out in that audience was one 16 year-old boy who, a few nights earlier, had been standing outside a Target at midnight so that he could be one of the first to buy Phantom Menace merchandise. He bought two Jar Jar Binks action figures because, even before Phantom Menace opened, he suspected Jar Jar would be the most controversial character.
When the lights went down, the audience cheered. At the start of every trailer, someone in the dark theater shouted, “I bent my Wookie!” The audience laughed the first two times. By the fifth time, there were only a few pity titters.
Finally, it was time! The first few notes of John Williams’s Star Wars theme echoed through the theater. Again, the audience cheered as the familiar title crawl appeared on-screen.
The 16 year-old read the opening crawl and he started to get worried. What was all this talk about taxation? Trade routes? Trade Federation? Blockades? It seemed more appropriate for Star Trek or even Dune. Except for the mention of Jedis at the end of the crawl, it did not sound much like Star Wars.
Things started to look up as soon as Liam Neeson and Ewan McGregor made their first appearance as Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan’s first line was, “I have a bad feeling about this.” A few people in the audience clapped. “I bent my Wookie!” a familiar voice shouted. Nobody laughed.
When a hologram of Darth Sidious appeared and told the Trade Federation goons to kill Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan, everyone in the audience knew that Darth Sidious was Palaptine, the future Emperor, and the excitement was palpable. When Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan fought off the battle droids and escaped to the besieged planet of Naboo, the audience started to relax. Maybe this wouldn’t be as bad as the critics were saying.
Then Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan met Jar Jar Binks and the whole movie went to shit.
In the months leading up to the release of The Phantom Menace, everyone had heard about Jar Jar Binks and how he was a totally computer-generated character. Jar Jar Binks was the future of movie technology and, from the minute he first appeared, the future was fucking terrifying. Jar Jar was a Gungun, an amphibious creature who was characterized as being clumsy and cowardly. He shrieked in a high-pitched voice and spoke in an indescribable dialect. As much as the audience tried, there was no way to avoid or ignore Jar Jar Binks. He was not in the entire movie but he was at the center of every scene in which he did appear.
As Jar Jar led Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon to the underwater city of the Gunguns, a voice in the dark theater shouted out, “I bent my Wookie!”
“Shut the fuck up!” the 16 year-old snapped back.
The 16 year-old was not sure if anyone heard him but the voice was silent for the rest of the movie.
Sorry, Ralph.
No sooner had the audience recovered from their introduction to Jar Jar then they met young Anakin Skywalker. Anakin’s story was the whole reason that The Phantom Menace had been made. The audience knew that the prequels would show how Anakin Skywalker would grow up to the greatest and most evil badass in the universe, Darth Vader. But in Phantom Menace, he was just a 9 year-old slave on the planet of Tatooine, conceived by immaculate conception. Even before Phantom Menace was released, the word was out that Jake Lloyd, the child cast as young Anakin, was not exactly the best actor in the world. But even though they had been forewarned, the audience was not prepared for just how terrible little Jake Lloyd was in the role. There was no darkness to Jake Lloyd’s cutesy performance. There was no sadness or toughness. Jake Lloyd came across like the type of hyperactive child who would end up in the ensemble of a Christmas play, breaking character and waving to his parents during the Crucifixion. Not only could the audience not see him growing up to be Darth Vader but they could not imagine him as a slave living on an inhospitable desert planet.
Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan, Jar Jar, Queen Padme (Keira Knightley), and Padme’s handmaid, Amidala (Natalie Portman) were stranded on Tatooine when they first met Anakin. Qui-Gon felt that Anakin was “the chosen one,” who would bring balance to the force. It was hard for the audience to believe him when they heard Anakin shout, “Yippe!”
For that 16 year-old who had stayed up past midnight to buy two Jar Jar Binks action figures, that “yippe” was the final straw. He had watched the original Star Wars trilogy on VHS tapes. He had gone to the re-releases. He loved Star Wars and he wanted to love The Phantom Menace. Instead, he felt so let down by the film that he could barely look at the screen.
The 16 year-old wondered why C3PO and R2D2 were in the film. Phantom Menace revealed that they were built by the future Darth Vader. R2D2 would even help Anakin in the film’s final battle. It made no sense. The 16 year-old wondered if anyone else in the audience was as confused as he was. He wondered why, if he could see that this made no sense, George Lucas could not understand the same thing.
Anakin won a pod race and was allowed to leave Tatooine. The film’s action was moved to the Coruscant, a planet that was covered with one huge city. Samuel L. Jackson appeared as Mace Windu and, when he stared out at the audience, he seemed to be saying, “I fucking dare you to yell anything about bending your motherfucking Wookie!” There were scenes set in the galactic senate, presumably to appease everyone who wanted a meticulously detailed portrait of how a galactic Republic would be governed. Padme turned out to be a fake and Amidala was revealed as the real queen. There was a final battle between the forces of the Republic and the Trade Federation. Qui-Gon was killed in a duel with the evil Darth Maul (Ray Park) but Obi-Wan promised to train Anakin in the ways of the Jedi. Palpatine promised that he would be watching Anakin’s development.
And, of course, there was this:
For many in the audience who truly loved the original trilogy and who had spent the past two years scouring every corner of the Internet in search of news about The Phantom Menace, the midi-chlorians was the point that they give up on the movie. The Force added a hint of mysticism to the original trilogy. Because it was so mysterious and its origins so deliberately obscure, fans of Star Wars could imagine that The Force was inside of them as well as Luke and Darth Vader. “May the force be with you,” was more than just a catch phrase to those fans. It was a reminder that, even in a galaxy far far away, there was still mystery and faith. When Qui-Gon talked about midi-chlorians, fans realized that not only did they understand the appeal of Star Wars better than George Lucas but George Lucas did not even care why they loved his film. For those fans, the midi-chlorians not only ruined The Phantom Menace but cheapened the original trilogy as well. The Force was no longer special or mystical. Anakin might as well have just been bitten by a radioactive spider.
For the 16 year-old, it was somehow even worse that, before asking about the Force, Anakin apologized to Qui-Gon for causing so much trouble. Sitting out in the theater, he knew that the boy who would grow up to be Darth Vader would never yell “yippie!” and he would never apologize for causing any trouble.
At the end of the movie, the audience did not know how to react. The 16 year-old talked to his friends as they filed out of the theater. Everyone was in a state of denial. They knew that they had seen something very disappointing but, after all the excitement leading up to the release of The Phantom Menace, they did not want to admit how disappointed they really were with the actual movie. They talked about what did work. They talked about the pod race, which had been fun. They talked about the exciting light saber duel between Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan, and Darth Maul. Being teenage boys, they also talked about Natalie Portman and Keira Knightley.
They tried not to talk about Jar Jar Binks, beyond agreeing that he sucked. They tried not to talk about Jake Lloyd as Anakin. It was too painful to know that Star Wars had been reduced to Jar Jar Binks and Jake Lloyd. They did make fun of the “I bent my Wookie” guy. In the face of grave disillusionment, it was all that the 16 year-old and his friends could do.
Today, enough time has passed that it is easier to laugh about Jar Jar Binks and The Phantom Menace. Though the initial trauma may have faded into memory, it all came rushing back to me as soon as Lisa asked me if I would be willing to review The Phantom Menace for this site. I cautiously agreed and hoped that, since I already knew what I was getting myself into, The Phantom Menace would not be as disappointing the second time around.
It was a strange experience rewatching The Phantom Menace. While I remembered how bad the movie was, I’d forgotten how equally boring it was. Jar Jar Binks was even more annoying than I remembered and Jake Lloyd was even worse. Of the film’s best scenes, the pod race went on too long and the duel with Darth Maul was too short. For such a badass villain, Darth Maul was underused for much of the film, as if George Lucas did not understand that the kids he claimed to have made the film for would be far more interested in the dynamic Darth Maul than the histrionic Jar Jar Binks.
Emphasizing Jar Jar Binks over Darth Maul made as much sense as emphasizing the Ewoks at the expense of Boba Fett.
Worst of all, the entire movie felt even more pointless the second time around. When the prequels were first released, George Lucas always said that all three of them should be viewed in the context of the larger story that they were telling. But what do we really learn from The Phantom Menace or any of the prequels? Did anyone really want to know about how trade was regulated before the Empire? Did we really need to know the exact details of how Anakin became a Jedi? Watching The Phantom Menace, the answer is no.
I was especially surprised by how bad the CGI looked. When The Phantom Menace was first released, the CGI was often the only thing that was critically praised. Critics may have hated Jar Jar Binks as a character but they all agreed that it was impressive that a major character had been created by a computer. It is easy to forget just how big a deal was made about The Phantom Menace‘s special effects. At the time, we had yet to take it for granted that an entire movie could be made on a computer.
But seen today, the CGI not only seems cartoonish but, like the midi-chlorians, it feels like a betrayal of everything that made the original Star Wars special. The universe of New Hope and Empire Strikes Back felt lived in. It was imperfect and real. It was a universe where even the most fearsome storm trooper could accidentally bump his head on a doorway.
But the CGI-created universe of The Phantom Menace was too slick and too perfect. There was no chance for spontaneity or anything unexpected. The universe of the original Star Wars trilogy was one in which you could imagine living but the universe of The Phantom Menace seemed only to exist in the computers at Lucasfilm. With The Phantom Menace, George Lucas seemed to be reminding those who loved his films that the Star Wars universe belonged to him and him alone. Our imagination was no longer necessary.
As for that 16 year-old who first saw The Phantom Menace in that Baltimore theater, I still have those Jar Jar Binks action figures. I keep one of them on my desk at work and I enjoy the strange looks that it gets. If you push down its arms, Jar Jar sticks out his tongue.
The year is 1971 and Malcolm Smith (Kyle MacLachlan) has just started working as a prison guard at Attica Correctional Facility. Even though his father (Harry Dean Stanton) was a prison guard, Malcolm does not fit in with the other guards at Attica. Malcolm is younger than them and is disgusted by the inhumane treatment of the prisoners. If not for his wife (Anne Heche) and the child that they are expecting, Malcolm would just quit but he needs the money. He fears that he is going to eventually turn into just another sadistic guard.
The Rev. Fred Sultan (Samuel L. Jackson) has a problem. He is the richest and the best known fight promoter in America but the current (and undefeated) heavyweight champion is just too good. No one is paying to watch James “The Grim Reaper” Roper (Damon Wayans) fight because Roper always wins. Sultan has a plan, though. Before Roper turned professional, he lost a fight to Terry Conklin (Peter Berg). Conklin has long since retired from boxing and is now a heavy metal, progressive musician. Sultan convinces Conklin to come out of retirement and face Roper in a rematch. Since Conklin is white and Roper is black, Sultan stands to make a killing as white boxing fans get swept up in all the hype about Conklin being the latest “great white hope.”
The year 2005 was a dark time to be a fan of Star Wars.
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…
Through the Shattered Lens 