Back from the movie theater. In a line: I liked it more than the first episide and less than the second.

I didn’t feel really immersed this time, I watched the whole movie feeling sort of emotionally detached even if some passages are slightly more effective and well executed. If I had something to write on during the show I could have filled pages and pages. To begin with it’s my first movie in a theatre with a digital support but the only difference I noticed is that the image doesn’t show any sort of “impurities” like it always happen with the normal film. The first part of the movie is great. I loved the whole scene in the space but I wished it showed some more the “choral” aspect of the movie and linger some more to describe the battle instead of just focusing on the two “heroes” gliding around cheerfully in the mess of the battle thanks to irritant luck and super-powers. That’s a general trend of the last three movies where each character becomes just the classic, predictable hero while all the other elements remain as an irrelevant backdrop. But at least the start is fast and spiffy, then the movie slows down and did very little to keep me intrigued.

In particular I noticed two problems. The first is tied to the emotional involvement. Not only it’s weak for the most part due to the predictability of the scenes and behaviours, but even the actors themselves show no involvement. The love story between Padme and Anakin is weak, I loved her in the second movie but in this episode she just sits there whining and mourning pathetically all the time. All the charm she gained (Uhm, someone saw “Closer” by the way?) is completely lost and even her aseptic death is sort of irrelevant and not involving. There’s no “feeling” between her and Anakin and the same happens between Anakin and Obi-Wan Kenobi. They are supposed to be good friends after all they went through together but all they are able to communicate is a rather cold friendship and some failed attempts at humor. You cannot feel any affection in their actions. As I said this is noticeable throughout all the movie, all the actors sort of sit there and play their role like if they felt actually ridicule with those dresses. The dialogues do not help this situation, they are often silly and pretentious and this add to the “faked” feeling that in this movie is more evident than ever.

Again all these elements affect the movie as a whole. The “baddie” of the first part is just too stupid and out of place. It’s humorous on a meta-level that in my opinion breaks completely the atmosphere. An asthmatic robot is an obvious and inappropriate mock of Darth Vader, in particular when the movie would need some seriousness due to what is supposed to go on. Lucas announced that this movie is more “dark” but this is definitely not what I saw. The humor is always inappropriate and uneffective, the actors do not show any emotional involvement, the characters look more and more like super heroes completely alienated and “opaque” for the public and the scenes are just too quick and already predetermined to revive some interest. Watching the movie feels more like a “practice” of something you know too well than a discovery. It fails to surprise, it fails to communicate. Some passages are “muffled” and awkward (I didn’t like the howling Darth Vader at the end).

At least there are some valid and still actual archetypes. The corruption of the power, the reasonings about war, peace, democracy are all actual and effective. Anakin’s journey toward the dark side works better than how I expected if it wasn’t for some parts a bit too forced (the murder of the Jedi childs, some dialogues with Palpatine) or badly acted (the murder of Samule Jackson). And finally Yoda remains the best part of the movie on every aspect.

Visually there are some good passages but still not on par with the second episode that I felt more evocative, imaginative and varied. Great is the zoomed out scene with Anakin and Obi-Wan hanging on a structure that is about to fall in the lava. Due to the distance and the dark light you cannot locate the bodies but you can still easily follow the scene thanks to the shiny neon-swords. I liked a lot the idea. As in the second movie these swords become even more an “icon”, a recognizable symbol everywhere.

In general I’d say that the serie would need some renovation and less self-complacency. It became a bit too much autoreferential to recapture the magic of the first trilogy. There was some more story and less plastic (but if the plastic is in the space, I love it).