Star Wars Episode III : Birth Of The Empire 970
lemmen writes "According the Brtish tabloid The Sun, Star Wars III will carry the name 'Birth Of The Empire'. This will be announced soon according the article. Also it describes one of the highlights of the movie: 'A thrilling lightsabre clash between Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker while surfing on lava.' Can't wait till May 15th 2005!" Thanks to reader ExoticMandibles, another quality news source: Teen Hollywood. Update: 05/20 05:47 GMT by T :
Gokey writes with a correction: "StarWars.com indicates that the movie is released May 19th, 2005 (exactly
one year from now) not May 15th, 2005."
I'll wait... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I'll wait... (Score:5, Insightful)
I would trust Maxim more...but that is only because I have a subscription to it.
-Grump
Are those crickets chirping that I hear (Score:4, Insightful)
Surfing? (Score:4, Insightful)
Now, if they fired Lucas and made the Zahn books into movies then they could rekindle the franchise, but Lucas would never allow that.
Lava (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh great, this will be ultra realistic. Lucas has just gotten way too happy with the CGI in the prequels. Give me the old minatures any day.
4-6 were cool because they were grounded in reality with some cool special effects. The prequels have lost all sense of reality. A few of the things that bug me:
A planet with a water core that you can travel through, I just don't think this was possible
Yoda needed cane to walk and then doing double back flip, mctwists while fighting.
Jedi's plummiting 100's of feet through the air and landing on flying cars.
My list goes on and on. Fighting on lava is another example.
Re:Oh great (Score:4, Insightful)
George is being serious. Almost makes you feel sorry for him. Billions of dollars can't save him from still being an idiot...
Ride the Walrus (Score:3, Insightful)
what happened to lucas? (Score:5, Insightful)
how can someone create such a dark and fantastic universe and make it so compelling int he first 3 movies, and then fill it with things like jar jar and "surfing on lava" (whoa gnarly yo!) and other idiocies in the last 3
well, the ewoks were a hint of the direction i guess
maybe lucas, who said he wants this to be for kids, not adults, is crashing the entire ship of the series against this rock of kid-friendliness
but you don't have to make it like shrek to appeal to kids
i mean i saw star wars at 7, and it was stunning... no jar jar binks needed to apply to captivate me
i think lucas really screwed up that whole "kid-friendliness" dictate- what that really means to be "kid-friendly", and what its dubious implementation might do to the tone of the series
Engine schmengine (Score:1, Insightful)
Lucas makes me want to vomit.
embracing the videogame market (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember, A-B-B-A-up will let you kick-flip your lava board; B-B-A-B-down-up does a stalefish grab.
timothy
Re:No kidding! (Score:5, Insightful)
Class vs. Camp (Score:5, Insightful)
So what do we have to follow this up? Fighting on lava surf boards? That's just stupid. I wish I could say it more eloquently, but it's just. plain. stupid. The original movies exhibited a certain amount of class, but now it's just drivel. I cannot possibly get excited or emotionally involved in a battle when I'm laughing at the implausability of the entire affair. It's the same reason that the huge battle at the end of Ep2 sucked so hard: there was too much going on, it was too fancy, and it was there just for the sake of coolness.
Minimalist direction and set design can convey so much more emotion and plot than overblown, busy looking CG riddled garbage. Of course I'll see this movie, but I'm going into it knowing I'll be laughing at, rather than actually caring for, the characters.
I'm not angry at George Lucas, he has a right to make the movie he saw in his head. I just rather pity him. Growing old should make someone more mature, not less.
George has already forsaken the Star Wars cannon (Score:2, Insightful)
Someone really needs to remind George Lucas, and Hollywood in general, that while CGI is a great tool it's not a panacea when it comes to making films. Stories matter. Miniatures and actual sets still have their places.
It's such a shame..... (Score:5, Insightful)
Case in point
Matrix - Kung Fu in a virtual world
Matrix Reloaded - Kung Fu in a virtual world with mythical beasts
Matrix Revolutions - Kung Fu in a virtual worldwith mythical beasts that walked on the celing and not the floor.
It's like Star Wars is running out of ideas so the franchise is going for big and flashy over anything worth watching. This is why I am predicting that there will be a battle involving the largest armies ever concieved, and this time, there will either be a two lightsabred enemy or more than one bad guy at once. Just so this film can be "Bigger, More Destructive, Better" than the last one.
Which is a shame, because these new films are in serious danger of ruining the original films (which I love) just by association....
Re:A new hope... (Score:3, Insightful)
- ridiculous references to modern times, like themeing the pod race like a nascar race, with stupid anachronistic quotes.
- more in-jokes referencing tv programs, like anakin saying "there's nothing to see here" a la police stereotype at a crime scene
- the removal of the wonder and mysticism of the force by explaining it scientifically, n.b. "midichloreans". This has the effect of forcing the viewer to treat everything that happens as having a real scientific reason, and there are plenty of ridiculous happenings that cannot be explained this way.
- atrocious over acting on the part of Hayden Christensen and Euan McGregor. Hayden for his emotionless portrayal, and McGregor for blatantly trying to retrofit McGuinness's voice style and coming off sounding like he's holding in a sh*t the whole time.
- that ridiculous "bowl" haircut on young anakin. Can't we have one american movie without a bowl-haircut child in it, please?
- no nekkid carrie fisher.
- mind-numbing script. need I go on?
Re:Spoiler alert (Score:4, Insightful)
Good idea, smuggle him to his father's home planet. Why didn't Lucas create a couple more places? It always struck me as ridiculous that he made Anakin come from Tatooine in Episode 1 (to say nothing of the whole Vader is also C3PO's father weirdness).
Re:Lava (Score:5, Insightful)
Forget the miniatures. I've seen a little about the making of Predator vs. Alien and they use technology for them, but that technology is to make them real. They are very cool big robots each controlled by a team of people.
I don't know about you but to me CGI doesn't look real. The movements, textures, and impacts are always too perfect. Even if the try to make them imperfect, they are perfectly imperfect.
"Surfboards?" (Score:5, Insightful)
God, Lucas, please stop! Give me a dignified sword fight in the vein of the OT. Nope, we need green-screened, CG'd light saber battles on top of lava with the two combatants using them like surfboards!!!
Re:hmmmm.... i wonder.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Oh great (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually it stars Mel Gibson's dad (Score:0, Insightful)
You know what, I might pay to see *that* movie.
Re:Surfing on lava? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Star Wars III: (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm excited to see the last movie, becuase it's the reason the prequels were made in the first place. It's the reason any of us were excited to see the Phantom Menace. It's the reason why everyone, including PM-haters, went to see Attack of the Clones. However, even though I liked the first 2 prequels, I admit this last one will have to be nothing short of great. If it fails, the whole prequel trilogy fails.
Re:A new hope... (Score:3, Insightful)
Of all the complaints I see, I've never seen anyone else complain about the one thing that annoys me the most--the freaking DINER in Attack of the Clones.
I swear, I was half expecting some manner of creature in a pink dress to come out and screech "kiss my grits!"
Re:Surfing on lava? (Score:4, Insightful)
I can imagine Tolkien's middle earth because things act and interact in a consistent manner, I can imagine the scenario in episode 4, but ewoks helping defeat the empire is a bit of a stretch, and surfing on lava is just ridiculous - regardless of the setting.
~Berj
Re:Dude, they HAVE to surf on lava... (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course, Star Wars has an actual plot, so it'll have a leg up on Spy Kids 3-times-shittier-than-anything-you-ever-imagined-D .
Was it EVER Sci-Fi? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:"Surfboards?" (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm complaining about the goddamned "extreme" surfing that will apparently be taking place in a battle that should be serious and epic, two former Jedi partners fighting each other in a conflict of Light and Dark Force!
Nope, let's CG lava, CG platforms, and greenscreen our actors instead so we have no class left.
Re:hmmmm.... i wonder.... (Score:3, Insightful)
If the entire Jedi counsel can stand next to Senator Palpatine and not have the slightest clue that he's force sensitive, let alone a Sith Master, Vader not locating Yoda doesn't really rank up there in the hard to believe catagory.
Kids Movies (Score:2, Insightful)
I let my 2-year-old son watch all 5 recently, and he loves them. Now instead of asking to watch Monsters, Inc. or Toy Story, he wants Star Wars.
There's a difference between Lucas and Lang... (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe... (Score:5, Insightful)
Go ahead, mod me down as though I were some sort of nerd heretic. Although it's really odd how being a Star Wars fan used to be a nerd prereq, and now you have to despise the movies in order to get your loser cap.
Re:A new hope... (Score:5, Insightful)
- hokey physical comedy and stupid gags, like C3PO in both movies. In retrospect, the special edition of ANH fortells this, with the Jawa being thrown around by some huge lizardlike steed, or Han stepping on Jabba's tail.
- Ridiculous foreshadowing that attempts to tie every single plot thread or character from the original movies into the prequels. Tatooine figures so prominently in the prequels that you'd think the Empire would have been interested in the planet before the droids landed there in ANH. They should have just left the droids out entirely; they had character in the originals, and here they're just cartoonish plot devices. Any bets on whether and how Han Solo will show up in EPIII?
- Overexplanations in general, not just the midichlorians. I don't give a shit whether the stormtroopers are all clones. What made them so scary in the originals was the fact that they've been dehumanized by sticking them behind all that armor. It's actually a lot more frightening if you don't know their origin; they're robot-like, but not robots.
- Which brings me to: all those friggin' robots. Battle droids aren't scary or evil. Stormtroopers are evil, massive Star Destroyers are evil, TIE fighters are evil. The only evil parts of I and II were Darth Maul, Count Dooku, and the Fetts. The Empire had this whole aesthetic style to it that just screamed "heartless planet-crushers and destroyers of hope"; the Trade Federation has crappy faux-Oriental accents and CGI bots.
Re:Oh great (Score:3, Insightful)
Some people don't expect our movies to be scientifically sound. I've seen enough of reality; bring on the fantasy.
OH? I bet you'd like the lava surfing if... (Score:1, Insightful)
Incompetance (Score:5, Insightful)
Poor editing, actually.
If you look on the ep1 DVD's deleted scenes, you'll see a scene where Qui Gon is talking with Anakin in Mos Eisley, and one of the flying camera droids that Darth Maul had released when he got on the planet creeps up on them. Qui Gon senses its presence, and in a very cool Jedi move turns around, takes out his lightsaber and destroys the drone in one swift motion. then turns to Anakin and, aware that they have been found, says something like "We must hurry!" and they run off to the ship. Upon their hasty arrival, Darth Maul catches up with them, and they fight (the deleted scene ends when he says they must hurry).
But that scene was cut, so the following scenes do not make sense:
That is now a useless scene because they don't do anything. He releases them...and that's the last we hear of them (I think we see one zipping along once in the background, but that's all).
Why are they running? How did Darth Maul know the ship was there?
So, he cut an important scene that linked two other scenes (therefore crucial to the flow) and showcased super cool lightsaber action and force powers (what we are there to see!), all because of "time constraints". But he felt it necesary to leave in the same chapter the scenes of:
That is bad storytelling. If you have time constraints, you cut the scenes that have no relevance to the story and no impact on the flow, not the ones that are both cool and integral to the story.
Veteran Star Wars Fans: What's wrong with I & (Score:5, Insightful)
Getting to the question at hand, what about episodes 1 and 2 turned you off? I enjoyed them on their own merits rather than comparing them to the first trilogy (because it was easy for me, read above), and although there were some things like a planet with a core of water that was unrealistic, Star Wars in general is unrealistic.
Of course, there is the Jar Jar Binks factor. Personally I bet Lucas regretted that character, I know I sure would.
Some talk about a Jedi falling 100 feet and landing on a flying car and how that is unrealistic, others talk about the set rules of physics that seem to be ignored in I and II, others about destroying the "wise sage" that was Yoda, and also the demystifying of the force with science. I'm sure there is more, which I hope you'd inform me of.
One thing I'd like to say is that episode II to me seemed to show the golden age of the Jedi coming to an end. I can see how certain things in the first 2 or 3 episodes could be different from the last 3, such as the jumping from 100 feet thing.
Anyway, I'd like to hear your responses as I've been wondering why people seem to rag on the new SW movies a bit.
Re:Are those crickets chirping that I hear (Score:5, Insightful)
Lucas says he planned a series of movies all along but nobody believed it until Empire Strikes Back. Suddenly Star Wars seemed as deep as Star Trek. Together the two movies implied a much bigger background than the first one alone. We all started drinking the Joseph Campbell kool-aid.
Return of the Jedi did a nice job of continuing the mystique and mythology, but the sucky Ewoks started to make it easier to step back and think, hey, it's just a bunch of movies. Episodes 1 and 2 have completed that process.
Re:Keep Continuity. PLEASE Don't Make It Stupid Su (Score:2, Insightful)
Don't go see it (Score:2, Insightful)
If Episode I and II were such a travesty, such a smear on the well-coddled spot of pop culture that you hold so dearly close to your heart, then don't go see Episode III. I mean it. Don't spend any money, don't ask anyone else how good (or bad) it was. Just ignore it when it comes out and leave it behind you forever.
Will you do that? I would venture to say no. That would spoil the fun of having something to bitch about.
The real reason people use as justification to see the new version of anything is that they might miss something that DOESN'T suck, something that everyone else saw on midnight the night before opening night. Heaven forbid I be left out of a geek orgy! But feelings are so strong about Episodes I and II you would figure no one would touch Episode III without biohazard gear and robotic assistance. But they will. In droves. And when Episode III comes out, people will dress up in their Stormtrooper outfits, Darth Vader suits, and Leia bikinis and flock to the theaters.
And they will be thoroughly disappointed.
Expectations for this series are way beyond what anyone can reasonably expect. George Lucas has left the Star Wars universe simmering for far too long and with little discipline for ANYONE to be satisfied with his vision of the beginning of his own saga. Anyone with such high expectations is destined for disappointment, because the movie they see is never as good as the movie they imagine.
So ignore Episode III when it comes out. Don't go see it. And don't complain when it sucks. Because Star Wars does not belong to you. It belongs to George Lucas. And he can rewrite his story (and "history") all he wants, because it's his. If you don't like the story, don't fork over the cash. And if you do go see it, just remember what George Lucas actually said: "the last three [episodes] are more commercial." Don't expect to see the death of every Jedi. Because I am predicting Darth Vader will not show up until the end of the movie. And if there's anything that will get the Star Wars zealots up in arms, it will be the "implied" slaughter of all the Jedi, just like the "implied" slaughter of the Tusken raiders in Episode II. After all, this is a series for kids!
Re:There's a difference between Lucas and Lang... (Score:2, Insightful)
Either that, or it is a well digested story about how democracy can fail if the citizens and representatives are too complacent and the high-level leadership is playing both sides of the fence. To top it off, the graphic design in Star Wars is best-of-breed, and the talent of a few of the cast really does come through. Whether or not the actors are well directed is really an annoyance rather than a major failing when taking the whole series of movies into consideration.
Re:what happened to lucas? (Score:4, Insightful)
Lucas never created anything, he recycled other people's ideas:
Lucas never created anything, his talent resided in two things: Getting himself a kick-ass team to do an incredible job, and incredible marketing insight.
Don't get me wrong, I love the original trilogy and I see nothing wrong with a bit of post-modern cultural recycling. In fact, I applaud Lucas for reviving the classic sci-fi pulps, but he his in no way a creative man, he's just good at rehashing already existing ideas.
So my guess is that the problem with the prequels is that he has somehow convinced himself that he has creative talent. Dellusional men do weird things...
Which evil? (Score:5, Insightful)
Meh? How was Maul evil? He had horns? All of these guys are evil only because they're on the wrong side, not because they really establish their respective characters at all.
Darth Vader used the force to choke a guy to death - because he got a little back-talk. Darth was a bad, bad man - and got lots of great scenes to establish his character. So did the emperor. Heck, they blew up a whole planet.
Don't take The Sun's word as gospel... (Score:2, Insightful)
Just look at the quote- "they control these like surfboards". Wow... sounds plausible. Sigh. I strongly suspect that whatever actually happens in this scene, the 'insider' or The Sun felt they had to dumb it down so that their readership could understand it- and distorted it in the process. Surfboards!?! Hah!
Personally, I'm hoping to see "Star Wars: Episode III: Return Of The Sith" scroll up the screen. That would follow George's professed style of making movies 'like music', echoing the same riffs and themes throughout the Star Wars sextology.
Re:"Birth of the Empire"? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Maybe... (Score:3, Insightful)
You do realize that George Lucas is writing and directing this movie, don't you? You do realize this is the same guy who gave us Jar-Jar, virgin-birth Anakin, and mitichlorians, right? Do you seriously think anything is "too stupid" for George Lucas to insert into his next action-figure-selling movie vehicle?
Re:There's a difference between Lucas and Lang... (Score:3, Insightful)
Do you mean 2001, A Space Odyssey? I've read all four Odyssey's and Arthur Clarke's notes in each, and I'm pretty sure 2001 had a lot more going on than man vs. machine. I'd view it more of a "Great Moments in Human Evolution" type story; having HAL malfunction was as much a criticism of the human paranoia* as it was on human-machine relations. It's almost arguable that it simply served to make certain that Bowman arrived at the monolith alone, and any social commentary was incidental.
(*Spoiler-type information: the book makes clear the fact that HAL was given information that the astronauts were not, for reasons of 'National Security'. It/He became obsessed with the repercussions that would inevitably result when this became revealed, so his actions were those of someone determined to not face the consequences of their secrecy, at all costs. It can almost be argued that HAL's character acted in such a human manner that he could have been written as a human without much of the plot being altered, other than how his brain would be picked apart of course.)
Spoiler, if you ask me. (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd personally like to thank the retard editor who let this spoiler go. Surfing lightsabre battle, great, I'm sure it's fantastic, but what is it with posters and editors who think it's necessary to dump details without a spoiler warning? I find I enjoy movies best knowing as little about them as possible before going in. In particular it saves people from me being yet-another-twit posting about how this or that was a let down thanks to my inflated expectations.
I'll see it when it comes out, probably a week or so after opening and when crowds have thinned (after all the whinging begins in papers and on /. about how it sucked because of this, that or the other thing.)
you have a dubious definition of creativity (Score:5, Insightful)
in other words, your forensic analysis of lucas's influences are dead on, but that simply illusrates how creative he is: to mix and match such disparate influences into something wholly fresh and enthralling
you seem to think creativity happens in a vacuum
ALL stories, written by ANYONE can be found to have similarities to previous stories, as all stories are simply variations on the hero myth and have the same story arc of crisis leading to resolution
i mean, according to your definition, shakespeare or homer deserve credit for all books and movies made in western culture for the past couple of hundred years... um, no
study joseph campbell [jcf.org] and his groundbreaking work with myths, especially the hero with a thousand faces [amazon.com] to see what i mean
lucas is incredibly creative: watch his early film thx-1138 [imdb.com] and do a forensic analysis of the science fiction and cultural critique roots of that movie... it doesn't take away from lucas's creativity to find his sources of inspiration
no, the problem with lucas is that he hit his audience dead on in the first few films: older children and young teenagers, in the spirit of tintin [zardo.net]: genuinely evil forces and genuine mortal risk at work against a young hero with colorful friends and enemies in a colorful universe
however, for whatever bizarre reason, with jar jar and surfing lava, lucas somehow thinks that YOUNGER children should be courted instead of staying with his sweet spot of older children/ young teenagers... i mean c'mon jar jar is nothing but a teletubbie character: lucas has gotten the age wrong when he seeks to be kid-frinedly- he's aiming at too low of an age, and losing the sweet spot that his star wars universe appeals to
on a side note, this whole delving into the forensic analysis of predecessors to creative works gets at the problem with corporations claiming intellectual property creep further and further into the public domain: micky mouse not lapsing into it, or the whole debale with the grey album: at some point, by claiming excessive ownership on what is essentially our shared human culture, corporations are stifling innovation, not helping it, by keeping works locked up in a vault where no one can freely dip into and remix from them...
in such a too near future world where corporations and their hordes of lawyers exert too much of an influence on cultural ownership, a lawyer can come along just as you did in your parent post, and claim ownership of star wars based on previous works, and stifle star wars before it ever got out of the script pile
on other words, in the future of increasing dubious and aggressive cultural ownership practices by large corporations, we would never have seen star wars... that's the kind of stifling of innovation we are dealing with in the whole ip battle
Re:A new hope... (Score:3, Insightful)
ridiculous references to modern times, like themeing the pod race like a nascar race, with stupid anachronistic quotes.
Nascar? More like chariot races of Roman times.
more in-jokes referencing tv programs, like anakin saying "there's nothing to see here" a la police stereotype at a crime scene
What else would you expect him to say? Something cool like "Some friend"?
the removal of the wonder and mysticism of the force by explaining it scientifically, n.b. "midichloreans". This has the effect of forcing the viewer to treat everything that happens as having a real scientific reason, and there are plenty of ridiculous happenings that cannot be explained this way.
The midichlorians only allow people to interact with the force, they are not the source. Besides, you're kind of repeating your previous point.
atrocious over acting on the part of Hayden Christensen and Euan McGregor. Hayden for his emotionless portrayal, and McGregor for blatantly trying to retrofit McGuinness's voice style and coming off sounding like he's holding in a sh*t the whole time.
Oh, like Leia pointing to a star destroyer and blandly saying, "Star destroyer," isn't emotionless...or the millions of times Luke overacts his youthful exuberance or wannabe venerable Jedi calm attitude?
that ridiculous "bowl" haircut on young anakin. Can't we have one american movie without a bowl-haircut child in it, please?
Luke's haircut throughout was a friggin bowl. And how about Han's fun little hairdo? Another bowl.
no nekkid carrie fisher.
Natalie Portman in a torn form fitting suit will do in a pinch.
mind-numbing script. need I go on?
Please do. I haven't seen a single thing you mentioned that's not visible in the holy trilogy, script included. Come on man, Vader's "No disintegrations" isn't cheesy? Everything's lifted from something else, from "You must learn the ways of the force," to the emperor's "You want this..." to Luke, it was all awful, disgusting, and stolen. But because it was so friggin cool, I ate it all up and continue to do so. Unlike some people, I still watch Star Wars through the eyes of a child and treat it as such. It doesn't have to make perfect sense and mesh with the laws of physics. All it has to do is give me an environment where I'm willing to suspend my disbelief. Nothing will come close to Star Wars. Nothing.
Re:what happened to lucas? (Score:3, Insightful)
He needs to remember - kids are a lot more tough-minded than he thinks, especially nowadays. He used to know this, back when he made ANH. Maybe having kids of his own has led him to want to create entertainment that will be "safe" for kids to watch, instead of work that they will really want to watch. This is completely understandable, from the parent's perspective. But look at the results. The generation of kids that grew up in the '70's and '80's worshipped this man and the universe he created. Today's kids are just indifferent. Maybe they're better off.
This is nothing new, in the world of so-called "children's entertainment." Everything from fairy tales, to comics, to science fiction and fantasy novels have been shunted off into the "kid's corner." Most of this stuff is written to appeal to the adult's vision of childhood. The shame of it is, the original Star Wars trilogy transcended that label of "kids' stuff." The prequels embody all of its worst stereotypes.
Bitch...Bitch...moan...moan (Score:3, Insightful)
It's amazing how people are ready to take a hard dump on the movie before it's even released. It's even more amazing how people take one word "surfing" out of a press release or news report and negative fantasize until they are blue in the face like somebody who is REALLY constipated.
But the fact of the matter is.....just about every one of them will be at the theater within 2 weeks of release, ready to pay their 7-10 bucks (or equivelant currency) to see it.
Maybe their expectations will be so low that they might actually like it.
Fetts were evil? (Score:3, Insightful)
The lack of star wars in Star Wars (Score:4, Insightful)
Where are the X-Wings? The Tie Fighters? The space battles?
Where is the history of the Rebellion, and their first design prototypes of the Y-Wings, X-Wings, and so forth? The creation of the Rebel fleet and bases on Hoth and so forth? I'd rather see Hoth again, not Tattooine.
You know, actual prequels to the storyline we know in the original movies. If Lucas wants to jerk off over CG--where is the absolutely monstrous, record-breaking spaceship battle taking place between Star Destroyers, fighter ships, and so forth that shows everyone how it's done?
Nah, lets watch a bunch of Gungans and some CG clones shoot through clouds of dust instead.
Re:"Birth of the Empire"? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:"Surfboards?" (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Spoiler, if you ask me. (Score:3, Insightful)
Even knowing who Kaiser Soze really is does not spoil The Usual Suspects in any way.
Re:Veteran Star Wars Fans: What's wrong with I &am (Score:3, Insightful)
The lauded Jedi Council was also a room full of idiots. Blindly they walked into trap after trap and then got slaughtered by the hundreds by flying into an ambush on purpose! "Gee Yoda, maybe we should fly down under cover fire, load up our friends, get the hell out, and nuke the site from orbit." "No no, let's try to attack from the center of the combatants, yeah!"
Did the Jedi, at the height of their power, just not like to use the force? I expect that a few hundred Jedi would have some seriously cool tactics involving force manipulation. But no, all I saw was isolated force pushes and medieval sword twirling.
Bah!
However... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:On 2001, HAL, and self-awareness (Score:3, Insightful)
Kubrick spent a ton of time and energy finding, and then filming and editing, 2001 becasue he was trying to work in a central metaphor for the whole movie.
If you're familiar with Nietzsche, there's this whole "Worm turns to Ape turns to lower Man, who then turns to Uber-Man" (or something like this) thing he wrote about. That transformation, and the details of it, are what Kubrick tried to present through Clrak's plot.
Instead of using the plot to tell us the story, Kubrick used the process of editing and filming the story to get this message across.
I think this is one reason why he is so highly regarded. He used the form of "filmaking" to tell a story that was (as I am sure he saw it) much larger than the hackneyed "aliens help man evolve" b.s. in Clark's story.
After the film was done, Kubrick intentionally had all the props and film footage destroyed. Telling the story arc of Clark's book was not what was *really* going on in the film, for Kubrick.
There're a couple of books you might want to check out that really give an in depth view of the whole deal:
Geduld, Carolyn. Filmguide to 2001: A Space Odyssey. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1973.
Rasmussen, Randy. Stanley Kubrick (Seven Films Anlayzed). Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company Inc., 1998
Re:Star Wars III: (Score:5, Insightful)
When questioned why he never made another series after the second, or whether he would do a movie or a reunion episode, he categorically says "no". Not because he doesnt want to, but that he knows that individuals romanticise movies and tv shows, and in their own mind make them to be better than they ever really were.
We all remember the great parts of the OT, but all too easily skip over the bad parts that we have chosen to forget about, or discard when we watch them again.
The reality is, that in our childhood minds the OT have a special place. And that will never be matched by any subsequent episode in the Star Wars universe. We all hold it so fondly in our minds that, regardless of how bad it actually was, we still love it anyway.
The REAL test is to put someone who has never seen any of the 5 movies and gauge their reaction. You will be surprised to find that (of the people i know) the OT is considered cheesy, melodramatic and (in the case of ROTJ particularly) are just kids films.
We made them great in our minds... the Prequels could never live up to that.
Re:Can we still consider this a "good franchise?" (Score:3, Insightful)
Ewoks are dumb, but don't forget all the good stuff that happened when they weren't around.
Re:Birth of a Nation^H^H^H^H^HEmpire (Score:2, Insightful)