Lucas may have problems as a director and writer, but I’ve always thought that those flaws are balanced by his great storytelling ability. The problem with “The Phantom Menace” is that he simply has no story to tell. The film merely adds an introductory chapter to a story that has already been told, and stretches it out into a two-hour movie. It is no accident that prequels of this kind are rare. They are very difficult to make properly. And apparently he’s just not a sophisticated enough filmmaker to pull it off.

For one thing, this project is limited by the fact that anyone familiar with the first trilogy knows the story’s outcome, and it therefore lacks some of the suspense associated with a gradually unfolding saga. More importantly, however, this situation leaves Lucas with very little freedom as a storyteller. It also encourages him to gloss over key events; because their outcome is a foregone conclusion, he forgets to bring them to life.

For example, we know there will eventually be a romance between Anakin and Padme. So Lucas has the two characters meet here and–surprise, surprise–they seem to like each other. Their developing friendship isn’t portrayed that clearly, and their motivations for becoming close aren’t explained. Because Lucas fails to make scenes like these believable, we can’t help being conscious of how he’s manipulating the plot in his effort to connect the two trilogies. Another good example of this problem is Anakin’s portrayal as a potential Jedi. There doesn’t appear to be anything about this kid remotely out of the ordinary, even though the other characters keep talking like there is. Our only reason for thinking he’s special is that the plot requires it.

If the story fails to be engaging, it is because we never see the important events. Lucas makes a fatal error in not showing what’s happening on Naboo, the small planet whose capture is the focus of the plot. Numerous atrocities are supposedly being committed against the planet’s inhabitants, but we only know about this because the characters on screen refer to the events, usually rather woodenly.

The deadpan performances are a problem in themselves, but they only highlight our lack of involvement in the story. Think of Han Solo sweating in fear, then think of the emotional vacuums passing for characters in this film. Whenever any of the characters do express emotion, as in the scene where Anakin and his mom part, it still seems awfully restrained. Somehow, Lucas manages to keep the emotional reactions of his characters to a minimum, which gives the film an almost mechanical feel.

It’s true that “A New Hope” never showed Alderaan’s inhabitants, but we still could feel the tragedy of the planet’s destruction through the horrified reactions of Princess Leia and Obi Wan. Moreover, there were many other involving events which we witnessed directly, such as the slaying of rebels at the beginning; the capture and torture of the princess; and the murder of Luke’s foster parents. Furthermore, the major plot elements were intriguing in and of themselves. They weren’t there merely to show us how they were to be linked to later events, which seems to be the case with the new film.

I suspect that Lucas was not as concerned in the first trilogy with what had to happen later in the story and was therefore able to focus his attention on the events at hand. The weakest segment was “Return of the Jedi,” which had the task of bringing the story to an end. Only then did Lucas start to show signs of forcing plot points. In “The Phantom Menace,” he gets so bogged down in the task of bringing his story from point A to point B that he ends up with only the bare bones of a plot, and none of it comes alive.

This is especially true of the characterization. In the old trilogy, characters like Yoda and Han reveal distinct personalities in their first few minutes on screen. This film goes for more than two hours and the characters, including the familiar ones, come off vague and nondescript. We aren’t given much of a chance to experience their personalities in the way they interact. We must take Qui Gon’s word for it when he describes Obi Wan as “headstrong.” What’s most odd is that the cartoons seem better developed than the humans. The scenes where Qui Gon negotiates with the birdlike slave-owner Watto are amusing and well-done–probably the movie’s best scenes aside from the stunning action sequences–but they can’t hold a candle to the constant interactions throughout the first trilogy.

One thing I cannot do is accuse the film of lacking creativity. The design of the creatures, the technologies, and the planets is impressive. Watching the film is sort of like reading a children’s book that isn’t very good but abounds with beautiful illustrations. There is certainly a “wow” factor in the movie’s visuals, but the effect of it is short-lived.

I get irked when I hear fans talk as though the “Star Wars” movies were never about anything beyond special effects. While the inventive visuals are part of what made the originals so revolutionary, they’re not what made the films so fun to watch. And in no way can they explain the trilogy’s continuing popularity today. After all, many of the original effects look primitive by today’s standards, and their novelty has certainly worn off. Only an enduring and compelling storyline could have allowed the first three films to become the classics they’re almost universally acknowledged to be.

Well, after waiting 16 years for his next installment, George has given us “The Phantom Menace”. As a Star Wars fan I got what I expected – another chance to immerse myself in the Star Wars universe – a film whose sole purpose is essentially escapism. But as a movie fan, and judging it as I would any other movie, I frankly feel mildly disappointed. Any movie that’s made can always be improved upon but I feel that this SHOULD have been better. Firstly the good points :

1) The visuals are stunning – a lot of love and hard work has quite obviously gone into the effects and the people involved can quite rightly be proud of their work

2) All the performances by the main cast were good. Particularly Natalie Portman and Pernilla August.

3) The Pod Race was exciting and amusing.

4) The final sabre duel was quite fantastic : Darth Maul prowling up and down like a caged tiger was a particularly excellent touch – it added real tension and anticipation to the scene.

5) The music as always was magnificent. The Star Wars saga would lose much of its charm and intensity without Williams’ scores.

And now the negatives :

1) The pacing was too fast in parts! The first half hour of the film just left me cold – you weren’t led into the story. You were dumped straight into the action. On paper I’m sure the first half hour looked fantastic but I found myself sitting in the theatre going – ‘hey, great special effect shot there!’ I wasn’t involved in the story and the scenes lacked tension and danger.

2) The film only truly started for me on reaching Tatooine. I finally got a chance to get to know the characters. However there still was not enough character development in the film as a whole. For example, Obi Wan had nothing to do or say throughout the movie except flash his light sabre around from time-to-time. Who is Obi Wan??? After seeing the film I’m none the wiser. And the final sabre duel (good as it was) would have been infinitely better had the relationship between Qui-Gon and Obi Wan been explored past the mere mentor-apprentice motif. The final sabre duel lacked emotional involvement as a consequence.

3) Why did they make Jar-Jar so incomprehensible?? I found myself becoming annoyed at having to strain to understand his nonsensical utterings! (Having said that, he wasn’t as annoying as I’d been led to expect) Why George used easily identifiable racial accents for his alien characters completely puzzled me. It just shows a lack of imagination!

4) Not enough Darth Maul.

5) What’s with the biological exposition on the Force! Was that necessary? The first three films pointed to links between the Force and genetics but I don’t need tiresome cold scientific explanations as to the Force’s origin, thank you very much! It just ruins the mystique.

6) Can we have less of the mindless gaffes that occur in the final battle scenes (You know the ones that save the day!) Its an insult to the audience’s intelligence (In a full theatre I swear I didn’t see a single soul who looked under sixteen! – has George forgotten about the original fans). In the original trilogy there was none of this cringeful embarrassing material (Ewoks excepted!!)

Well I think I’ll stop there. To summarise : a good movie that could have been a whole lot better. Perhaps there was too much story to cover in two hours? In which case the plot should have been shortened on the adage that “less is more”. I’ve always thought that episode one was always going to be the lamest of the new films so I await the next installment with anticipation and hope …..

More or less everything worthwhile in The Phantom Menace can be attributed to the cinematographer. In addition, the computer effects are clearly impressive, and whoever choreographed the fight scenes gets some props too. However, don’t let its staunch defenders fool you — nothing else is any good at all. The characters are trite and undeveloped, the acting is unremarkable to poor, and the dramatic arc is nonexistent. It felt to me like the movie was still just beginning until half way through the final sequence — nothing that felt like a plot had happened yet, so I had assumed that the real action was yet to begin. In addition, many plot and character decisions are totally disloyal to the original series. I will elaborate below, but DO NOT READ FURTHER if you don’t want anything given away.

Jar Jar is more or less the most insulting character I have ever seen on screen. He only exists to be laughed at. Children can appreciate a substantive comic relief character, as C3PO and R2, not to mention Sebastian (from The Little Mermaid) and any of several other Disney characters, demonstrate. However, Jar Jar was not one. His only personality was of a “look how stupid I am” variety; the only way to relate to him is “look how stupid he is”. I certainly don’t need my little sister thinking that’s a useful way to relate to people.

Just about every invocation of the powerful, resonant images from the original series is compromised. The force is changed from a mystical, magical idea that captivated my entire generation, to a kind of microbe. Anakin is given a virgin birth, making his fated status absurdly heavy-handed. Yoda, full of real wisdom in The Empire Strikes Back (“No. Try not. Do, or do not. There is no try.”), is reduced to canned and vaguely fascist sloganeering (“Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”). The movie’s publicity would have us believe that it foreshadows Anakin’s descent to the dark side and eventual transformation into Darth Vader, but except for some Vader- breathing at the end of the credits, this is completely absent. Nothing in Anakin’s character foreshadows Darth Vader in any way: the boy is headstrong, but so was Luke; the Jedi council says he’s full of fear, but nowhere in the original trilogy do we find indication that Darth Vader’s fall was through fear.

Darth Maul may be cool-looking, but he’s completely substanceless. He’s on screen for two seconds, says a total of about twenty words, and generally has nothing that puts him in the same league with Vader. He fights with a cool double light-saber, but that is all.

The movie has no story. It wasn’t until Qui-Gonn died that I realized that the final battle was in progress. This is because the movie is entirely lacking a dramatic structure. There is some meandering action as the Jedis escape the trade federation and pick up Jar Jar on Naboo before heading to Tatooine; then there is meandering action on Tatooine as the Jedis find Anakin and watch him win a pod race; then there is a cool-looking but contextless scene in the Imperial senate; then there is a final battle. I was still waiting for the story to get started when the final battle began. It wasn’t until a main character died that it occurred to me that the film might be nearing its end.

The film is also politically objectionable on several counts. As has been noted frequently, several characters (especially the representatives of the trade federation and Jar Jar Binks) fit problematic racial and ethnic stereotypes. More importantly, I think, is the way that the film portrays entire alien races as having a species-specific character, as though they were created with racial personality cookie-cutters; hence, the Hutts are gangsters, while the Gungans are clownish, petty and stupid. The scene in which the Gungan leader is bought off by the false deference of Queen Amidala and her (almost all-white) entourage smacks of the European colonialists’s scorn for the peoples they colonized.