Attack of the NO
Continuing with my Star Wars watching, I attacked Attack of the Clones. I wasn't impressed.
I'd heard this film was awful, but since I couldn't remember anything about it even though I did see it in theatres, I thought that it was probably exaggeration. Not so.
This film couldn't even be saved by Yoda coming in with an army to save the day and then saving the day again by being a fucking badass in a lightsaber battle. It was really that awful.
I normally don't notice bad acting. It tends to just go over my head. But in this film it was... uh. Well. The dude playing Anakin was pretty bad.
The script didn't help either. Natalie Portman was fine as Padme in The Phantom Menace; nothing wrong with her there. But there was something about the way her lines were delivered here that just... didn't work. In The Phantom Menace, she was convincing in her role as a queen - or as someone who is used to firmly relaying the queen's opinions, since a lot of the time she's playing as Padme rather than Amidala (the gal in the fancy Queen's clothes was often the handmaiden Sabe, played by Keira Knightly, rather than Portman herself). But in Clones, Padme doesn't have the air of authority that she had when she was a queen, and to me she doesn't sound like a Senator at all.
A lot of the lines were cheesy and not all that natural, which probably affects it. Those romance scenes between Padme and Anakin were just... awkward as hell. I normally don't fast-forward through scenes in films unless it's for violence, but I fast-forwarded through a lot of them after a while. They just didn't work. A lot of the time in the earlier parts, Padme seemed kind of creeped out by Anakin's attention, which certainly didn't help things for me.
"I don't like sand." ... Okay.
Ewan McGregor was fine as Obi-Wan in The Phantom Menace, but in Clones it's another case where the script is showing through. A lot of the lines are just... bad. And not entirely in keeping with his character, nor with the overall atmosphere of the film series.
In a way, something about the dialogue felt very dated to me, very early-2000s. There's a sort of attempt at forced humour there, at completely inappropriate moments. In some ways, it reminded me of the type of humour in Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl, and it works in that film because it's very different movie from this one. The thing that I mean is scenes like-
Anakin: [Pulls a life-threatening move in the middle of an intense chase scene]
Obi-Wan: ... I hate it when he does that.
There's something very artificial about that kind of thing, and it doesn't suit the atmosphere, or the world it's delivered in, or the character delivering it, and it sounds very... American... and very "early 2000s film". And this happened a lot, with a bunch of different characters, so the only conclusion I can make is that it's a bad script. This wasn't so much a problem in The Phantom Menace; when there was a bad attempt at humour, it was usually Jar Jar Binks delivering it, and -- well, it's Jar Jar. He's an idiot, and isn't meant to be taken seriously.
(Actually, I'm surprised at how serious Jar Jar was in Clones; I found it rather... jarring. Pff. It's possible that he could have developed into an intelligent Gungan who carries himself well and acts responsibly, like Captain Tarpals, but we don't see that on-screen really - at the end of Phantom Menace, Jar Jar is still a clumsy idiot, so -- well, anyway)
And... everything surrounding Shmi's death upset me. I don't like the way it was done. At all.
Normally I wouldn't have so many thoughts on this, and I realize I'm not saying anything new at all (people have been talking about how much this movie sucked since it came out, really) but I so rarely notice when a film is done badly, rather than just not to my taste, so this is... interesting.
Anyway. All that aside... the only things I took from this movie were "Yoda was awesome, everything else was blah". Oh, though I did like that some of the Jedi knights in that big epic battle were women. Though it would have been better if they'd had speaking lines.
This entry was originally posted at http://yuuago.dreamwidth.org/3370648.html. You can comment here or at the original entry.
I'd heard this film was awful, but since I couldn't remember anything about it even though I did see it in theatres, I thought that it was probably exaggeration. Not so.
This film couldn't even be saved by Yoda coming in with an army to save the day and then saving the day again by being a fucking badass in a lightsaber battle. It was really that awful.
I normally don't notice bad acting. It tends to just go over my head. But in this film it was... uh. Well. The dude playing Anakin was pretty bad.
The script didn't help either. Natalie Portman was fine as Padme in The Phantom Menace; nothing wrong with her there. But there was something about the way her lines were delivered here that just... didn't work. In The Phantom Menace, she was convincing in her role as a queen - or as someone who is used to firmly relaying the queen's opinions, since a lot of the time she's playing as Padme rather than Amidala (the gal in the fancy Queen's clothes was often the handmaiden Sabe, played by Keira Knightly, rather than Portman herself). But in Clones, Padme doesn't have the air of authority that she had when she was a queen, and to me she doesn't sound like a Senator at all.
A lot of the lines were cheesy and not all that natural, which probably affects it. Those romance scenes between Padme and Anakin were just... awkward as hell. I normally don't fast-forward through scenes in films unless it's for violence, but I fast-forwarded through a lot of them after a while. They just didn't work. A lot of the time in the earlier parts, Padme seemed kind of creeped out by Anakin's attention, which certainly didn't help things for me.
"I don't like sand." ... Okay.
Ewan McGregor was fine as Obi-Wan in The Phantom Menace, but in Clones it's another case where the script is showing through. A lot of the lines are just... bad. And not entirely in keeping with his character, nor with the overall atmosphere of the film series.
In a way, something about the dialogue felt very dated to me, very early-2000s. There's a sort of attempt at forced humour there, at completely inappropriate moments. In some ways, it reminded me of the type of humour in Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl, and it works in that film because it's very different movie from this one. The thing that I mean is scenes like-
Anakin: [Pulls a life-threatening move in the middle of an intense chase scene]
Obi-Wan: ... I hate it when he does that.
There's something very artificial about that kind of thing, and it doesn't suit the atmosphere, or the world it's delivered in, or the character delivering it, and it sounds very... American... and very "early 2000s film". And this happened a lot, with a bunch of different characters, so the only conclusion I can make is that it's a bad script. This wasn't so much a problem in The Phantom Menace; when there was a bad attempt at humour, it was usually Jar Jar Binks delivering it, and -- well, it's Jar Jar. He's an idiot, and isn't meant to be taken seriously.
(Actually, I'm surprised at how serious Jar Jar was in Clones; I found it rather... jarring. Pff. It's possible that he could have developed into an intelligent Gungan who carries himself well and acts responsibly, like Captain Tarpals, but we don't see that on-screen really - at the end of Phantom Menace, Jar Jar is still a clumsy idiot, so -- well, anyway)
And... everything surrounding Shmi's death upset me. I don't like the way it was done. At all.
Normally I wouldn't have so many thoughts on this, and I realize I'm not saying anything new at all (people have been talking about how much this movie sucked since it came out, really) but I so rarely notice when a film is done badly, rather than just not to my taste, so this is... interesting.
Anyway. All that aside... the only things I took from this movie were "Yoda was awesome, everything else was blah". Oh, though I did like that some of the Jedi knights in that big epic battle were women. Though it would have been better if they'd had speaking lines.
This entry was originally posted at http://yuuago.dreamwidth.org/3370648.html. You can comment here or at the original entry.