May the Schwartz Be With You

I went to see Star Wars last weekend. It was far and away the best one of the past three -- which isn't hard, as I can't even remember what happened in the last three. There were some good fight scenes, and it was cool to see how Darth Vader turned out bad, how Luke and Leia were born - in short, how everything from the first Star Wars is set in motion. Particularly awesome was seeing most of the characters from the original movie in this one. If they had put Han Solo in there, this really could have been fantastic.

Alas, George Lucas made plenty of mistakes. My complaints:

1. Natalie Portman. I thought she was the only redeeming part of Garden State, in which she played a hyper, annoying girl. It must have been a cakewalk of a role though, because when I see her onscreen all I can think is: HYPER ANNOYING GIRL (from the Upper East Side). Definitely not queen material. And don't tell me they had to stay consistent with her in each film - cut the bad people! Batman got cut, James Bond got cut, Queen Padme can (and should) get cut. They needed somebody with grace and elegance, and Natalie Portman wasn't it.

2. Old school Darth Vader design. The best part of the movie is when the Darth Vader suit makes its first appearance. While the suit is largely still awesome, the console in Darth's chest has cheap looking buttons that appear to be from a payphone, plus a couple of extremely simplistic red and green buttons. Update the uniform, George! That doesn't cut it in 2005. Go back and digitally remaster all the old films if you have to, but make that suit cooler!

3. Acting/Characters. Han Solo was awesome. Jabba the Hut was awesome. Obi-Wan was awesome. Even C3PO wasn't annoying. The actors in this film aren't all terrible, but they're certainly not as good as the group in the first round (that means you, Samuel L), and I wasn't left thinking anybody was amazing. Then again, I'm not six years old anymore.

Still, this is the event of the year. I'm generally a confirmed wait-for-the-DVD guy, but shell out the $10 to see this one on the big screen - worth it.

And for a truly hilarious rip on the film, read Anthony Lane's review in the New Yorker.