Should you go see The Phantom Menace 3D?

So, last night I went along to check out Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace in 3D at a packed screening in Dublin.
So, should you go see it?



Well that depends. How stupid/masochistic are you? The Phantom Menace is the same film you more than likely saw back in cinemas in 1999, only with some added extra-dimensional fluff that, at least in my screening, made it look like someone had smeared the projector with Vaseline. The image was muddy and there was no perceptible depth – so if you are asking yourself should you go see the film then certainly don’t seek it purely for the promise of 3D.

13 years on and with the bitter disappointment of summer 1999 behind me, it’s easy to take a step back from The Phantom Menace for a more mature viewpoint on what remains the highest grossing Star Wars film to date. And it doesn’t fare well – the story remains by turns dim witted and hopelessly bogged down in the political machinations that bore adults and children alike. It’s filled with asinine characters doing dull things and goes on for roughly two weeks longer than it should.

I’d like to be able to say that, in retrospect, it’s a perfectly watchable piece of CGI filled entertainment but it simply fails at almost every juncture. In a 133 minute running time, only two scenes are partially engaging – the much feted pod race and the final battle, particularly those moments where the Jedi face off against Darth Maul (which also contains John Williams' only wothy new theme). But even here there’s a sense of this entertainment value being almost despite director George Lucas, with the copious CG in the former and the intense choreography in the latter likely the responsibility of others on the team.

Lucas first began destroying the legacy of the Star Wars series with the ill-advised re-release of the original trilogy in 1997 and he’s been further abusing the corpse ever since. Quite apart from episodes one through three, it’s the constant tinkering that is most irksome to fans – in those special editions, the later DVD release and the recent blu-ray update which adds, wait for it, blinking Ewoks in Return of the Jedi. Did you even notice that the Ewoks never blinked?! Well now you will as they’ve had CG lids applied. It’s utter madness and proves still further that Lucas has no understanding of his fans – they loved the movies already George, why change a single frame. It’s not as though they’ve been subtle in their condemnation.

The fiddling continues in this latest release, adding in 3D obviously and the CG Yoda from the blu-ray but also some extra debris and moments of presence during certain scenes. It might even be effective if the post converted 3D felt like anything more than an obfuscating filter.

But the real problem with The Phantom Menace is that it’s just plain boring. Whoever thought that an intergalactic trade dispute was a suitable topic for a blockbuster science fiction adventure was sadly mistaken. But the film’s attempts to appeal to a younger audience prove just as ill-conceived. I’m not going to waste any more column inches on the character of Jar Jar Binks but even the very notion of a race composed of characters whose speech patterns are nigh on indecipherable is bizarre. Lucas also has no idea how to balance his tone – scenes of near genocide near the end of the film are intercut with slapstick antics from Binks.



You saw the 'kids' trailer, right?

Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace is crap. Pure, unmitigated, intergalactic dung which takes one of the most exciting and beloved sagas cinema has ever known and attempts to erase every good memory you have involving Luke, Leia and Han.

So, should you go see it in its new 3D form? No, absolutely not – this is the exact same, disappointing film as before. But the fact remains that the film has already made its millions and that the conversion process for the possibly even worse Episode 2 is already well under way. The only good news? If you can hold onto your sanity for long enough, eventually you’ll get to see the words ‘A New Hope’ scroll down your screen again, hopefully with a better attempt at 3D. Though God only knows what new additions Lucas will have made by then.