Review of Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002) by Lenny R — 08 Jun 2017

This is a big improvement on The Phantom Menace, but still doesn't manage to match the originals, for a few reasons. Firstly, the Lucas dialogue (as usual) makes it impossible for the actors to sound natural. This is especially true of Hayden Christensen, though I don't think the dialogue is entirely to blame in his case (however, his freakout post-Sand People incident is actually pretty good). Also, there is absolutely no chemistry between him and Nat, and, if I didn't know how the story turned out, I'd have guessed Padme was going to end up with Obi Wan for a while there (to the extent that I actually found myself hoping she would). Ewan McGregor fares best in the resembling-a-human-being stakes (reshoot fake beard aside), and Obi's detective story is one of the major reasons for this being my favourite of the prequels. I choose to ignore the "courting" scenes, despite them containing Nat's best acting in the whole series. Compare these scenes to the Han-Leia scenes in Empire, and...well, there's no comparison. And there's the point. If the quality of Phantom Menace proved anything, it was that George got kinda rusty in the twenty-two years between directorial outings -- plus the fact that he apparently regards writing and directing as necessary evils in getting the movie to the editing stage, which he enjoys most (or so I heard somewhere). So, in my ultimately worthless opinion (just to throw in on the pile with the millions of others), he should have done what he did with Empire: handed his newly-established series over to more interested writers and directors to carry on with, and potentially improve.

But, as I said, this is my favourite of the prequels, because of the Obi/Jango storyline (including the Coruscant speeder sequence, and particularly the asteroid field bit), as well as the arena sequence and everything after it (though someone needs to teach Nat how to handle a blaster rifle). Rose Byrne is a plus, though she doesn't have much to do (understandably). Great Matt Doran cameo.