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Sixteen years we have had to wait for George Lucas to give us another installment of his Star Wars epic. And twenty-two years have we waited to see how Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Darth Vader got their beginnings in this space fairy tale. Now, it is always odd to see a prequel, especially with how the original Star Wars movie, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi flowed together and often filled us in on what happened earlier in the story. The film begins at the very begging of the Star Wars adventure, back in the day of the Roman Republic , opps (Freudian slip), make that simply The Republic. However, the evil Trade Federation is starting to cause some problems for the faltering Republic, but you just have a feeling someone else is really controlling things, thus the whole Phantom Menace idea. Well, the Trade Federation has decided to get the ball rolling by blockading the small planet of Naboo, with secret plans to invade. The Republic sends two Jedi knights, Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor, Emma) and Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson, Michael Collins), to negotiate an end to the blockade. In a preemptory strike, the Trade Federation leaders try to kill the Jedis without success and begin the invasion. So now the leader of the Naboo, Queen Padmé Amidala (Natalie Portman, Heat), must seek out the assistance of The Republic to save her people, but first she needs the help of the two Jedi to get off her planet. Well, her majesty and the two Jedi are able to escape along with a very annoying character by the name of Jar Jar Binks (Ahmed Best) that is a computer generated inhabitant of Naboo that sounds a lot like a slave from the American South. Unfortunately, their ship is damaged during their escape, and they make an emergency landing on old Tatooine for repairs. Here Qui-Gon Jinn discovers a young slave boy named Anakin Skywalker (Jake Lloyd) who has an unusual affinity for The Force. So Qui-Gon Jinn adds him to the shopping cart and they take him with them after repairs and some morality issues are discussed. Soon young Anakin and the young queen develop a strong bond, and you already know where that is going to go. Once repairs are complete the gang heads for the capital of The Republic, Coruscant. Once there they plead with their Senator Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid, Restoration) who seems eager to help, but also seems to be driven by exterior motives. It is here that we run into Yoda (Frank Oz, Blues Brothers 2000) and a new Jedi, Mace Windu (Samuel L. Jackson, The Negotiator) who are both leery of young Anakin. Then the rest of the film is a bunch of battles and political intrigue as The Republic begins its transformation into the empire it will become, plus we are introduced to R2-D2 (Kenny Baker) and C3PO (Anthony Daniels). George Lucas was back at the helm this time directing this episode after skipping the previous two episodes. And as always, he wrote the film himself. Frankly, he probably should have had someone else direct, as he was probably to close to the material to have an objective eye towards it. Yes, I am saying George Lucas should not have directed this Star Wars. And yes, I am saying that Episode I is not as good as the first three installments. That said, it is still a decent movie and garners seven couches out of ten on the About-Movies.com scale. Goodbye.
Last updated: Thursday, March 20, 2008 02:45:36 AM Click Here to get back into frames.
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