Post by Heineken Skywalker on Mar 16, 2006 0:23:51 GMT -5
Director: Richard Marquand
SPOILERS!
Randal Graves: Which did you like better? "Jedi" or "The Empire Strikes Back"?
Dante Hicks: "Empire".
Randal Graves: Blasphemy!
Dante Hicks: "Empire" had the better ending. I mean, Luke gets his hand cut off, finds out Vader's his father, Han gets frozen and taken away by Boba Fett. It ends on such a down note. I mean, that's what life is, a series of down endings. All "Jedi" had was a bunch of Muppets.
I have to say that when this exchange occured in Kevin Smith's "CLERKS", back in '94, I laughed quite hard. Not just because it's funny, but because for years, I had been saying pretty much the same thing. To the point that my nickname for RETURN OF THE JEDI was, and still is, THE MUPPET MOVIE. Not in a "I hate that movie" kind of way. It was more like a term of endearment.
There really are so many characters that seem to be either some sort of puppet, or people in rubbery or furry types of costumes in JEDI, that it really did seem like George Lucas had handed over the reigns of the movie to Jim Henson & Frank Oz. Jabba the Hutt, Salacious Crumb (Jabba's little laughing pet monkey-thing), the band in Jabba's court, the Rancor (the giant creature in the pit), the pig guards, various other Jabba henchmen, Yoda, the Ewoks. See? That's a whole lot of Muppet-like characters in this movie.
So, anyway, 3 looong years after THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK first premiered, we finally got the next and final chapter in the STAR WARS trilogy.
If you recall, when we last left our heroes, Han Solo (Harrison Ford) and Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher) had become an item, just before Han was frozen in carbonite and taken away by bounty hunter, Boba Fett. And Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) had been defeated in a lightsaber duel with Darth Vader (David Prowse) and found out he had some serious "daddy issues".
There are three main villains in this movie. Darth Vader, Emperor Palpatine & Jabba the Hutt.
Up until now, Jabba had been mentioned a few times, but never seen on screen, (this review is pre-Special Edition, folks.) and when we do finally see him, it's quite shocking and probably not what anybody expected. He's a humongous slug-like creature, with bulbous eyes, a wide toothless mouth, two short arms, no legs and a tail. Even though he's a pretty vile character, Jabba is a pimpin' bad guy. His henchmen fall over themselves to serve him, he has a live band that performs nightly, and there are scantily clad women dancing around. If I was gonna be a vile gangster type, that's pretty much the set-up I'd have too.
The first quarter of the movie is essentially everybody trying, and failing miserably, to rescue Han from Jabba. First, loyal droids, C-3PO (Anthony Daniels) and R2-D2 (Kenny Baker) show up at Jabba's palace and are quickly detained and turned into a translator and a bartender, respectively. Then Leia, disguised as a bounty hunter with Chewbacca as her prisoner, shows up, and the two of them are captured. We find out that Lando Calrissian (Billy Dee Williams) was already there disguised as one of Jabba's underlings. Finally Luke shows up, cool, confident, all dressed in black, and just when he's about to lay the smackdown on everybody, he too is captured.
Jabba's had enough of the whole lot and decides to take them all into the desert and sacrifice them to the Sarlacc, a creature in the sand, that will eat them, then digest them for a thousand years.
Just when the audience is about to freak out over the eminent deaths of our heroes, it turns out Luke had a "Plan B" and saves the day. Boba Fett goes out like a punk and Jabba and many of his men go, "BOOM!".
Meanwhile, the evil Empire, led by Vader and the Emperor (Ian McDiarmid), are building a larger, more powerful Death Star than the one the rebels blew up in EPISODE IV.
The plan is to try to destroy the rebels and to try to sway Luke to the Dark Side of The Force.
After a grand entrance and first scene, Vader, seems a lot less sure of himself in this film than in the previous ones. While in the last one, he had no qualms about Force-choking any officer who screwed up, here you can tell the idea of having a kid has softened him. Plus, he's pretty much playing second-banana to the Emperor.
The Emperor on the other hand is a truly evil villain. He's a wrinkled, shriveled-up, cackling old man with yellow eyes and rotting teeth. Even when he's just sitting or walking, the guy just oozes evil.
Luke goes back to Dagobah, where Yoda confirms that Vader is indeed his father. While there, Luke also finds out from the Ghost of Jedi Past, er, Obi-Wan (Alec Guinness), that Luke has a twin sister. Seeing as how there's only one possible candidate in these movies, it's not too difficult for him, or us, to figure out that it's Leia.
Wait a minute! That means that his sister rammed her tongue in his mouth in EMPIRE!! (BARF!)
Ahem, anyway.
The rebels need to send a strike team down to a forest planet to blow up a power generator so they can then attack the new Death Star.
While there, Leia and the gang encounter a tribe of small, furry, bear-like creatures called Ewoks.
The one that Leia first befriends is named Wicket and he's played by little person, Warwick Davis. Warwick has gone on to lots of film success appearing in such movies as the title characters in both WILLOW, and LEPRECHAUN and it's sequels, as well as supporting roles in RAY and the HARRY POTTER franchise. Ironically, Mark Hamill & Carrie Fisher? Hmm... not so much.
Wouldn't be a STAR WARS movie without a lightsaber duel and this movie's got a good one. Vader and Luke have a rematch, only this time, Luke gets the upperhand. Told you Vader was going soft.
When Luke refuses to side with the Emperor against his father, Palpatine turns his wrath on the kid. Vader steps in, rescues Junior and destroys the Emperor.
Meanwhile, Lando and the other pilots attack and destroy the Death Star and back on the ground, the rebels and Ewoks team-up to kick some Stormtrooper ass. Hooray! The rebels all meet up again where they celebrate with fireworks, music and a party of some kind, I'm pretty sure it was a barbecue. The spirits of Yoda, Obi-Wan and Anakin Skywalker aka Darth Vader, show up to the barbecue unnanounced, but they bring potato salad, so it's okay.
Gotta love a happy ending.
While, A NEW HOPE was fast-paced, high adventure and EMPIRE STRIKES BACK had a darker, more serious tone, JEDI has elements of both, but not as successfully. It has the unenviable task of tieing up all the loose ends, but still try to be entertaining.
There are some great moments like the Speeder Bike chase scene through the forest and the lightsaber duel, and even though I joke about the Muppet stuff, I am a big fan of the scenes with Jabba and company.
I do however think that the movie slows down a bit too much around the time the rebels land on the Ewok planet. There're a lot of "talky" moments, too much just standing around and cutesing it up with the Ewoks and a lot of back and forth with the Imperial troops. We've got the upperhand! Now they've got the upperhand! Now we've got the upperhand again!
Also, by this point in the trilogy, a couple of the actors seem to be a little bored. Han Solo doesn't really have much to do, so you can tell Harrison Ford is more than ready to move on. Being frozen in carbonite must've sapped most of his energy.
Carrie Fisher was pretty much high as a kite for most of this production so you know her mind wasn't really on business, but at least she looked pretty good in a metal bikini.
Thank God, for Ian McDiarmid as the Emperor. For me, the movie really comes to life everytime he's on-screen. Come to think of it, he pretty much did the same thing for EPISODE III. Maybe McDiarmid should be cast in the third movie of every trilogy from now on. Imagine what he could've done for the third parts of THE MATRIX or THE GODFATHER.
While not as good as the first two entries in the trilogy, still a worthy movie and an overall fun time with just a couple of bumps in the road.
8.5/10
SPOILERS!
Randal Graves: Which did you like better? "Jedi" or "The Empire Strikes Back"?
Dante Hicks: "Empire".
Randal Graves: Blasphemy!
Dante Hicks: "Empire" had the better ending. I mean, Luke gets his hand cut off, finds out Vader's his father, Han gets frozen and taken away by Boba Fett. It ends on such a down note. I mean, that's what life is, a series of down endings. All "Jedi" had was a bunch of Muppets.
I have to say that when this exchange occured in Kevin Smith's "CLERKS", back in '94, I laughed quite hard. Not just because it's funny, but because for years, I had been saying pretty much the same thing. To the point that my nickname for RETURN OF THE JEDI was, and still is, THE MUPPET MOVIE. Not in a "I hate that movie" kind of way. It was more like a term of endearment.
There really are so many characters that seem to be either some sort of puppet, or people in rubbery or furry types of costumes in JEDI, that it really did seem like George Lucas had handed over the reigns of the movie to Jim Henson & Frank Oz. Jabba the Hutt, Salacious Crumb (Jabba's little laughing pet monkey-thing), the band in Jabba's court, the Rancor (the giant creature in the pit), the pig guards, various other Jabba henchmen, Yoda, the Ewoks. See? That's a whole lot of Muppet-like characters in this movie.
So, anyway, 3 looong years after THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK first premiered, we finally got the next and final chapter in the STAR WARS trilogy.
If you recall, when we last left our heroes, Han Solo (Harrison Ford) and Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher) had become an item, just before Han was frozen in carbonite and taken away by bounty hunter, Boba Fett. And Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) had been defeated in a lightsaber duel with Darth Vader (David Prowse) and found out he had some serious "daddy issues".
There are three main villains in this movie. Darth Vader, Emperor Palpatine & Jabba the Hutt.
Up until now, Jabba had been mentioned a few times, but never seen on screen, (this review is pre-Special Edition, folks.) and when we do finally see him, it's quite shocking and probably not what anybody expected. He's a humongous slug-like creature, with bulbous eyes, a wide toothless mouth, two short arms, no legs and a tail. Even though he's a pretty vile character, Jabba is a pimpin' bad guy. His henchmen fall over themselves to serve him, he has a live band that performs nightly, and there are scantily clad women dancing around. If I was gonna be a vile gangster type, that's pretty much the set-up I'd have too.
The first quarter of the movie is essentially everybody trying, and failing miserably, to rescue Han from Jabba. First, loyal droids, C-3PO (Anthony Daniels) and R2-D2 (Kenny Baker) show up at Jabba's palace and are quickly detained and turned into a translator and a bartender, respectively. Then Leia, disguised as a bounty hunter with Chewbacca as her prisoner, shows up, and the two of them are captured. We find out that Lando Calrissian (Billy Dee Williams) was already there disguised as one of Jabba's underlings. Finally Luke shows up, cool, confident, all dressed in black, and just when he's about to lay the smackdown on everybody, he too is captured.
Jabba's had enough of the whole lot and decides to take them all into the desert and sacrifice them to the Sarlacc, a creature in the sand, that will eat them, then digest them for a thousand years.
Just when the audience is about to freak out over the eminent deaths of our heroes, it turns out Luke had a "Plan B" and saves the day. Boba Fett goes out like a punk and Jabba and many of his men go, "BOOM!".
Meanwhile, the evil Empire, led by Vader and the Emperor (Ian McDiarmid), are building a larger, more powerful Death Star than the one the rebels blew up in EPISODE IV.
The plan is to try to destroy the rebels and to try to sway Luke to the Dark Side of The Force.
After a grand entrance and first scene, Vader, seems a lot less sure of himself in this film than in the previous ones. While in the last one, he had no qualms about Force-choking any officer who screwed up, here you can tell the idea of having a kid has softened him. Plus, he's pretty much playing second-banana to the Emperor.
The Emperor on the other hand is a truly evil villain. He's a wrinkled, shriveled-up, cackling old man with yellow eyes and rotting teeth. Even when he's just sitting or walking, the guy just oozes evil.
Luke goes back to Dagobah, where Yoda confirms that Vader is indeed his father. While there, Luke also finds out from the Ghost of Jedi Past, er, Obi-Wan (Alec Guinness), that Luke has a twin sister. Seeing as how there's only one possible candidate in these movies, it's not too difficult for him, or us, to figure out that it's Leia.
Wait a minute! That means that his sister rammed her tongue in his mouth in EMPIRE!! (BARF!)
Ahem, anyway.
The rebels need to send a strike team down to a forest planet to blow up a power generator so they can then attack the new Death Star.
While there, Leia and the gang encounter a tribe of small, furry, bear-like creatures called Ewoks.
The one that Leia first befriends is named Wicket and he's played by little person, Warwick Davis. Warwick has gone on to lots of film success appearing in such movies as the title characters in both WILLOW, and LEPRECHAUN and it's sequels, as well as supporting roles in RAY and the HARRY POTTER franchise. Ironically, Mark Hamill & Carrie Fisher? Hmm... not so much.
Wouldn't be a STAR WARS movie without a lightsaber duel and this movie's got a good one. Vader and Luke have a rematch, only this time, Luke gets the upperhand. Told you Vader was going soft.
When Luke refuses to side with the Emperor against his father, Palpatine turns his wrath on the kid. Vader steps in, rescues Junior and destroys the Emperor.
Meanwhile, Lando and the other pilots attack and destroy the Death Star and back on the ground, the rebels and Ewoks team-up to kick some Stormtrooper ass. Hooray! The rebels all meet up again where they celebrate with fireworks, music and a party of some kind, I'm pretty sure it was a barbecue. The spirits of Yoda, Obi-Wan and Anakin Skywalker aka Darth Vader, show up to the barbecue unnanounced, but they bring potato salad, so it's okay.
Gotta love a happy ending.
While, A NEW HOPE was fast-paced, high adventure and EMPIRE STRIKES BACK had a darker, more serious tone, JEDI has elements of both, but not as successfully. It has the unenviable task of tieing up all the loose ends, but still try to be entertaining.
There are some great moments like the Speeder Bike chase scene through the forest and the lightsaber duel, and even though I joke about the Muppet stuff, I am a big fan of the scenes with Jabba and company.
I do however think that the movie slows down a bit too much around the time the rebels land on the Ewok planet. There're a lot of "talky" moments, too much just standing around and cutesing it up with the Ewoks and a lot of back and forth with the Imperial troops. We've got the upperhand! Now they've got the upperhand! Now we've got the upperhand again!
Also, by this point in the trilogy, a couple of the actors seem to be a little bored. Han Solo doesn't really have much to do, so you can tell Harrison Ford is more than ready to move on. Being frozen in carbonite must've sapped most of his energy.
Carrie Fisher was pretty much high as a kite for most of this production so you know her mind wasn't really on business, but at least she looked pretty good in a metal bikini.
Thank God, for Ian McDiarmid as the Emperor. For me, the movie really comes to life everytime he's on-screen. Come to think of it, he pretty much did the same thing for EPISODE III. Maybe McDiarmid should be cast in the third movie of every trilogy from now on. Imagine what he could've done for the third parts of THE MATRIX or THE GODFATHER.
While not as good as the first two entries in the trilogy, still a worthy movie and an overall fun time with just a couple of bumps in the road.
8.5/10
