Star Wars: Episode VII: The Nerd Rage Awakens

[Corran Horn]

I've seen that doc many times When did he say that?

You know, I listened to it (it's on youtube) at work the other day and I didn't hear it. It's not in the Episode II one either. I figure he either said it in the commentary for I or II or I just imagined it.

It's all good.
It's interesting how worried Lucas, McCullum, and Burtt seem as they start screening the rough cuts of Episode One.

I thought the Anakin casting process was even more striking. We see three kids - in my opinion one is clearly better than Lloyd. Someone event says, after GL picks Lloyd, 'well, some people audition well' in regards to the kid who I thought did a really good job. It seems like everybody just goes along with what GL thinks about the casting.

 

[Mr Light]

I remember in the docu Lucas flat out says Lloyd wasn't the best actor of the bunch, but he was the most consistent, which was what he was interested in. The others started out great but quickly got bored/disinterested as the session went on.

 

[DWF]

Jake Lloyd was probably the most experienced one of the candidats. I rather liked his version of the young Angelo on The Pretender. But he did grow before the reshoots of TMP, in the blood testing scene he's a few inches taller than he used to be.

 

[cooleddie74]

And just before he was cast in Episode I he'd starred alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger in Jingle All the Way, so George probably knew that Jake would be more recognizable to both American and international film audiences in addition to having more experience.

 

[Corran Horn]

I remember in the docu Lucas flat out says Lloyd wasn't the best actor of the bunch, but he was the most consistent, which was what he was interested in. The others started out great but quickly got bored/disinterested as the session went on.

He seems to say Lloyd is more unpredictable while the one I thought did better just 'hits all the beats' as someone says.

Still, interesting to watch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=da8s9m4zEpo#t=4m30s

 

[fireproof78]

You know, I listened to it (it's on youtube) at work the other day and I didn't hear it. It's not in the Episode II one either. I figure he either said it in the commentary for I or II or I just imagined it.

It's all good.
It's interesting how worried Lucas, McCullum, and Burtt seem as they start screening the rough cuts of Episode One.

I thought the Anakin casting process was even more striking. We see three kids - in my opinion one is clearly better than Lloyd. Someone event says, after GL picks Lloyd, 'well, some people audition well' in regards to the kid who I thought did a really good job. It seems like everybody just goes along with what GL thinks about the casting.

Which seems to sum up how the movie production would go. Everyone became a "yes man" to GL, and that isn't always a good thing in terms of movie making.

I don't think Lloyd delivered a horrible performance but just kind of generic. It was not remarkable in a way that make Anakin stand out as an exceptional person.

I think the same thing could be kind of said about Hayden. It isn't that he is a terrible actor, but that he isn't a remarkable one either. I know GL's direction is not great, given the rest of the performances but Hayden has the dubious struggle of being a messianic figure who is still a teenager. Not exactly an easy role.

 

[theenglish]

TPM is actually the most well paced and fun movie in the prequels. It would have worked a lot better with an adolescent Anakin though--somebody closer in age to Padme and an actor who could have been the same for the next two movies.

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

I disagree. It's hard to watch page after page after page of dialogue about the risks of podracing play out on screen.

I think AotC is closer than you think to nailing the pace.. it doesn't hit the mark, and it's a crime that there is very little action just talking for over an hour.. and the romance scenes do drag it down even further, but consider: there is a different story to be told there, as Obi-Wan is almost a gumshoe trying to get to something and his scenes move with real purpose. It comes close to being well-paced, because he actually discovers shit around every corner.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I'm glad we got to see as much of Shmi was we did. I thought Pernilla August was pretty much great in everything she did with Shmi.

 

[fireproof78]

I disagree. It's hard to watch page after page after page of dialogue about the risks of podracing play out on screen.

I think AotC is closer than you think to nailing the pace.. it doesn't hit the mark, and it's a crime that there is very little action just talking for over an hour.. and the romance scenes do drag it down even further, but consider: there is a different story to be told there, as Obi-Wan is almost a gumshoe trying to get to something and his scenes move with real purpose. It comes close to being well-paced, because he actually discovers shit around every corner.

I'm inclined towards this position as well, and don't even mind the romantic dialogue that much. TPM never struck me as very Star Wars-y, if that's even a term, as far as the general feel and mood of the film. I think it is well paced as a film (save for the pod race) but overall, it lacks something for me to feel like Star Wars.

AotC, on the other hand, feels more like Star Wars, the dialogue is more interesting, and I love the sequence on Kamino. Generally speaking, if Obi-Wan is on screen in this film, its pretty interesting.

I'm not saying TPM isn't fun, but I find it wanting on a story level.

 

[cooleddie74]

I'm glad we got to see as much of Shmi was we did. I thought Pernilla August was pretty much great in everything she did with Shmi.

Agreed. Along with Ian McDiarmid and Ewan McGregor she was one of the best actors in the entire Prequel Trilogy even though she was given so very little to do before they killed her character off. It's practically impossible not to feel sympathy for and like Shmi Skywalker.

 

[Ithekro]

When we got our first ideas about Anakin Skywalker from Obi-wan back when he talks to Luke, I had expected Anakin to be older than he was. Roughly Luke's age, perhaps a year or two younger. I wasn't thinking 9 year old racer kid. I was thinking barn stormer teen at best. I also expected Old Ben to have been a little more arrogant in his training of Anakin ("I thought I could teach him just as well as Yoda"). So it was a little jaring to have Anakin be so young at first. But the ending pulled it off a litllw bit...also that breathing at the end of the credits (that foreshadowning).

Obi-wan rarely seems arrogant. Perhaps overconfident. Anakin is arrogant. After the Clone Wars cartoons, most of what Obi-wan says about himself in teaching Anakin fits Anakin teaching Ashoka.

 

[Mr Light]

I'm a total Prequel Apologist and I actually like TPM (aside from Jar Jar). I think a lot of it is just seeing a new Star Wars movie for the first time in 16 years. And seeing actual Jedi in action for the first time ever. And Darth Maul. And Qui-Gon. And the Podrace. And the Duel of the Fates. There's so many great sequences to make up for the weaknesses.

I will agree there isn't a sense of urgency to the movie, though. A single planet we don't care about was peacefully invaded. We don't see anybody dying or in mortal danger. The Queen gets away and could just chill on Coruscant to the end of her days and nobody would be in danger. They're wandering around Tatooine because they need an engine. Then they're wandering around Coruscant trying to get a bill passed. It's a little lethargic until the third act.

AOTC, aside from the awful romance scenes, is an amazing movie! The Speeder Chase. The Asteroid Field chase. Obi-Wan playing it cool on Kamino. Obi-Wan vs. Jango. Every second on Geonosis. Hundreds of Jedi in action. That amazing army battle. Yoda vs Dooku.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I will agree there isn't a sense of urgency to the movie, though. A single planet we don't care about was peacefully invaded. We don't see anybody dying or in mortal danger. The Queen gets away and could just chill on Coruscant to the end of her days and nobody would be in danger. They're wandering around Tatooine because they need an engine. Then they're wandering around Coruscant trying to get a bill passed. It's a little lethargic until the third act.

Uh-uh. How peaceful the invasion was and what sort of danger people were in depends upon whether you believe that people were really dying in concentration camps. Padmé believed that they were, though, which is good enough for me. Although it would have undoubtedly sucked some of the spirit of light-hearted adventure out of the film, the narrative probably would have benefited from showing us one of the camps and a mass grave, even if only in holo-images that had been smuggled or beamed off the planet by spies loyal to the queen.

 

[Mr Light]

I know Padme says "our people are dying! we must do something quickly!" but do we see the droids killing anyone in the first half of the movie? (aside from Padme escaping orbit) It's been awhile I don't remember.

 

[cooleddie74]

^
I'm assuming the droid executions were done off-screen. You can't occupy a planet like that without having to shoot some of the natives to send the message or subdue pockets of resistance, plus we did see Gungans fall in battle near the end of the film so the Trade Federation did rack up a kill count on Naboo. This was a PG film aimed at all ages and with a significant focus on younger viewers, though, so Lucas wasn't about to make it too violent, at least the sequences we saw on-screen.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

You don't mention putting people into camps in this sort of context without it being implied that people who would have otherwise lived are going to die in them under harsh conditions. What, you think the droids mean summer camp?

 

[cooleddie74]

And doesn't Nute Gunray at one point mention starvation as part of the punishment for the Naboo if they resist the Trade Federation? That implies withholding food which in and of itself is just as brutal an act by an occupying army as direct execution. The Trade Federation army meant business whether we saw them mow down a bunch of innocent citizens or not.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

And doesn't Nute Gunray at one point mention starvation as part of the punishment for the Naboo if they resist the Trade Federation? That implies withholding food which in and of itself is just as brutal an act by an occupying army as direct execution. The Trade Federation army meant business whether we saw them mow down a bunch of innocent citizens or not.

He says that the people are starving, and since it's in the context of trying to get Governor Bibble to get the people to stop resisting, I think it's implied strongly enough that they are starving because the Trade Federation is punishing the people for resisting and that the threat of continued starvation is being used as leverage.

Part of the story depends upon there being no proof of what the Trade Federation is doing, so on those grounds I might have to walk back my recommendation just above that perhaps the story could have benefited from the Queen having tangible evidence of what the Federation was up to, such as holo-images she could show to the Senate.

 

[cooleddie74]

Lucas obviously intended the droid army to be a brutal occupation force that inflicted unjust and inhumane treatment on the Naboo, so the absence of a lot of visible bloodshed and carnage doesn't really affect the movie too much. As I mentioned earlier, it was a PG film designed for audiences of all ages with a heavy skew towards kids (hence the design and presence of Jar Jar) so neither Lucas nor 20th Century Fox were going to release a Star Wars movie with a lot of (up-close and obvious) killing in it. Star Wars movies just don't do that, and even the genocidal obliteration of Alderaan was done from a distance and we never saw the individual victims.