Category: Culture

Anti-spoilers (revelations that something does not happen in a movie, show, or book) can not only help folks who haven’t seen/read it yet from getting their hopes up. They can also help them not to needlessly worry about what the fear the work might contain.

You may have read press accounts that try to interpret Star Wars Episode III as an anti-American parable of some kind.

Don’t worry ’bout that.

This story was apparently set off following the debut of the film at Cannes, France.

Now the thing about France is, they just loooove America over there. So much so that they want to be a "counterweight" for us.

They love our President even more.

They’re so pro-American and pro-Bush that they’re obsessed with them, so any time they see anything in the movies that can plausibly be interpreted as being a symbol of America or Bush, that’s how they interpret it.

Their affection for us is touching.

That’s what’s going on here. T’ain’t nuthin’ to it.

I feel a bit sorry for the folks over yonder who are so caught up in Bushmania that they lept to this interpretation. It reveals that they don’t know their own history–European history–which is what Lucas is really playing off of.

Ever since Episode IV originally came out, Lucas has been playing off the history of ancient Rome. Y’know how in Episode IV Grand Moff Tarkin (sounds like Tarquin–an important name in Roman history) announces that "the Emperor has dissolved the Imperial Senate–permanently–sweeping away the last vestiges of the Old Republic."

That’s straight outta Roman history. Any time you get an Emperor, and Empire, a Senate, and a Republic being supplanted by an Empire, you’ve got an allusion to Roman history.

In fact, the term "Emperor" comes from the reign of Augustus Caesar. In Latin the word for "Emperor" (Imperator) was voted a title to Augustus (nee Octavian) as a substitute for the term "king," for Romans were very proud of the fact that they didn’t have a king. They could have one in reality–as long as they didn’t call him a king–so they called him an Imperator. Their subjects, some of whom shouted "We have no king but Caesar!" a few years later–were not fooled by the different in terms.

The term "empire" also comes from this.

The "Senate," of course, was the body that ruled Rome and voted folks titles like "Emperor."

And the "Republic" was what Rome became once they kicked out their last king (Tarquin the Proud). The term is Latin for res publica or "public thing"–a reference to the political order or "public thing" of Rome.

Now, the Roman Republic proved not to be stable. With time it became corrupt, with ineffective leadership.

Eventually a guy named Julius Caesar showed up and decided to provide strong, decisive leadership, even if it meant backstabbing his colleagues on his way to absolute power. This led to . . . civil war (dum! dum! dum!) . . . and to avoid perpetetual civil war, the Senate voted Caesar progressively more dictatorial powers until he became "dictator for life."

His successor, Octavian (later Augustus), became the first Emperor and continued with dictatorial powers lest civil war break out again.

Any of this sound familiar?

Yeah! It sounds just like what we’ve been watching (in an altered form) in Episodes I-III.

Palpatine’s rise from Senator to Chancellor in Episode I mirrors Julius Caesar’s rise. The Roman Civil Wars that led to Julius being voted dictatorial powers are mirrored in the Clone Wars. And Palpatine’s creation as Emperor mirrors the voting of the title to Augustus. (Oh yeah, and <SPOILER SWIPE>there was an assassination of Julius in this time, mirroring the attempted assassination of Palpatine</SPOILER SWIPE>.)

Rome, not contemporary American politics, is the central organizing framework for what Lucas is doing.

That’s not to say that there’s no reference to American history in there. In Episode II the separatist movement is modelled on the Confederacy. It’s even called "the Confederacy of Independent Systems" (also an allusion to the Commonwealth of Independent States that used to be the Soviet Union) in the script.

As to allusions to more recent American history, there ain’t many. Maybe an individual line of dialogue here or there, but that’s it.

When episode I came out in 1999, Clinton was still on the throne and the Monica Lewinsky Scandal was still big news, and I couldn’t help thinking that Palpatine’s line that Chancellor Finis Valorum (Latin = "Last of the Valiant") was a good man brought low by scandal derived from "baseless allegations" had an echo of Lucas’ views of the Clinton-Lewinsky mess, but I couldn’t prove it in court.

The timing of this also puts the lie to the anti-Bush interpretation. The "corrupt Senate > civil war  > empire" stoyr was overtly set up in Episode I, which came out in 1999 and was written at least 3 years earlier than that. Waaaay before 9/11 and the events that followed.

Episode II came out in 2002 (and was written no later than about 1999), making it too early for the manufactured Clone Wars to be an allusion to the Iraq War, which happened in 2003 (and it would be silly to suppose that they were an allusion to the toppline of the Taliban).

So when Episode III comes out and we see the endgame of the scenario played out on screen, it just ain’t based on contemporary American history. It’s Roman history redux.

The single line of dialogue that could plausibly be read as a riff on contemporary American politics is Anakin’s line at the end of the film about "If you’re not with me, you’re my enemy." That maybe, kinda, coulda be interpreted as a riff on Bush’s line post-9/11 (or on Jesus Christ’s pre-9/11 line), but you couldn’t prove either one of these in court.

In any event, it’s too slim a basis on which to interpret Episode III as some kind of anti-American parable, no matter how awitter our French friends may be.

(And yes, Obi-Wan’s reply about only Sith dealing in absolutes is stupid; the Jedi clearly have absolutes. This is why Lucas really needs a good script doctor. It would be so easy to fix that line. Even "Only a Sith deals with that kind of absolutes" would do it.)

So yeah, Lucas is a Lib, but he’s not doing any kind of serious anti-Bush or anti-America riff here.

In fact, press reports report:

Lucas said he wrote Portman’s line ]about liberty dying to thunderous applause] and the screenplay’s other
politically pointed elements [like Anakin’s with me or agin’ me line] before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist
attacks and the subsequent war on terror.

Lucas’ yes-man Rick McCallum also is quoted as saying:

"First of all, we never thought of Bush ever becoming president," "Star
Wars" producer Rick McCallum said, "or then 9/11, the Patriot Act, war,
weapons of mass destruction. Then suddenly you realize, ‘Oh, my God,
there’s something happening that looks like we’re almost prescient.’
And then we thought, ‘Well, yeah, but he’ll never make it to the second
term, so we’ll look like we just made some wacky political parody of a
guy that everybody’s forgotten.’ "

GO FIG.

NOTE: THE BELOW WILL ALSO BE A SPOILER-FRIENDLY COMBOX. IF YOU WANT TO AVOID SPOILERS, USE THE SPOILER-FREE COMBOX DOWN YONDER.

A spoiler, for those who may not be familiar with the term, is a revelation about something that happens in a work of fiction (a book, movie, TV show, etc.) that might spoil the story for someone who hasn’t seen it.

Minor revelations (e.g., Obi-Wan rides a Giant Battle Iguana-Chicken What Goes "Awp! Awp!" in a few scenes) are not spoilers, but more significant revelations (e.g., "No, Luke . . . I am your father!") are.

Lemme suggest a new concept, though: The Anti-Spoiler.

An anti-spoiler is a revelation that something does not occur in a work of fiction. Anti-spoilers can be useful in that they can help folks who haven’t seen/read the work not get their hopes up for something particular to happen that they may be imagining.

With that in mind, lemme give you an anti-spoiler about Episode III, though I’ll put it in a spoiler swipe in case you really don’t want to know it even though it’s something that doesn’t happen in the film. Select the text to see the anti-spoiler:

<SWIPE>Annakin does not fall into lava in the movie. Don’t go into the film with your heart set on seeing Hayden Christiansen falling into lava and screaming with pain–as tempting as that image may be as retribution for his acting in Episode II.</SWIPE>

Now, in case you read the anti-spoiler and need a little context to understand it given what you have probably seen in the previews for the movie, here’s a minor, minor spoiler (given that it’s all over the previews and mentioned in countless reviews) to help give you the context you may need:

<SWIPE>Annakin’s final confrontation with Obi-Wan does occur in a lava-infested environment which is very dangerous and dramatic. He just doesn’t fall into the lava. Heat from the lava does play a role in what happens, though.</SWIPE>

Hope those are helpful if you haven’t seen the movie! Didn’t want you thinking they were going to do something that they don’t, in fact, do.

Now,

BELOW IS A COMBOX FOR THOSE WHO HAVE SEEN THE MOVIE (OR WHO DON’T CARE ABOUT SPOILERS). IT’S A SPOILER-FRIENDLY ZONE! HAVE AT IT!

Just got back from seeing Episode III.

It’s clearly the best of the prequel trilogy–by a longshot.

What surprised me most about it is that, despite its listed running time of 146 minutes, the movie itself is only 26 minutes long, after you sit through two hours of previews. Doesn’t take Annakin harly any time to fall at all. Hope they don’t put all the previews on the DVD to fill up space.

Okay, I’m kidding about that of course. They won’t put the previews on the DVD.

And the movie also is really 146 minutes long, it just feels like you sit through two hours of previews first.

Episode III is, as I said, the best of the prequel trilogy. It succeeds in the chief tasks it sets for itself, which are considerable.

First and foremost, it has to find a convincing way to make Annakin turn to the Dark Side–something a lot more convincing than the "temptation" Luke gets put through in Episode VI. Ranting about the "true nature" and "power" of the Dark Side ain’t gonna do it. There has to be something more than that to make a convincing turn from good to evil.

The trick is harder than you’d think because of the extreme nature of the turn that has to be made. It’s not like getting somebody to cheat on his taxes. They’ve got to take Annakin Skywalker from being a little resentful to being a full-blown, black-wearin’, helmet-sportin’, Jedi-killin’, voice-raspin’ Supervillain.

What makes that so hard?

Well, people who are supervillains generally don’t believe that. Like everybody else, they like to think of themselves and what they are doing as good, and it’s hard to make Darth Vader-level evil look good.

The film thus has the challenge of taking us far enough into Annakin’s perspective to make what he’s doing seem intelligible, but not so far into it that we end up believing that the Jedi are evil and need to be wiped out.

The movie succeeds far, far better than I thought.

In fact, in some ways it succeeds a little too well, though there’ll be time to talk about that on another occasion, once folks have had a chance to see the movie.

I think there are flaws, though. Up to the point that Annakin actually turns to the Dark Side the movie is firing on all cylinders. Just after this, though, there is a scene in which Annakin formalizes his commitment to the Dark Side that I don’t think works as well. And then Annakin goes and does something so evil that, frankly, I could have done without it. It exceeds the bounds of what is believable in terms of sane human motivation and one can only be explained upon some kind of Dark Side mental compulsion that ain’t spelled out explicitly in the movie.

I would have handled things a little differently. Lucas has Annakin’s initial conversion to the Dark Side (which is quite intelligible) occur earlier than his final descent into total, irrational supervillainry, and I would have had the descent bridging the two be more even and gradual than what the film gives us.

Despite this, the movie does achieve its primary goal: Getting Annakin to break with the Light Side and embrace the Dark Side believably.

The movie also achieves its secondary objective, which is tying up the significant loose ends: How do Luke and Leia get born? How are they separated? How do the Jedi fall? What’s the sequence of events leading Yoda an Obi-Wan to go into exile? Why does the Emperor look so icky in the original trilogy? What’s with the "becoming one with the Force" bit? What is the confusing prophecy of "Bringing balance to the Force" supposed to mean in practical terms? Why doesn’t C-3P0 remember any of this? And most importantly: How Does Darth Get Physically Transformed Into A Half-Machine Icon Of Darkness And Why Doesn’t He Know About Luke And Leia?

The answers to some of these are obvious, but we still need to see them happen. Others are things fans have speculated on for years. The film manages to achieve these quite well, though at the price of introducing one notable departure from established continuity (something mentioned in a scene in Episode VI).

I’m prepared to accept the departure from continuity, though, as I think it serves the overall plot and makes the story of Episode III more believable. If Lucas hadn’t departed from continuity on this one point, it would have been harder to pull off the ending of the film.

The film’s third goal–like always–is to dazzle us with action, and it does that, though I’m probably not the best person to describe action scenes as my focus is more on plot and character.

It’s final major goal–also as always–is to be visually stunning, and it certainly is that. People are right when they say that this movie is more visually stunning than any previous Star Wars film. Not in every scene, mind you, but overall, it is. We get a raft of new visually dymanic worlds to look at–some (unfortunately) seen only in passing during the fall of the Jedi.

A favorite of mine are some scenes in which Obi-Wan is mounted on a Giant Battle Iguana-Chicken What Goes "Awp! Awp!" (It’s better than it sounds.)

We also get to (briefly) see the Wookies in action in their home environment, which can only call-up regrets about what Episode VI should have shown us. (Lucas originally planned for the forrest moon of Endor to be inhabited by Wookiees, but changed his mind, cut them in half, made them more teddy-bear like, and called them Ewoks–Wook-iee —-> Eee-wok, Get It?)

The acting has also improved, though it’s still poor. Ewan McGregor kicks butt as Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Yoda is okay. Samuel L. Jackson still comes off as flat to me, but Hayden Christiansen’s acting has literally doubled in quality since Episode II. Unfortunately, since his acting score last time was only 2.0 out of 10.0 possible, he’s still only up to 4.0 out of 10.0.

There are other things about the film that I’d nitpick, but there will be time for that later after folks have seen it, and these don’t fundamentally distract from the fact that this is without a doubt the best of the prequel trilogy.

I need to see it a second time before I try to compare it to the films of the first trilogy (though I strongly suspect I’ll conclude that it’s better than Episode VI, which is infested with teddy bears and lame attempts at conversion to the Dark Side, among other things).

NOTE: I know folks are likely to want to talk about this film, but since many have not seen it yet, please keep the combox for this post a SPOILER FREE ZONE. Comments with spoilers will be DELETED. I’ll create another post with a combox for spoiler-laden discussion for those who have already seen the film.

Just got back from seeing Episode III.

It’s clearly the best of the prequel trilogy–by a longshot.

What surprised me most about it is that, despite its listed running time of 146 minutes, the movie itself is only 26 minutes long, after you sit through two hours of previews. Doesn’t take Annakin harly any time to fall at all. Hope they don’t put all the previews on the DVD to fill up space.

Okay, I’m kidding about that of course. They won’t put the previews on the DVD.

And the movie also is really 146 minutes long, it just feels like you sit through two hours of previews first.

Episode III is, as I said, the best of the prequel trilogy. It succeeds in the chief tasks it sets for itself, which are considerable.

First and foremost, it has to find a convincing way to make Annakin turn to the Dark Side–something a lot more convincing than the "temptation" Luke gets put through in Episode VI. Ranting about the "true nature" and "power" of the Dark Side ain’t gonna do it. There has to be something more than that to make a convincing turn from good to evil.

The trick is harder than you’d think because of the extreme nature of the turn that has to be made. It’s not like getting somebody to cheat on his taxes. They’ve got to take Annakin Skywalker from being a little resentful to being a full-blown, black-wearin’, helmet-sportin’, Jedi-killin’, voice-raspin’ Supervillain.

What makes that so hard?

Well, people who are supervillains generally don’t believe that. Like everybody else, they like to think of themselves and what they are doing as good, and it’s hard to make Darth Vader-level evil look good.

The film thus has the challenge of taking us far enough into Annakin’s perspective to make what he’s doing seem intelligible, but not so far into it that we end up believing that the Jedi are evil and need to be wiped out.

The movie succeeds far, far better than I thought.

In fact, in some ways it succeeds a little too well, though there’ll be time to talk about that on another occasion, once folks have had a chance to see the movie.

I think there are flaws, though. Up to the point that Annakin actually turns to the Dark Side the movie is firing on all cylinders. Just after this, though, there is a scene in which Annakin formalizes his commitment to the Dark Side that I don’t think works as well. And then Annakin goes and does something so evil that, frankly, I could have done without it. It exceeds the bounds of what is believable in terms of sane human motivation and one can only be explained upon some kind of Dark Side mental compulsion that ain’t spelled out explicitly in the movie.

I would have handled things a little differently. Lucas has Annakin’s initial conversion to the Dark Side (which is quite intelligible) occur earlier than his final descent into total, irrational supervillainry, and I would have had the descent bridging the two be more even and gradual than what the film gives us.

Despite this, the movie does achieve its primary goal: Getting Annakin to break with the Light Side and embrace the Dark Side believably.

The movie also achieves its secondary objective, which is tying up the significant loose ends: How do Luke and Leia get born? How are they separated? How do the Jedi fall? What’s the sequence of events leading Yoda an Obi-Wan to go into exile? Why does the Emperor look so icky in the original trilogy? What’s with the "becoming one with the Force" bit? What is the confusing prophecy of "Bringing balance to the Force" supposed to mean in practical terms? Why doesn’t C-3P0 remember any of this? And most importantly: How Does Darth Get Physically Transformed Into A Half-Machine Icon Of Darkness And Why Doesn’t He Know About Luke And Leia?

The answers to some of these are obvious, but we still need to see them happen. Others are things fans have speculated on for years. The film manages to achieve these quite well, though at the price of introducing one notable departure from established continuity (something mentioned in a scene in Episode VI).

I’m prepared to accept the departure from continuity, though, as I think it serves the overall plot and makes the story of Episode III more believable. If Lucas hadn’t departed from continuity on this one point, it would have been harder to pull off the ending of the film.

The film’s third goal–like always–is to dazzle us with action, and it does that, though I’m probably not the best person to describe action scenes as my focus is more on plot and character.

It’s final major goal–also as always–is to be visually stunning, and it certainly is that. People are right when they say that this movie is more visually stunning than any previous Star Wars film. Not in every scene, mind you, but overall, it is. We get a raft of new visually dymanic worlds to look at–some (unfortunately) seen only in passing during the fall of the Jedi.

A favorite of mine are some scenes in which Obi-Wan is mounted on a Giant Battle Iguana-Chicken What Goes "Awp! Awp!" (It’s better than it sounds.)

We also get to (briefly) see the Wookies in action in their home environment, which can only call-up regrets about what Episode VI should have shown us. (Lucas originally planned for the forrest moon of Endor to be inhabited by Wookiees, but changed his mind, cut them in half, made them more teddy-bear like, and called them Ewoks–Wook-iee —-> Eee-wok, Get It?)

The acting has also improved, though it’s still poor. Ewan McGregor kicks butt as Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Yoda is okay. Samuel L. Jackson still comes off as flat to me, but Hayden Christiansen’s acting has literally doubled in quality since Episode II. Unfortunately, since his acting score last time was only 2.0 out of 10.0 possible, he’s still only up to 4.0 out of 10.0.

There are other things about the film that I’d nitpick, but there will be time for that later after folks have seen it, and these don’t fundamentally distract from the fact that this is without a doubt the best of the prequel trilogy.

I need to see it a second time before I try to compare it to the films of the first trilogy (though I strongly suspect I’ll conclude that it’s better than Episode VI, which is infested with teddy bears and lame attempts at conversion to the Dark Side, among other things).

NOTE: I know folks are likely to want to talk about this film, but since many have not seen it yet, please keep the combox for this post a SPOILER FREE ZONE. Comments with spoilers will be DELETED. I’ll create another post with a combox for spoiler-laden discussion for those who have already seen the film.