A Certain Point of View on the Star Wars Prequels – Part III

Can we hope for peace?

“The interesting thing about Star Wars is, and I don’t ever push this very far, there’s a lot going on there that most people haven’t really come to grips with yet. But when they do, they will find it’s a much more intricately made clock than most people would imagine.” – George Lucas

^^That’s in case you think I’m reading too far into these movies. To revisit a point made back in Part I, Lucas knew what he was doing with the Prequels. He knew they were going to be different, he knew a lot of people wouldn’t be onboard, and he knew that they were good enough to make anyway.

So what Lucas wound up creating two seemingly disparate trilogies that, when viewed as a whole, create a densely knit story built on “rhymes”: motifs, dialogue, situations, and visuals that play off each other in a variety of fascinating ways.

More on that in a sec. First I feel like I should address an issue that is ultimately kinda subjective, but enough of a sticking point that I can’t exactly leave it alone. That, of course, would be…

The Acting

Star Wars, by its nature, rarely houses any sort of dramatically realistic performances. This is fast-paced, highly-stylized mythmaking based around a throwback serial format. Taken for what it is, I think the acting typically ranges from adequate to excellent, especially in the case of standouts like Ewan McGregor, Ian McDiarmid, Christopher Lee, and Liam Neeson. Much like some of the seasoned vets from the Originals, they grant a lot of believability and conviction to their assorted characters. But I won’t face a ton of dispute there, I don’t think.

Might show off a bit of the ol’ Lucas visual magic in the photos. Anakin faces away from the light…

It seems to me that when people criticize the acting in these movies, they’re most likely talking about the portrayals of Anakin in TPM and AOTC. This is a boy raised by a stern order of people who discourage the presence and display of powerful emotions. When faced with rage, hatred, or infatuation, he doesn’t know how to handle himself or articulate his feelings. This is exactly how Christensen acts in AOTC. He is awkward, particularly early on before he begins to find his footing. And you’ll notice that the other characters regard his outbursts with irritation (Obi-Wan) or hesitation (Padme). Anakin’s not portrayed as a skilled rhetorician.

At the very least, he’s not wooden. If anything, he’s over-emotional — natural, when you consider that he’s been forced to repress his feelings for the past ten years. And boy, when that guy gets mad, he nails it. Even if I didn’t find his portrayal of Anakin legitimate throughout, the scenes on Mustafar would cover a multitude of sins. The exchanges between him and Obi-Wan before and after the final duel are striking, and for some (me) they’re crushing. Even when I was going through my period of doubt with these movies, “I hate you!” kicked me in the gut.

Speaking of scenes with Anakin dangerously close to fire…

Meanwhile, Jake Lloyd does a fine job laying the groundwork for the character in TPM. While some of his one-word outbursts seem a little forced (“Yippee!”), I think he tends to bring a very believable cadence to the character’s speech. Young children often sound a little unpracticed in speech. Lloyd captures this effectively; I really like the way he delivers lines like, “I’m a person and my name is Anakin,” or “I can help! I can fix anything.” As I mentioned last time, there’s more at work in this kid than simple kindness.

I’ll concede that Natalie Portman has some real weak spots, though I think she’s decent for the better part of the first two movies. In ROTS, next to McGregor and Christensen, she comes up a bit short for me.

But in the end, does it really matter? The acting serves the stories just fine. It’s Star Wars, not Harold Pinter. The Originals are played broadly, too. They have a bit more scruffiness — befitting a tale about people on the society’s fringes — but the acting is only intermittently brilliant (Ford in ESB, Hamill in ROTJ, James Earl Jones always). The Prequels aren’t necessarily acting showcases, but the characters are portrayed with clarity and a surprising amount of nuance from time to time.

The Dialogue

This scene is one of the best in all of Star Wars.

Lucas self-identifies as “…the king of wooden dialogue.” So no, Star Wars dialogue isn’t defined by its dramatic realism either. Frankly, as with the acting, I don’t see what the big deal is. There’s no one way to write dialogue, and declarative melodrama can be as legitimate a choice as any other. Star Wars certainly has a unique cadence, but if you’re willing to accept it there’s a lot to glean from the onscreen dialogue.

What Lucas’s odd style affords him is the ability to be extremely precise. Within the (to me, often endearingly) clunky declarations his characters make is a treasure trove of wordplay and irony to be uncovered. Some choice excerpts:

“No one can kill a Jedi.” — Spoken by a young boy who one day will murder more Jedi than anyone in history.
“I can’t breathe.” — Says the man who will spend half his life in an iron lung.
“I’d much rather dream about Padme.” — Three years before that very thing sends him into madness.
“It’s an honor to finally meet you in person.” — Says the politician to the Queen’s decoy.
“Chancellor Palpatine, Sith Lords are our speciality.” — Said with smug confidence to the disguised Dark Lord of the Sith.
“They’ll do their job well. I guarantee that.” — Obi-Wan never asks what that job ultimately is, but he definitely finds out in ROTS.
“So love has blinded you?” — No… but it will soon.
“There was no danger at all.” — Seconds before an assassination attempt.

The Jedi Order has begun to fade away.

Along these lines, Lucas often illuminates thematic ideas through seemingly disposable moments:
“There’s always a bigger fish.” — Maul’s death is only the beginning.
“Machines building machines! How perverse.” — So then how perverse is the cloning facility?
“I’m programmed for etiquette, not destruction!” — A protocol-turned-battle droid says on the very day that the peacekeeping Jedi begin fighting as generals of a clone army.
“This weapon is your life.” — Obi-Wan asserts in the movie where people are constantly dropping their lightsabers.

Etcetera. You’ll notice that throughout this series, I’ve constantly reinforced my points with lines from all six movies. If one of the qualities of good dialogue is that it clearly and efficiently communicates the story and subtext of a movie, then the dialogue in the Prequels (and the saga as a whole) works like gangbusters, at least on some level.

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28 Comments

  1. I think that you lost me in the last post but after reading this I think that we just have VERY different concepts of what constitutes “good acting”. I’m glad you’ve found a way to enjoy the prequels but it’s a path I (and most people) can’t follow.

  2. Simply saying that there is no one way to write dialogue doesn’t mean that Lucas’ way works. Even the lines you point out are terrible…he has no idea how to do subtle foreshadowing, he hits you over the head with everything. Hey look, we are going to say one thing then the opposite is going to happen. Over and over again. Usually within minutes.

    But forget about foreshadowing, lets turn instead to the second movie. I don’t really understand how anyone can watch the scenes of Padme and Anakin frolicking in the fields without wanting to retch. I can handle sappy romance, when it is done well. This scene makes me yearn for the literary boon of Twilight.

    And yes, Hayden Christensen is acting like someone in turmoil. He just isn’t doing it well. When you watch him, you see someone who is…acting like he is having a tantrum, you never really believe he is a tortured soul. Heck, even Natalie Portman’s performances in these movies is pretty poor, especially when she dies of a broken heart (I’m not even going to get into the fact that the only major female character does nothing but have kids and die in the third movie, or the fact that she dies not heroically, but because she can’t live without her man).

    I’m sorry, I can understand some of your points about the plot and the links to the original trilogy being underrated by some. But if you are defending Lucas’ writing and directing (I blame him for the performances) you are searching too hard for a reason to like the movie. There is a reason he didn’t write or direct Empire and Jedi…these roles were not his strong point.

  3. Star Wars was never about great acting. It wasn’t “high cinema” for lack of a better term. Ewan proved something in that regard by managing to maintain some dignity throughout the prequels. Dignifying the writing for these films is ridiculous, though.

    The love story of Padme and Anakin was not believable. He’s going off about favoring dictatorships, hating his job/boss, and lusting after her (not that her choice of outfits helps) with his childhood crush being the most wholesome relationship element between them. I’m still not sure what she did (aside from look hot, poorly fake running through sand, and have vacuous conversations with Anakin) throughout the prequels besides play along as Palpatine expected.

    Their interaction is painful. The way Anakin’s character flaws/convictions are explained/shown is similarly relying too heavily on how the audience largely knows what to expect. It’s lazy. Anakin’s time as a slave was an opportunity to explain his becoming Darth Vader but Lucas opted to keep TPM kid-friendly. Shmi’s dying at the hands of savages gives us some idea he understands loss and regret but it’s still a far cry from him calling for a dictatorship, committing (on a small scale) genocide, turning on the Jedi, etc. Why were the sand people into taking old women and beating on them anyway? For that matter, what was Anakin so worried about getting some title within the Jedi Order for? He seems awfully perturbed about Obi-Wan holding him back but what’s he going to get from advancement? All we’re led to believe is that he wants Padme but it’s not like he’s going to get permission to wed…

    Shouldn’t a story make some sense? How would these movies stand on their own merits alone? That’s the trouble, isn’t it?

    p.s. – I was spending more time than I wanted to on this above so I sort of lost my organized train of thought at some point, sorry.

  4. I’ve enjoyed these points of view quite a bit. I’ve been a huge fan if Star Wars since I was about 2. (32 now). I enjoyed the hell out of the prequels! Parts bugged me quite a bit, but overall I enjoyed what Lucas created. A lot of game hated them, but I consider myself to be a huge fan who has stuck up for the prequels. Nice to see I’m not the only one…

  5. You have to be just trolling with these articles right? I really can’t believe that you are saying that the prequels are in fact good right?

    To sum up how bad the prequels are and how horrible the story is all you need do is watch the end of ROTS when Padme dies giving birth. She dies not from birthing complication nor from the wounds Anakin inflicts no she dies because “She lost the will to live” seriously she just gave birth to two kids and she has no will to keep on living because she wont have the whiny ass that is Anakin constantly bitching about how he isnt good enough???!?!?!?

    It’s like Lucas took a dump on the script and said yea thats how we’ll end this because even though its the future and you can have cyborg villains the main character will die because she loses the will to live…..

  6. Well, thank god you started this entry with a quote from George Lucas saying George Lucas shameless cash grab was much deeper than we might have thought, or I might not have believed it…

    I think you lose some steam each time you started to fight in favor of something (the dialogue, for instance) only to wrap up the section on an apologist note. That said, it at least makes you seem capable of logic. The other spot I really feel you lost the bubble on your defense of the series, and a large portion of your credibility, was every time you mentioned “Haden Christensen” and “Acting” in the same paragraph. If Lucas really wanted a poor, wooden, 2D character for the role, it’s good casting on his part… but that’s about as far as you can go in defense of Anakin. Portman was a travesty, as we at least know her to be capable of much more.

    I enjoyed the sequals for what they were, but they weren’t much.

  7. Enough with the Star Wars prequels. They have been out for years now, it’s way too late for you to add your extreme minority opinion to everyone else’s.

  8. Well, having read and commented on your three posts about the prequels I think I have identified the reason why you think they are good films.

    It’s because it’s Star Wars.

    That’s the only reason I can see. You like the prequels precisely because they mirror the OT so much. It’s essentially more of the same, with only slight and cosmetic differences that enable us to claim they are “different”. The performance of actors is irrelevant because it’s Star Wars, the style of the story and the justification or lack thereof for character’s motivations and actions is irrelevant because it’s Star Wars. Adding in more of the base triggers that people want like: Lightsaber fights, Sith, large battle scenes etc to try and cover for the lack of direction and storytelling just infuriated fans who felt as though they were being treated like the children Lucas was actually pandering to.

    I will give you one thing. The concept, Palpatine’s secret war where he controlled both sides is really quite good. But it is a good idea poorly executed and terribly presented (in the way the story is communicated to viewers). As I commented on your last post, if you need to view three other films in order to see the magic of the prequels then there’s something wrong with the film you’re sat in front of.

  9. @kasper – You bring up so, so many great points. But just to piggyback on your comments about foreshadowing, since the dialogue portion of the post made me a little crazy: there is a difference between foreshadowing and telegraphing. One hints at a larger development to come, and when done really well, may not even be noticeable in the moment it’s occurring. The other insults the intelligence of the viewer and dashes any hope of suspense, drama, or catharsis when the telegraphed moment hits. I was rolling my eyes all through the prequels. Jesus, George, we get it. I wish he would actually stick to broad strokes, since all his moments of hackneyed “foreshadowing” almost always occurred when he tried to zero in on the characters and their relationship (or lack thereof) to each other.

    That being said, I’ve really enjoyed reading this series. This particular entry did not do anything to convince me, but I did really like the part in the second one pointing out the sort of unholy trinity that is Maul, Dooku, and Grievous, of which Vader can be seen as an amalgamation. I never thought to look at it like that before. And hey—that may even be an example of good foreshadowing! But I just don’t know if I can give Lucas enough credit to believe he did that on purpose.

    1. Now that we’ve all presumably seen The Force Awakens, were you foreshadowing or telegraphing the eventuality that J. J. would later telegraph his plot so much more than Lucas ever could? 😉

  10. Once again I’m glad to see someone who likes the films as well. While I might not look as deeply into the films as some I can still enjoy the series as individuals and as a whole. I also agree with Sara C. about the Maul, Dooku, Grievous angle.

  11. Lucas isn’t the “king of wooden dialogue,” he’s the king of long-winded filler dialogue. that’s why the acting seemed unnatural in the prequels and more genuine in the sequels – when the written dialogue is stripped down and to the point it allows for more emotion and conviction bc the actors are working more with actual feelings than with feelings written down for them in a script.

  12. What color was Obi-Wan’s lightsaber when Vader kills him in New Hope? Blue. You’re giving Lucas too much credit/reading too much into his “method”. And your “rhyming” examples weren’t that at all, they were Lucas’s misguided attempt at tying everything in the 6 movies together to 1. please the fans 2. please himself by having the fans be pleased by him, and that’s why the 3 prequels failed – everything seemed/was forced (no pun intended).

  13. a purple lightsaber means Lucas had to sway Samuel L Jackson to the movie somehow. Jk jk, but really…

    Here’s my biggest beef with the new ones. And let me say, I really want you to address this in a future post. The way they were filmed. Have you ever watched the extras on the DVD for ATOC or ROTS? Every freaking character is standing infront of a blue screen (or green screen). In the director commentary Lucas even remarks he digitally touched up Obi-Wan’s beard in a few shots. WHAT? The digitalization of Star Wars is what killed them. As you have pointed out here the acting, the dialogue, the characters, the symbolism is all the same from original trilogy to the prequels, the difference is in how they look.

    This is why TPM was my favorite of the prequels, it had that classy, old school, SPACE look. Space is mysterious, odd, empty. It is supposed to be limited by the lack of special effects… that’s what made space movies back in the day good. Have you ever seen the new Star Trek? One reason it was so good is that so much of the set is real, not digital. Go look at TESB and the background for Cloud City sets; that an’t digital, it’s a beautiful painting yo that is REAL. It just gives it a quality of being more believable. I think this is such a huge thing people miss when comparing the new and old. There is a reason the old ones were good, the lack of “superior digital quality” gave them a classiness the new ones (especially ATOC and ROTS) do not have. Less than perfect special effects allow the audience to be more forgivable and acceptable of any less than perfect acting. As I said, easily the biggest distinction between the old and new, and in my mind, the straw that breaks the camels back.

  14. Well, clearly someone swallowed the kool aid, but regardless, I thought I’d point something out…

    You mention red, blue and green sabers as if three is some deeper meaning behind them. It’s worth pointing out that Lucas simply liked green and wanted it in the original (ep 4) and even tried to recolor it green in the special edition but it didn’t work out too well. Had it worked, then Anakin’s saber, ultimately lukes, would ALWAYS have been green, under Lucas’ intention. Thereby negating your entire argument.

    More importantly, Yoda has a green saber, yet demonstrates none of the traits you suggest, only a calm arrogance. Every decision he makes is poor and yet his own sense of self clouds his judgement. He sits directly across from the ultimate evil and senses absolutely nothing. More importantly, he has no power or calm or center with the force, instead needing to jump around like a hyper active squirrel monkey to fight, when instead he should have been able to deactivate his opponent’s saber with a wave of his finger, and deflect, rather than moronically try to levitate, the large object about to crush Ben and Anakin.

    It’s easy to cherry pick dialog intended to sound clever or get a laugh and ascribe some deeper totemic meaning behind it, but all most of that dialog was for was laughs, without anything richer beyond. And keep in mind, Lucas did little more than a rough treatement for Empire, considered the best of all the films, and even Star Wars was written more by Kurtz than Lucas, though you’ll never hear Lucas admit ANYONE helped him or had any hand in the work.

    Sorry, but the last three movies spoiled what was brilliant about the original movies. It does make a larger story, but a larger story with no impact, no soul, and one with questionable motives. Vader should have been lying all along. Jedi was a bad movie, and the prequels even worse.

  15. These really are some great points but, again, choosing to interpret a bad film in a way that makes it sound better on paper, in no way changes the experience of actually WATCHING said film. When you put the film in and watch it play out on screen, no amount of reminding yourself of the “hidden brilliance” will change what you’re actually seeing.

  16. ““The interesting thing about Star Wars is, and I don’t ever push this very far, there’s a lot going on there that most people haven’t really come to grips with yet. But when they do, they will find it’s a much more intricately made clock than most people would imagine.” – George Lucas

    ^^That’s in case you think I’m reading too far into these movies.”

    Have you ever heard of begging the question?

    1. When arguing artistic intent, the closest thing there is to empirical evidence is a statement from the artist. It’s no definite proof, but it turns an uncorroborated opinion into a somewhat corroborated one. That’s an admittedly weak position–unless the opposing position is just some other guy’s uncorroborated opinion. And oh–guess what? Yeah. I’m afraid that’s as good as it gets in this case.

      Begging the question would be citing a point of criticism from Red Letter Media, as many do, because accepting their assertion (which is not proven) means that your identical assertion must be true! Suggesting such an assertion has merit because so many people say the same thing is called “appeal to popularity” and so on.

      Ultimately, the vast majority of prequel bashing boils down to an arm-waving “look at this crap, isn’t it just objectively, obviously awful?” That is begging the question in its purest form. And when someone finally answers “no, it isn’t,” then what? That was the whole basis of the argument. Stalemate. Nothing left. So of course the haters resort shouting down any other equally subjective opinion, all aghast with equally insubstantial “but how could you possibly not agree with mine?” or even personal insults. After all, there’s nothing else for it.

      And GOD FORBID anyone should come around with an insightful, logical, reasonably well-supported defense of the prequels. Then we have to counter with “too bad they’re still awful movies (simply because I say they are)” or by feebly attempting to poke little holes in the tiniest, least significant parts of the argument. **ahem**

      I’ve seen these before, and the message in the comments is always “stop defending what I don’t like and let me have my opinion.” But people never stop attacking what others DO like. It’s almost as if they’re terrified of the idea that someone else got a fun movie to enjoy and to add to their childhood memories, when they themselves have grown too old to go back to Neverland for that adventure.

  17. Can’t believe this turned into a 3 part series.
    I commend you only on the fact that you put more effort into defending those aweful movies then George Lucas put into writing them.

  18. Here’s the one truth I’ve found in life. The more you have to defend and\or explain something to the masses to make your case that it is good, the more likely that its complete and total garbage.

    There is no interpretation of what Lucas meant for these movies. There is no…well look at it this way. Its either works or it doesn’t.

    The concept behind episode 1, 2, and 3 is good. The execution was not. The idea that “That’s how kids are growing up” didn’t fly when it came out and sure as hell doesn’t fly now. We don’t go to the movies for realistic depictions of children. Or at the very least meet us halfway with something that doesn’t make us roll our eyes. At no point growing up did I ever roll my eyes at 3, 4 or 5….maybe the scene when they were to be dinner for the ewoks, but other then that.

    Might I suggest folks watch this 7 part review of Phantom Menace: http://youtu.be/FxKtZmQgxrI When Lucas himself says *runs hands across his face* “I may have gone to far”. Its telling and zeroes in on the core problem with Lucas: the dude tries to do to much with a story and it doesn’t work out.

    1. “Here’s the one truth I’ve found in life. The more you have to defend andor explain something to the masses to make your case that it is good, the more likely that its complete and total garbage.”

      Must be true. Look how much it took to defend your opinion! (I guess mine must smell like roses right now: no effort required!)

  19. To those who think the prequels were all green screen and no sets/miniatures/whatever, it’s not true. They made more sets, miniatures, and objects in comparison with the original trilogy.

  20. Thanks for writing these, David. It’s always great to see people approach these movies from a logical and stylistic/artistic point of view. Too many people rush to degrade them in irrational, emotional ways based on their many unique qualities when compared to the originals. They expected to see the same side of the coin, but instead they got the opposite side that completed and informed the other and vice versa.

    The complaints about acting and dialogue (as if they had ever been five-star quality in Star Wars) and Jar Jar and CG and et cetera — they come after the reaction to the new and unexpected. They’re scapegoats to mask and potentially legitimize the outrage these people felt for receiving something they didn’t expect.

    This will pass someday.

  21. Before I begin I would just like to say that I agree with you and that most people miss the point of this article: The movies weren’t great, and for sure arent as special as the OT but they certainly not as bad as you all portray them to be.

    ” I’m sorry, I can understand some of your points about the plot and the links to the original trilogy being underrated by some. But if you are defending Lucas’ writing and directing (I blame him for the performances) you are searching too hard for a reason to like the movie. There is a reason he didn’t write or direct Empire and Jedi…these roles were not his strong point. ” @ kasper

    i) How can you look at some of these reply-posts and not say that anything about the movie is not underrated, no movie really deserves the criticism that I’ve heard and read (across the whole internet)
    ii) Perhaps you are searching the easy way out by completely shitting on the movies that really don’t deserve that magnitude of offense.

    ” Enough with the Star Wars prequels. They have been out for years now, it’s way too late for you to add your extreme minority opinion to everyone else’s. ” @Grand Wazoo

    All I can say in response to this one is that there was a time when the “majority” believed that blacks and Jews were “garbage”, doesn’t make the statement or OPINION any more true. And that’s all this really is, an opinion.

    ” Here’s my biggest beef with the new ones. And let me say, I really want you to address this in a future post. The way they were filmed. Have you ever watched the extras on the DVD for ATOC or ROTS? Every freaking character is standing infront of a blue screen (or green screen). In the director commentary Lucas even remarks he digitally touched up Obi-Wan’s beard in a few shots. WHAT? The digitalization of Star Wars is what killed them. As you have pointed out here the acting, the dialogue, the characters, the symbolism is all the same from original trilogy to the prequels, the difference is in how they look. ” @David

    Since when is attention to detail a bad thing?

    By all means, like the author of these tree articles was trying to say, I am not saying that the prequels were as good as the OT. There are interesting developments in both. How can you watch the scene where Darth Vader is assembled in ROTS and not go “that so epic” or when you find out that Darth Vader used to be this little innocent little boy. The length of these articles was great but it dosent even begin to compete with all the shit you all put out in criticizing Lucas for his movies. The TV Series and a pointless MMO; now that’s stuff to be really upset about. Both of these trilogies were different and special in their own right.

  22. Actually, the acting in the Original Trilogy is no better or worse than the acting found in the Prequel Trilogy. The style of the dialogue is more relaxed and less formal – except in a few scenes featuring Leia. But the cheesiness and occasional awkward dialogue and acting were there.

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