Take it for what it's worth, to some reviews mean nothing, so don't read the thread if that's the case.

http://www.aintitcoolnews.com/display.cgi?id=20069


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Another positive review for REVENGE OF THE SITH! Could this really be the one we've been waiting for?

Ahoy, squirts! Quint here! Now, we have the press junket for STAR WARS: REVENGE OF THE SITH next week (no, I'm not invited... I'm still crying) and, from what I hear, foreign distributors are getting the movie right this very moment, so expect a flood of reviews starting from this point on till the release of the film.

The below is very plot-heavy, so go at your own risk. I didn't read it all (I want something to be unknown when I finally see this flick afterall), but it seemed very levelheaded, especially when talking about not quite digging Grievous.

I'll be keeping an eye out for more screening reviews, so stay tuned! For now, we have this review that places ROTS next to TESB... tall order, that. "Please don't suck, please don't suck, please don't suck..."

Harry,

Can?t say where I saw it. When I saw it. With whom I saw it. Just trust me, I did. Revenge of the Sith. Final print.

Won?t bore you with ?I?m a big fan?, blah, blah, blah. Rest assured, I am, and believe not much comes close to Empire Strikes Back when thinking Star Wars. Except maybe for this movie.

Please note I also liked Alien 3 which might, for some, call my credibility into question, but what the heck, here it goes

As if you don?t know already, the opening battle above Coruscant is absolutely breathtaking, with the camera following Obi-Wan and Anakin in their starfighters as they desperately try to get to Grievous? ship, with all kinds of stuff blowing up in the background. Still, while visuals are nothing short of amazing, I kinda missed the militaristic approach to space battles found in the Classic trilogy, especially Return of the Jedi. Somehow, whether this particular battle, or exciting but short assault on the droid donut ship in TPM, or the Geneosis confrontation in AOTC, the prequels never seemed to embrace the idea that to care about the action a bit more we should be given some indication of who is doing exactly what and why. A sense of progression, if you will. This lack of focus always bothered me in Attack of the Clones and the beginning of Revenge is just the same: we are never really told what?s at stake and then the battle ends too abruptly. Ships blow up. That?s it.

In the end I was left with the ?nothing to see here, move on, people? feeling. A minor and rather personal rant, but still The Obi-Wan / Anakin banter during the battle is alright, nothing great or particularly inventive, but fortunately nothing really awful either. In fact, it?s worth to mention I never noticed strikingly bad dialogue throughout the movie. Anyway, once our characters board the Invisible Hand, the humor quotient goes up, but contrary to the infamous C3PO gags from AOTC I actually found some of the scenes pretty amusing... except for the R2-D2 making the fools out of a couple of super battle druids, which seemed too slapstick and silly for my taste (though I imagine Lucas thought this necessary to further undermine the droids? effectiveness). In retrospect, the lightweightness and a sense of adventure of the first 30 minutes contrast and emphasize the darkness that follows when things go bad for our characters.

Grevous is a non-entity for me. He?s supposed to be this great and invincible master strategist but nothing in the movie actually proves that he is except that the characters constantly say he is. I?d say Grevous? cartoonish appearance and his manierisms belong to the animated Clone Wars tv series rather then to this movie. In the end the general is just another droid and a plot point for Obi-Wan to follow, not the Episode III Big Bad Lucas often touted him to be.

Once the Chancellor is rescued, Revenge slows down a bit to make room for the seduction of Anakin. I read the movie novelization a while ago and must say I was truly impressed by how THE transformation of Anakin was handled. It just all made perfect sense and resulted in a tragic, ?can?t escape fate? dilemma for the character. I was rather afraid the movie would simplify matters too much ? I mean, the book had so much more time to concentrate on the slow and natural change in Anakin. Fortunately there are enough Palpatine / Anakin scenes throughout the film to actually illustrate the process of Skywalker being slowly dragged into the darkness. The signals of doom are all there: Anakin?s pride and arrogance, his prophetic dreams regarding the death of Padme, his inability to keep those he loves but who are destined to pass away, and in the end Palpatine?s promises of power and control.

Speaking of Palpatine, Ian McDiarmid shines. To some extend, Revenge is his movie. I particularly liked subtle changes in his tone of voice and body language during his shifts between the good Chancellor Palpatine and ever-manipulative Emperor, especially in the ?Squid Lake? opera scene which in itself was a very eerie and unsettling moment in the movie. Of course once he becomes the Emperor full time he?s just, well, crazy evil, laughing like a lunatic even when hanging and about to fall from one of those floating senate platforms during the climatic duel with Yoda.

Hayden Christensen, while not in the acting league of Ian or Ewan, gets to perform some nice and emotionally charged scenes, which was a nice surprise considering Attack of the Clones. The rift in Anakin / Padme relationship, a direct consequence of Anakin?s blind and desperate search for a way to save his wife from imminent death, is showcased with surprising believability. A far cry from the overly forced love between them in AOTC, indeed. Strangely enough, the best scene between Anakin and Padme takes place when they are actually apart. While Anakin is told to wait in the Jedi Temple by Mace Windu (who goes on to arrest Palpatine), Padme is looking out from the window of her apartment and gazes toward the Temple spears ? with rather nicely underplayed musical score in the background and some nice editing, it is immediately evident both characters feel each other?s anguish and fear of the future, and suddenly realize they cannot escape what awaits them, namely Anakin?s decision to accept Palpatine?s offer. Definitely one of the great emotional highlights in ROTS and possibly the entire saga. Nice!

And then all hell breaks loose and the movie gets better, and better, and better... Mind you, this is a true PG-13 experience. When the Emperor activates Order 66 and the slaughtering of the Jedi begins, Lucas does not shy away from showing the brutal reality of it. In one of the most shocking scenes of the entire saga, the clones keep shooting at the fallen and already dead Jedi, with the camera slowly panning up to the sky. In fact, the whole montage of the clones turning against their former masters is extremely effective and emotional ? a disturbing mixture of horrible images and truly sad music by John Williams. A goose-bums moment at its best.

I could go on for hours how much there is to cherish in the last 45 minutes of Revenge. The duels are absolutely awesome. The only one I didn?t care much for was Mace Windu vs. Palpatine ? I simply never liked Mace and always thought Jackson should have stayed away from playing a Jedi Master. His delivery is somewhat wooden and instead of intended coolness we get another ?this party?s over? stuff. On the other hand, Yoda taking on the Emperor in the Senate chamber is simply enormous in scope and I think at least in this respect it overshadows the climatic Obi-Wan / Anakin fight but just a bit. Sparks fly everywhere, Senate platforms crash into each other, dark energy explodes ? truly wild stuff accompanied by the only bombastic part of the Williams? score.

Obi-Wan / Anakin fight on Mustafar is just too good to write about. You need to see it for yourselves. What?s worth mentioning is another uber-cool moment just before the duel begins, when Anakin confronts Padme and says something along the lines: ?You will rule beside me in MY new empire?. That and the final ?You were the chosen one!? and ?I HATE YOU!? exchange between Obi-Wan and Anakin rule big time, no question about it.

Obviously I have barely scratched the surface as there is so much more to enjoy in Revenge of the Sith. Even though I dislike Grievous, the bit on Utapau, with Obi-Wan chasing the good general on Boga, was fun to watch as an exciting adventure. Bail Organa, while absent for the first 45 minutes, delivers some good lines later on and is brought into the story seamlessly. The final minutes of the movie ? the cutting between death of Padme and the birth of Vader in his mechanical form; Padme?s quiet and etheral funeral procession; Bail and his wife lovingly holding Leia in their arms on Alderaan ? all of it is just heart-breaking, but cathartic and not without a sense of hope. A new hope

Call me No One



http://www.aintitcoolnews.com/display.cgi?id=20077

now this guy doesn't go into many spoilers, but he gave me some background info on where he is and who he works for and I'm confident he's seen the film. Plus, knowing what happens isn't a big deal anymore now that any Tom, Dick or Harry can go down to Wal-Mart and buy the script. Anyway, this is more for those that want a little enthusiasm without reading all the spoilers! Add another one onto the "He did it! Lucas did it! Holy shit!" pile.

Before we get to that, though, I got this in... sounded sweet... read the description of why it got this rating in the UK!

Harry

Please see the below mail sent to me regarding UK Certificate for Star Wars 3:

Dear Guest

We are contacting you to let you know that "Star Wars Episode III" has now received a "12A" certificate from the BBFC with the following consumer advice "Contains moderate fantasy violence and scenes of horror"

The "12A" certificate explanation is as follows:

"12 with Parental Guidance - 12A means that the BBFC have classified the film unsuitable for children under 12. However, they may still watch the film, as long as they are accompanied by someone over 18 at all times during the showing. Advice is given regarding the content of the film and the ADULT must decide if it is appropriate for the accompanying under 12."

Thanks and enjoy the site

Mike
SCENES OF HORROR! Oh, I'm so hyped for this... "Please don't suck, please don't suck. Please don't suck..."

I'm still under quite the impression and what little i can say right now is that it's by far the best episode.

I'll keep this short and absolutely spoilerless, with possible details about certain scenes later, if that's needed for you to believe me.

I remember, three years ago, when Attack of the Clones hit the theatres, there was bunch of talk about bad acting, bad writing, all sorts of things taking away from the whole experience. I felt that way too, for the most part. But with revenge of the sith, it's as if Lucas matured as a director, at least when the new star wars trilogy is concerned. Everything seems complete, it feels that every second of the film is used well and not wasted, no unnecesarry scenes. Battle scenes are by far better than in previous films, lightsabre duels too, with the possible exception of final phantom menace duel which i still hold very dear to my heart, even if the rest of the film was rather bad. Hayden does a fine job, but that also may be because there's no more groan inducing lame lines, just cool bad ass 'bow before me, i'll be darth vader' attitude. Maybe it's just that you don't really get the time to notice bad things, there's just too much action going on left and right. When there's no action, there's anticipation of it. No dull spots. I must say, i'm sort of sad this is the end, no new films. Just when it started to get good.

- Little bugger

everything is proceding as he has forseen

very nice

im so happy that this movie is good

if star wars has to finish im glad its finishing on a good note

having the last star wars movie be like the phantom menace would suck

ooo i so cant wait to see this movie

ive been a star wars fan since i was like 10 years old.. but i have never seen a star wars movie in the cinema

ive been too poor/lazy the last 2 films lol

i got a nice job now though so i have no excuses!

Gene Shalit is also a sexual predator. Sexually harrassed my x-girlfriend's mom at a party once.

Just thought I would throw that in while the five minute hate was going on.

I'm really looking forward to twats like him saying that this one is TOO dark or TOO violent or TOO mature, whereas the bitch about TPM was that it was too childish.

what will really be funny is if the movie gets a majority of positive reviews...we won't have anyone to hate

but as mentioned earlier, lucas has many enemies so I doubt it

also AICN is full of cock-gobblers and their word doesn't mean shit to me (even if it's positive)

I think this basically says it all.

The first reviews negative point was stupid. He said he didn't know what the point of the opening battle was or what the objective was. Did he read teh opening scroll?? Fucking morons.

Sounds just like the stupid ass complaints I'd expect from members of the AICN Jedi Council meetings. They always bitch about crap that either doesn't need to be explained or is explained in plain site and they're just to friggen dumb to see it.

I was never bothered about critics and their shit comments.

To me its like asking a soccer fan to comment on a golf tournament .The soccer fan whom would gice rave reviews of a Champions League match would probably find the golf tournament damn boring.

I am Star Wars fan , n I love Star Wars movies.

Fuck off , critics!

I think its hard to find an exact point in the space battle, cause theres sooo much going on. In respect to the OT, there was the death star everyone was going after, but in this one, its another ship, and that can make the whole thing confusing...

If anything, its a way to show of more of the CG that is gonna be unbelievable in this movie...

Right!

Except for Gene Shalit, of course...

Right, but at the same time, there are critics you don't bother with because you know what their tastes are. And for that matter, those critics aren't writing/speaking for you anyway. Gene Shalit's reviews aren't directed at Star Wars fans, they're directed at old grandmothers, or people who are just waiting to be told that the movies they want to see are good, and the movies that they don't want to see are bad. No one watches fucking Gene Shalit to help decide whether to see a Star Wars movie.

Lisa Schwarzbaum shouldn't review action movies, and her negative reviews of such are generally a good reverse barometer. Roger Ebert is so desperate to side with what he thinks is "hot" that his reviews are completely irrelevant. The list goes on and I'm sure we all have our own additions.

AICN foamed at the mouth over AOTC and there's no reason to believe their reaction to ROTS will be any different, whether the reviews were fake or not.

hey Fatboy, regarding the reviews did you see evidence of a fake or are you just going on common sense?

I mean after all didn't whatever-the-hell-his-name-is at AICN vouch for the authenticity?

Yeah, but consider the source.

There is not yet a web-only source whose reviews I will take seriously for even a second. When I see a film in release or a DVD that's quoting critical praise that only comes from websites, I know I'm looking at a piece of shit.

For all the talk here on MF about how badly TFN and AICN suck, they still seem to generate a hell of a lot of discussion. But that's another topic.

AICN has always been full of bullshit. It wasn't that long ago they posted that some guy had just 'turned up' to the ranch and he watched the film. 'Quality Control' is not an issue with Harry these days.

I looked in my Ep3 folder today at hundreds of megs of shitty captures, low res jpegs, crappy .mp3 clips, a couple hi-res press photos... you know, the typical spoiler shitlog with a few gems sparkling in it, and I realized my patience window is at least 21 days wide.

I came here, sort of by habit, and scanned the first "review" (obvious bullshit), and I kept waiting to give a damn enough to say something. But at this point, fuck Kevin Smith, fuck AICN, fuck all reviews, actually... I'll be seeing it myself in a couple of weeks, and mine's the only opinion that matters anyway. Months ago it was a big fuckin' mystery but I think the truth is we all probably know exactly what RotS is going to be like by now, having read the script and heard the score and everything else: Best of the prequels by a mile, McDiarmid owns the show, same wooden acting, same stupid unfunny shit, just less of it, and killer visuals.

I think that IS the review. That's it. You know, worth seeing. It's not going to feel like some other movie, it's going to feel like the third prequel, just doing the good stuff better, and having less of the bad stuff. I mean, the whole crew's had 2 practice runs, basically.

People who are waiting, wanting, or expect this to be some sort of transcedent experience, a diamond capstone at the pinnacle of the Star Wars pantheon scare me anyway.

amen mike

I'm glad to hear someone say that. I've been trying to express that very thought since 1998 or '99, but was always met with cries of "blasphemy!" and "heretic!"

Alot of people treat ESB that way, and it always makes me wonder what they´ve been smoking. The films are good for the most part, but I´ve never met God through them or had any kind of religious experience. People need to stop taking this seriously, it ain´t healthy (and I speak from personal experience).

i hate this point before a film. less than a month and all these media people have to blow some knowledge on us i don't fucking care what some cunt at time says or some stupid website like aicn says. fuck em. just echoing what others have said and i said in the kevin smith thread: the only review that should matter is your own.

These two "reviews" are phonier than Jenny McCarthy's breasts and not as much fun to look at -a real put-down because I hate fake knockers.

I remember about this time three years ago, Fat Harry claimed he was treated to a special screening of Episode 2 in a hotel room. It was pure bullshit and I called him on it. The Facer then spoofed Harry by claiming to have been given an advance screening of Kill Bill (Knowles was all over the producers' cock for "pwesents" on that movie.) before they even started filming. Harry was too fucking stupid to realize he was being parodied!

These reviews are bullshit.

I think the problem at the present moment is the manner in which these three 'reviews' are being used. I think it is pretty presumcious to criticise or ignore Kevin Smith’s 'review' (I would call it Kevin Smith speaking out aloud and not a review) simply because he is under the banner of prequel apologist. If he loves it, then he loves it. However in saying that, in no shape or form should these reviews be used to validate, or heighten your expectation of this movie.

As Mike stated, we've read the script, watched the Ricky Mac presentation, watched the trailer and looked at countless pics. We should have a fairly accurate barometer as to whether this movie will rock (I'm under this banner), or whether it will disappoint.

However, if we ignore that and leave our expectation of the film to positive word of mouth from reviews then we are only going to disappoint ourselves when the negative or indifferent reviews do roll in and we have to then justify why we are looking forward to the film.

Yeah. I think the point is not to get too worked up over some reviews. Especially when they are reviews from sources that are not always the most... balanced. Not to say they're wrong and the movie isn't what they say it is, but hyperbole is an easy trap to fall in to. I'm going into the movie expecting a few things:

1. Bad or passable dialogue
2. Good, entertaining action

Anything else will be a bonus. Expecting it to be the greatest Star Wars movie yet is a stretch for me. I see this movie as being the culmination of the prequels, not the culmination of the entire saga.

Anyway, I'm not getting too worked up. But then again, I prefer talking about films to watching them, so... just ignore me. :bankheadbounce2:

^^^But should you be going into this movie with expectations that the dialogue is going to be poor or barely passable.

Also, are you questioning the recent reviews of ROTS, or reviews of the prequels in general?

Is there anyone on this board that isn't going to go and watch this film?

If not, all these reviews mean jack diddly doo.

Whether it's slated as a turd or praised as a classic, I'm still gonna watch it. Come May 19th the web will be swamped with peoples own reviews/opinions anyway.

I agree though that it will be fun to watch it, draw my own conclusion and compare that to the reviews that have been made.

If you need validation from a reviewer, seek help.

BTW, Fatboy, ever heard of Alfie Kohn? I feel you and he would agree on the education system (or lack thereof).

TPM was great and so was AOTC; I don't think I'll have any problem liking ROTS.

another great review...patience people...only 2 weeks to go..

Did you people read the fan reviews about Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy? They loved it. Unfortunately, the movie is not being loved by the critics or the general public. So fan reviews do not reflect the critics or average viewer. I am not sure why, after all these years of negativity, anyone expects positive reviews from the mass media anyway? Just enjoy it or hate it because it rules or sucks.

The mentality I don't get is that of people who wait for a review before they decide whether or not they liked a movie.

says it all.

Side note - I was deeply disappointed by that movie.

Not really relevant that.

I'll go back to lurking.

Harry the Hutt.