I thought this needed to be made in order to consolidate what will soon become an onslaught of reviews. As fun as it is to be blindly belligerent towards critics and the media, getting those initial reviews is one of the most exciting parts of the 3 year anticipation for me, at least. Thus this thread...

EDIT..I'm just going to turn this into a mini rotten tomatoes for the time being, changing the edit time as a new review comes...

REVIEWS

CURRENT POSITIVE REVIEWS: 16

Empire Online:Empire online

Telegraph UK: LINK

Latino Review: LR LINK

Modamag.com: LINK

EMPIRE MOVIES: Empire LINK

THE TRADES: TRADES LINK

MIXED REVIEWS: MR LINK

CINEMA BLEND: CB LINK

HOLLYWOOD REPORTER: HR LINK

VARIETY: VARIETY LINK

TIME: http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101050509/story.html

DAILY TELEGRAPH: http://dailytelegraph.news.com.au/story.jsp?sectionid=1258&storyid=3071297

KEVIN SMITH: http://viewaskew.com/news/sith/

NATIONAL POST: LINK

DVDFUTURE: http://www.dvdfuture.com/review.php?id=760

SCOTT CHITWOOD: http://www.comingsoon.net/news/reviewsnews.php?id=9479

CURRENT NEGATIVE REVIEWS: 3

FILMFREAK: Film Freak LINK

HOLLYWOOD ELSEWHERE: HW LINK

SLANT MAG: SM LINK (I hesitate to put this in negative, but RT did)


GENERAL:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/film/4513837.stm

http://theedge.bostonherald.com/movieNews/view.bg?articleid=81664

didn't they show 'Sith' at Cannes today?

I would think you'd get a bunch of reviews after that happened.

EDIT: In many ways, I wished this 2 week review period never happened. It's just mindless and useless bickering that leads to rediculous arguments. I wish Lucas refused to show advanced screenings. He has the power.

I guess you aren't familiar with Richard Schickel

I'm not familiar with him. Inform us.

RICHARD SCHICKEL
Contributor
TIME Magazine


Richard Schickel, one of the nation's most influential film critics, has been reviewing movies for TIME Magazine since 1972. Before that, he was the film critic for LIFE.

Schickel is presently writing the film biography of actor, director and producer Clint Eastwood. His other books have included Intimate Strangers: The Culture of Celebrity; D.W. Griffith: An American Life; The Disney Version; His Picture in the Papers, about Douglas Fairbanks Sr. and the beginning of the modern celebrity system; Another I, Another You, a novel; Schickel On Film, a collection of his longer essays on film, and Brando: A Life In Our Times.

Schickel pursues a second career as a producer-writer-director of television programs, beginning with "The Men Who Made Movies"", an eight-part PBS series, which served as the basis for a book of the same title. His filmography includes "Life Goes to the Movies", a three-hour history of American movies in the sound era; "Funny Business" and the "Horror Show", genre compilations broadcast on CBS; "Into the Morning : Willa Cather's American," a biography of the writer for PBS; and biographical portraits of Vincente Minelli, the director (PBS), and Gary Cooper, Myrna Loy and Barbara Stanwyck (all for TNT), and most recently, a documentary on the making of Clint Eastwood's "Unforgiven" for ABC and "Hollywood on Hollywood", a history of movies about making movies for AMC. He just finished "Elia Kazan: A Director's Journey", a retrospective of the director's theater and film career.

Schickel was born in Milwaukee, educated at the University of Wisconsin and lives in Los Angeles. He has two daughters. He has held a Guggenheim Fellowship and is the winner of the British Film Institute Book Prize.

Haha. I actually was curious about Dr. Bass's assement of the guy. Thanks though.

AICN posted a grouping of reviews tonight. One guy actually calls a lightsaber a life savor. Anyways, they are interesting to read. I'm not sure if they are all real or not, but I guess a few of them have to be.

I was just about to make a thread where we could organize all of the media reviews. Good job! I'm feeling pretty optimistic actually. Remember, no matter how good the movie is, there are those groups that will never admit that it's a great movie, even if it is. I feel like it's at least going to be amazing to fans like us and to average people it will be considered to be really good. Also, remember that ANH and even ESB got bad reviews at times.

I saw this on Monday night. Just so you know Bryant is a woman. She was actually really enthused about this movie. She seemed to be a big fan.

let me be the first to welcome stacy3p0 and her bossoms to this fine board





and on a side note, the review wasn't bad either

Anyone who has seen the movie (or knowing someone who's seen the movie):

Is there any music tracked over from previous movies at all like what was done in AOTC? That's probably the only thing on my mind right now and what ruined AOTC for me. Thanks!

I really only pay attention to official reviews, b/c, how can you buy anything else you read? I could write my own review of the movie now and it would be believable. So, the fan written ones I pretty much ignore and assume it was written by someone, who like me, just knows a lot about the movie.

So that leaves 2 official reviews as far as I'm concerned, the CNN one and the Time one, and both were cautiously positive.

Some of the comments of the tf.n posted ones were little worrisome, but like I said, who knows if you can believe those or not?

Here's another review I found on The Internet Movie Database. It's not too detailed, but positive. And oh yeah, hi everyone!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0121766/

As a lifelong Star Wars fan since I was eight years old back in 1977, I was disappointed by the previous two efforts (Phantom & Attack) But I was thinking maybe I'm a bit too old now for this and its aimed at todays younger generation or maybe I just miss all the original actors playing all our favourite characters. Anyway I had the pleasure of sitting in on Revenge of the Sith's classification screening yesterday and to my surprise I was really impressed by it.

Lucas does his best storytelling with this entry, the transformation of Anakin Skywalker to Darth Vader is really well executed, won't reveal any spoilers by saying this but his turning to the dark side is believable taking into account his ambitions of becoming a Jedi master and his own personal emotions towards his pregnant wife.

It was great to see Chewbacca again even though his appearance is short and brief (2 scenes) and of course Darth Vader himself is always a kick. You should all be pleased to know that about half way through the film I was wondering where that Jar Jar Binks guy was, he's nowhere in sight until near the end, he gets himself a medium shot and the bonus of keeping his mouth shut in his whole five seconds of screen time.

Anyway, I highly recommend Revenge of the Sith to not only Star Wars fans but to movie lovers of all ages. It maybe just under two and a half hours but hey, what a ride !

What is amazing to me is how a lot of people complain about the acting in I & II, how they didn't live up to the OT, how Lucas can't write, how Lucas can't direct, etc. , yet, all 5 of the Star Wars movies are in the top 25 of all time, with two in the top 10 and one of those is episode I the most hated of all due to Jar Jar. For the record:

Star Wars Ep4 #2
Star Wars Ep1 #5
Star Wars Ep2 #17
Star Wars Ep6 #18
Star Wars Ep5 #22

Interesting that ESB is the lowest on the list. I mean Lucas obviously has done something right or people would not fork over their hard earned money and make these movies the high grossing films they are. I personally believe Ep 5 will make the Top 10, maybe even the Top 5 moving Ep1 down a notch. We will see. That's my prediction.

Just my $.02.

Besides, Titanic is #1. There's the crippling blow to the box office = quality argument right there.

Don't you love how every review starts with: "well, I for one hated TPM and AOTC" to validate their review.

I'll give you the executive summary of every review:

Though TPM and AOTC sucked, this one is good, but not great. Acting was better but stil bad, Lucas's writing was meh and the movie had hits and misses in the story dept.

Found this on bbc news uk:


The new Star Wars film is a "bloodbath" which deserves its parental guidance PG-13 rating, a critic has said after an early screening of the movie.

Associated Press writer David Germain described its action as "relentless".

"It includes sequences more dark and disturbing than anything previously seen in the tragic Skywalker soap opera," he said.

Mr Germain was among reporters who attended a screening of the movie at director George Lucas' Skywalker Ranch home near San Francisco on Tuesday.

"Young Jedi knight Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) completes his transformation into black-hearted villain Darth Vader with a bloodbath against old allies," he said.

"Anakin is left gruesomely mutilated in a death duel with former mentor Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor).

"His surgical reclamation as the part-flesh, part-machine Vader is chillingly juxtaposed against the bleak childbirth scene of his wife, Padme Amidala (Natalie Portman), whose twins grow up to be heroes of the original Star Wars trilogy, Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia."


Lucas said he was getting "a lot of flak" from parents concerned about the film's US rating.

"A lot of people saying how can you do this? My children love these movies. Why can you not let them go see it?" he said.

"But I have to tell a story. I'm not making these, oddly enough, to be giant, successful blockbusters. I'm making them because I'm telling a story, and I have to tell the story I intended."


original link:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/film/4513837.stm

You forgot: "best of the prequels, but nowhere close to the OT."

I think anyone with the title ":gb2tfn: -er" is alreagy stuffed so full of shit that any review, post, etc. by said moron should just be deleted before too many people waste two minutes of their lives reading stupid crap like that review.

The TFN hate is silly. Yeah it's a much looser board with a lot of stupid threads and similarly stupid arguments but there are people on there that aren't complete morons.

I found this place through TFN. I have an account there. I've done quite a bit of sharing of material here. If I saw the movie early am I automatically a douchebag who opinion is to be dismissed?

Why not judge a review based on how well it is written and how intelligent it appears to be, and not where it originated.

Just because you have the menial ability to string together a few sentences without making glaring grammatical errors, doesn't mean you aren't a complete douche-bag...

It doesn't mean you're a complete douchebag if you decide to post a review on TFN either.

Yeah, the whole review seems rehearsed. It sounds like someone already made up their mind before seeing the movie & I agree that for caiming to be a fan, the whole bashing the visual effects is just wrong. How could you not have just a little respect for how far the effects have come since the very beginning? I too call bullshit.

I think that anyone who's read the novel, the screenplay and a couple of other early reviews could have written that review without even going near the movie itself. Just another reason why fan reviews, good or bad, are absolutely useless at this point.

For the most part, and I mean overwhelmingly most part, TFN is full of douchebags. Sure, there's a good poster here and there, but opinions there are no good to anyone with an IQ over 30.

Second, his review should be meaningless to just about every person here. He obviously went in spoiler free, cause he was surprised and disappointed by just about every thing we've known inside and out for months. Sure, it sucks he didn't like the film. Do I give a shit? No. His life was crushed? well boo fucking hoo and get a fucking life. It's a classic example of 'George didn't make the movie I had in my head, Star Wars acting should be Oscar worthy, If the film isn't in the best picture running it's terrible' mentality that illustrates a wastebasket of person who doesn't understand the films.

From what I know, and most of everyone here knows, about the film is that the seduction of Anakin is quite clear and happens from the VERY BEGINNING OF THE FUCKING FILM. Said asshole seems to have missed that point in his review, cause I sure has hell have seen it without watching the final product. Thusly, the review is worthless; the final cough of a loser who's faith in the franchise was obviously symbiotic with his physical life.

Wow. The very first negative review and everyone starts having a hissy fit.

CoGro-

I don't disagree with a thing you said about that particular review. It was completely retarded. I'm just more responding to the idea that "well it came from TFN it's automatically crap." That seems almost as bad as this guys complete lack of coherent or critical thought regarding the movie.

But I agree that review is total trash.

Yep, first bad review and no one can take it.

Hey, I could give a shit about the reviews in general, good or bad. It's all predictable. You know what's going to be said about the film. You knew it for three years, no: 6 years.

But there's a difference between a negative review that understands the film and the nature of the franchise to one that rants about how their childhood was raped for x, y and z reasons that have nothing to do with the quality of the film but more to do with premonitions going into it.

Ummm... if you are still using as your main source of info and haven't had the intelligence to graduate to a much better and reliable site such as this one, then yes, you are a douche-bag for posting your review there.

Which negative review are we referring to? If it's just a fan one I'm not goin put it into the total tally.

You are missing the point. No I do not use TFN as my "main source of info." I haven't since I realized that MF.com was the only good source for Ep 3. When I got the trivial pursuit clips I came straight here to give out the goods. I have tried to help share things that I downloaded as much as possible since sharing the goods amongst star wars fans is all part of the fun.

Ripping on people because they are idiots is one thing. Ripping on entire sites just because it happens to allow a lot more BS than this site is something else. It's an IGN site. It's not going to be tightened down like a private site. In fact, we should all be donating money to DP for the costs of this site. He pays it all out of his pocket with no advertising.

We're all just a bunch of nerds anyway. And this argument, including this post really, is a waste of space.

This whole thing is starting to remind me of an article from the Onion from a few years ago titled: "Gaywads, Dorkwads Sign Historic Wad Accord"

Will there be peace amongst the warring geek factions in our lifetimes?

read the script and you won't be shocked by the dialogue.

My take on it personally:

The dialogue is fine. It's clunky in spots, but nothing earth shattering. Some scenes were quite well written and from what I've seen, have been read quite well. Lucas writes Star Wars dialogue, not Shakespeare. If you go in expecting what you've gotten from the other films you should be alright.

The review is likely BS, and even if its not, its just a TFner expressing his opinion.

I'm OK w reading negative reviews, but if its some nitpicky bitter fan, I'm not too cool w that. I got a feeling there will still be plenty of those arund for EIII even if it is a kickass film.

not trying to get banned again or anything, but it really isnt explained. yeah, obi wan says that sifo-dias died 10 years ago and all that.. but no explanation is given as to why this jedi ordered the clones... i mean, its a big deal.

and i know the answers are in LoE for the fans curious enough to go out and read the books, but to the casual fan of the movies, it doesnt make much sense.

anyhow, i'll admit that the review is way too heavy-handed in its criticism, but i'm also level-headed enough to recognize that he may have a few points.

Anyone witha grain of insight or common sense would figure out the Sifo-Dyas mystery while watching Episode II. There's no point to waste time in III explaining it again.

People who get caught up in the continuity things need to take a deep breath. It is a film after all. Let's judge it as a film and not worry about all the nitty gritty. I'd like to see someone try making 6 films in a 30 year span, including 3 that take place before hte other 3, and have everything make perfect sense. GL did as best a job as I think anyone could possibly ask him.

so, lets recap what they say about sifo-dyas in episode II.

-he ordered the clones
-he died 10 years ago

so, from that, we are supposed to use common sense to deduce that:



great.

The idea of Sifo-Dyas ordering the clones was devised for the EU, dude. Pablo originally said that the person who ordered the clones was seen onscreen in II.

What you were SUPPOSED to deduce from II, and it quite easy to do, was:

-Sifo-Dyas was a name used by the Sith to order the army.

-Dooku hired Jango Fett and erased Kamino from archives.

But please, back on topic...

Are we assuming that everyone's going to love it?

Are we reading good reviews and saying "that's true" and reading negative reviews and going "That's bullshit".

Hmm, sounds like we're becoming TF.n Jr.

I know many people (myself included) went into TPM hoping to love it... and walked out crushed... I know many like me who loved most of AotC but couldnt' forgive the painful love scenes.

Dare I bring it up, but I too hate digital doubles in place of real actors in the duel. I pray it doesn't happen too much.

Anybody watch that last Matrix movie? Wall-to-wall action, with lots of digital doubles, but as boring as fuck.



NOW I THINK THIS REVIEWER WILL BE IN THE MINORITY. I PRAY THAT I DON'T HAVE THE SAME REACTION. I HOPE YOU DON'T.

But if you do have a similar reaction, better not post here or you'll be ripped a new one.

useless post, but yes. I would agree that review is worthless.

I got the impression that this TFN nerd wasn't really serious when he wrote his review, he just wanted some attention by going against the grain.

http://www.picpop.com/gallery/albums/us ... _whore.jpg

My childhood was raped by Micheal Jackson.

I hate to say this but although I haven't seen ROTS yet I'm willing to believe the negative review is for real. This guy describes exactly the feelings I had when I was reading the script.

Then you'll be able to explain how any person with common sense could interpret Anakin's turn to the dark side as 'sudden'.

"Are we assuming that everyone's going to love it?"

You and green destiny sword and gunsblazing already wrote your ROTS review in 1999. You might as well post it now and get it over with.

This was mentioned before in another thread, the AICN "fan review" was regarded as bogus.

The thread should probably stick to legitimate, reliable sources since there is no way to judge the credibility of fan reviews..positive or negative.

Too many people looking for attention are going to start making shit up just to stir things....true or not,obviously it worked.

What I'm tired of is when people say they have been "cheated". By what? Did George Lucas ask you what he should do with these movies and guaranteed you he would use your ideas? No. This is his story, his dream of what should happen in the world he created. These are the words he wanted the characters to say, and the acting he wanted. People want to talk about raped childhoods and how Lucas owed them so much. That's BS. Lucas gave you something in '77, '80 and '83 that you wouldn't have had otherwise. And if the PT doesn't meet your expectations well you don't have to watch them. And after 20 years of expectations, there was no way he was going to satisfy every fan. Every person is going to have their own idea of what this trilogy should have been like. But, this isn't OUR trilogy. It is HIS saga.

I found it completely unbelievable. I mean, Hayden I never cared for. I found Anakin more interesting when he was a kid, Jake Lloyd gave a much better performance than Hayden. Hayden sounds boring, monotonous. There's no fire, no passion. The dialogue of course doesn't help. When Anakin decides to cut off Dooku's head just because Palpatine says it's for the best, it's just stupid. I can't put it more eloquent than that. The one man who could spill the beans on what's been going on for the last decade or so is finally captured and defenseless and what does Anakin do? He knocks his block off, knowing that he shouldn't. Uh-oh.

Then he finds out who Palpatine is. The guy who has been taking everyone for a ride, including him. The guy that has been trying to kill his wife. He knows he's bad news and does the right thing by telling Mace who promptly goes to arrest him. Now, I know that Palps told Anakin he knows of a way to save someone's life. First of all, I thought I read somewhere that Anakin believes this knowledge is somewhere stored in the Jedi Archives as well. If he were to become a Master, and taking care of the most dangerous man in the Galaxy will surely earn him that rank, he would be able to go into the Jedi Archives to find out if there really is such a power. I for one wouldn't trust Palpatine, in fact I can't believe Anakin still believes Palps has been speaking the truth about everything else when obviously he's been lying about his identity since day one. But Anakin falls for it and goes to prevent Mace from getting medieval on Palpatine's ass. Right then and there he sees that Palpatine has killed several Jedi and is about to waste Mace. Now, I know Anakin doesn't like Mace very much but at that point he could have at least tried to stop Palpatine from trying to kill him.

What he does is the exact opposite. Mace gets killed. Anakin knows what he did was wrong. "What have I done..." And then what does he do? He looks evil right in the eye and then just decides, out of the blue, to join up with it. He does a 180 and kills all the Jedi at the Temple, even the kids, and he lets Palpatine get away with murdering all remaining Jedi. And a few hours later he kills his wife, the one person he was trying to save. So why did he join up with Palpatine again? In order to save one life he killed dozens of others. Every time he makes a wrong turn he knows it's wrong, he just goes ahead and does it all the same.

Whatever, maybe it will blow me away but I'm not counting on it. The script gave me a bad feeling and the clips I've seen aren't making it any better. Sure, maybe it's ripped out of context but I've seen the prequels enough times now to know what to expect from Lucas. The action will be great, the dialogue will be clunky, the delivery wooden, after the first half hour the action will die down and it won't pick up speed again till 45 minutes before the end. I don't see this being that much better than TPM and AOTC, it will probably be more of the same. Just a bit darker and moody and violent.

But hey, I won't actually see the damn thing till the 19th so don't take my word for it. I could be wrong and maybe it's the return of rock 'n roll, parts 1, 2 and 3.