Upon its release critical reaction was mixed, some felt it lived up to expectations, many thought it failed to meet them. In either case this was never a movie that was really judged on its own merit, but rather how much people felt it did or did not live up to the years of hype and theor own expectations. As it stands movie review aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes ranks the film "Fresh" with a 64%.
Fan reaction was also mixed, and over the years has tended to remain so. The vocal haters of the film have gotten more and more vitriolic with their seething criticism and the fans quietly defend the film doing their best into getting dragged into a "George Lucas raped my childhood" debate. Again, most of the reaction to the film is emotional, based on perceived expectations in relation to the original films rather than against the film itself.
As a life long Star Wars fan who vividly remembers waiting in the rain for hours to see Empire with my dad, I initially liked the film quite a bit. It was a lot to take in the first viewing. There's this kid, and there was Jar Jar and I wasnt sure if Keira Knightly or Natalie Portman was really Queen Amidala, the dual bladed light saber, pod races, a weird looking Jabba...just lots of stuff. I saw the movie about 6-7 times during its theatrical run and eventually during that summer decided that I liked it well enough, probably as much as I had liked Return of the Jedi. It was not exactly what I had expected or envisioned the story being, but I tried to manage those expectations and judge the film on its own merit.
Watching the film again tonight, almost exactly 10 years after I had first seen it my feelings have not really changed much. It is a fine film, a fun film, and it holds up fairly well ten years out.
The opening of the film is fantastic. It looked and felt like Star Wars. Much of my criticism of recent pics such as Watchmen and Star Trek were that they did not feel much like their source material. Episode 1, felt like Star Wars. The opening with Qui-Gon (Liam Neeson), whom to this day is one of my favorite characters in the Star Wars universe, and his young apprentice Obi Wan Kenobi on the trade ship is great. We are quickly thrust into the action. We learn quickly and concisely all of the information we need to know. Darth Sidious is behind a seemingly small trade dispute over the planet Naboo. Being a prequel we know that these events are teetering on the presipice of galactic war, but even without knowing that, the way the rest of the film unfolds the "phantom menace" of the title reveals itself to be more far reaching than just a simple trade dispute. The Trade Federation tries to kill the Jedi and our heroes make an escape which sets in motion a number of events that domino throughout the movie leading us to the eventual "star wars". They meet and evacuate the queen and wind up on Tatooine where they meet boy Anakin.
Now, I'll pause for two things here. First Jar Jar. I have not mentioned him or bitched about him, because for all the hate levied at him, HE IS NOT THAT BIG OF A DEAL. He is a comic relief character. He's no more bad or annoying than Leo Getz, Joe Pesci's character in Lethal Weapon. Second Jake Lloyd. Boy Anakin. Yes his acting is bad. But remember how bad Mark Hammil's acting was in A New Hope? Lloyd is just a bit worse here, but for a kid in a movie series previously marred by bad acting; again just not that big of a deal. The bigger issue with Anakin is the perception that since he was to become Darth Vader many many people expected him to be some evil, devil child. There is a quite funny comedy bit online making fun of this movie and the comedian makes a point of this as well. The thing is, it was always established and accepted and understood that Anakin Skywalker was a classic archetype of the tragic fallen hero. We know at one point Anakin was part of the Jedi order. We know he was good friends with Obi Wan and we know he procreated. The expectation that Anakin as a kid would be evil and killing people with his as of yet unrefined force powers is plain silly. I would expect Anakin as a kid to be, well pretty much exactly how he was portrayed in this movie.
NOW it is a whole other point to rather or not we NEEDED to see this. As a story of boy Anakin, Episode 1 is fine. I had always expected that these 3 movies would be more like on pace that we would see Vader, maybe not in suit, but the transformation to the dark side by mid way through Episode 2 and that Episode 3 would be the clone wars with Vader on the dark side. To me Episode 1 really should have been like an Episode Zero. The prequel to the prequels. But my expectations are not what was in Lucas' head and I can accept and manage that.
Again I am judging this movie against itself, not against the other three and not against my expectations.
So yeah, Lloyd's acting is terrible, but as a character it is what I would imagine Anakin as a boy would have been.
The story itself I think is well paced and interesting. Seeing the seeds of the coming war. Seeing the cloak of the darkside emerge. It is all done slowly and deliberately. The fun is knowing that Palpatine is Sidious. And Ian McDirmid reprising his role as Palpatine from the orginal trilogy is fantastic. He plays the good Senator from Naboo as straight as they come and plays the always hidden Dark Lord with a crunchy/crusty/evilness which you can tell he just relishes (and which he would perfect with his awesome scene chewing take on the role in Episode 3).
Having the genesis of the trade federations war with the republic take place on the serene and peaceful Naboo is a tip of the hat to Alderran and gives us a people that we can relate to care about, and of course conveniently give us Luke and Leia's mom.
Of course we get loads of great lightsaber action, especially from the villain Darth Maul. Maul is a secondary character, a place holder, just there to keep Vader's place warm. But what a villain. Part Terminator, part Vader, part Satan, all bad ass. His presence on screen is impressive. The look is menacing, the skills are awesome. And that double bladed saber? Come on that cancels out a little bad acting, no?
The action is top notch. The opening as mentioned above is great, lots of saber work and force use. The pod race is thrilling and amazingly presented. The battles are done well and are appropriate. The familiar ending with 3 separate action pieces; the battle on Naboo, the battle above Naboo and the awesome, awesome lightsaber battle with Kenobi, Jinn and Maul, is paced well and handled as good if not better than the same scenario in Return of the Jedi with the battle on Endor, the battle above Endor and the awesome, awesome lightsaber battle between Vader and Skywalker.
The subtle winks at the fans of the original trilogy, like the Sand People, and Jawas and the way the camera lingers on Palpatine at Jinn's funeral...all great. The music is off the charts. Just fantastic as always. The special effects are amazing and mostly hold up well today.
Overall, I am not ashamed to say I really still like this movie and that I think its pretty darn good.
That being said it is far from perfect and I am willingly able to acknowledge the films shortcomings. The acting as I stated earlier is mostly bad, like most of the acting in all Star Wars movies. Lloyd is terrible. Portman is stilted. Sam Jackson is terribly wooden. Yoda is a freaking puppet. There are some exceptions though, McDirmad of course as Palpatine is great as is Neeson as the sage like Qui Gon Jinn. Some of the dialogue is cringe worthy ("That's so wizard Ani" "Are you an angel?") for example. Rik Olie exists apparently to only deliver bland mostly unneeded exposition. Jabba looks terrible. Anakin accidentally destroying the droid ship is stupid. Midichlorians? Midiwhateverians...
But in the end, overall this is a fun movie; a Star Wars movie. And I like it.
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