The new STAR WARS: My review

The final STAR WARS (final as in Cher’s “Final” tour) is of course a boxoffice smash. Director/co-writer, J.J. Abrams tries to tie up all loose ends. So everyone except Jar Jar Binks seems to make a cameo appearance. As someone who has seen many of the STAR WARS movies but not all, there were a few times I was saying “Who’s that?” (or “What’s that?”)

Personal flashback: I saw the very first STAR WARS in a preview screening. I had no idea what it was about going in. Within ten minutes I was knocked on my ass. It was maybe the most fun I ever had watching a movie. The film was so fresh and exciting that even the clunky dialogue and Carrie Fisher’s ear buns didn’t bother me. The next few episodes were highly entertaining, but nothing matches “your first time.”

Once Jar Jar Binks and Natalie Portman and trumped up absurd plots started filling the IMAX screen my zeal for the franchise subsided. Way more fun was to go on the Star Tours ride at Disneyland than watch a new installment.

This final chapter should be called STAR WARS: EVERYBODY LOVES REY. Daisy Ridley stars again as Rey, leading a politically correct very diverse crew on yet another journey to save the world. (Droids Lives Matter) Adam Driver is along to provide actual acting in the film. And Oscar Isaac tries his best to be Tom Cruise.

I apologize to all the STAR WARS faithful who will doubtless watch this chapter a hundred times, but for me it was one long string of every cliché and battle scene from the franchise. What makes a sequence thrilling is not the CGI effects, it’s the fact that we’re seeing something NEW. And in this picture there was NOTHING new. Meticulously staged and filmed but NOTHING new.

And worse, several of the same scenes were repeated over and over. How many characters can be told they have what it takes by wise (and often dead) elders? How many times do they have to remind each other that if they don’t succeed with this mission that everything that has gone before will have been for nothing? I’ll answer that question. At least ten.

Now for a lot of fans, they don’t care. That, in fact, is what they want. But after a half hour I was already yawning.

And this time the clunky dialogue DID get to me. “What are you most afraid of?” “Myself.” “Don’t tell me what you think. Tell me what you are.” “Don’t blame yourself.” “I will always be here. I will live within you.”

Ugh!!!

And to hammer home these trite nuggets of overwrought palaver, John Williams score is so intrusive and on-the-nose you want to ask for two of his Oscars back.

Again, none of this matters if you’re a STAR WARS fanatic. I’m sure it was gut wrenching to have to say goodbye to these beloved characters. But for the rest of us, this final chapter was the dinner party where the guests should have left two hours ago.

from By Ken Levine