The whole series sometimes feel like a cover from Thrilling Wonder Stories, come to life. Set against awesome backdrops, the characters in "The Phantom Menace" inhabit a plot that is little more complex than the stories I grew up on in science-fiction magazines. And the other cities: one city Venetian, with canals, another looking like a hothouse version of imperial Rome, and a third that seems to have grown out of desert sands. And other places: the cityscape with the waterfall that has a dizzying descent through space. The Senate chamber, a vast sphere with senators arrayed along the inside walls, and speakers floating on pods in the center. Consider the underwater cities, floating in their transparent membranes. There are new places here-new kinds of places.
Unlike many movies, these are made to be looked at more than listened to, and George Lucas and his collaborators have filled "The Phantom Menace" with wonderful visuals. I do not attend with the hope of gaining insights into human behavior. Anakin is only a fresh-faced kid in Episode I in IV, V and VI, he has become Darth Vader.Īt the risk of offending devotees of the Force, I will say that the stories of the "Star Wars" movies have always been space operas, and that the importance of the movies comes from their energy, their sense of fun, their colorful inventions and their state-of-the-art special effects. Here we first see Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker, Yoda and R2-D2 and C-3PO. If some of the characters are less than compelling, perhaps that's inevitable: This is the first story in the chronology and has to set up characters who (we already know) will become more interesting with the passage of time. "Star Wars: Episode I-The Phantom Menace," to cite its full title, is an astonishing achievement in imaginative filmmaking.
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