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Star Wars - Episode II, Attack of the Clones (Full Screen Edition)

Star Wars - Episode II, Attack of the Clones (Full Screen Edition)

List Price: $19.98
Your Price: $13.99
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: "Padme...you're my density..."
Review: First of all, I couldn't decide whether to give three or four stars. I finally decided four just could not be justified, so it's really more like 3.5/5 from me. So, as you know by now, this is not a great movie, but it's better than Episode I by a considerable margin. The special effects are great and seamless (moments in Episode I and especially the ones added to the 3 original SW films were quite flawed). The asteroid chase and rain planet and Yoda's lightsaber duel were all memorable. I noticed some grainy scenes in the theater, but everything looks good -- almost TOO good -- on the DVD. The plot this time around is less convoluted and more coherent and flows more naturally from scene to scene. The video and surround audio are both reference quality on this DVD, and there's enough extras to keep the most ardent fans busy for a long time. 'Nuff said about that -- no complaints at all there.

But alas, the characters and their interactions with each other, is the film's downfall, due to poor acting, directing, and screenwriting. I appreciated trying to add some romantic facets, but the dialogue is laughably bad in many scenes, and certain actors are so blandly disinterested they cannot overcome the material to convince us otherwise. Hayden Christiansen is simply awful, there is no other way to put it. The annoying, forgettable, hokey child actor in Episode I has been replaced by an annoying, forgettable, hokey teenage actor here. Natalie Portman is only slightly less wooden than in Episode I, which must be blamed on the direction, because in other places she's proved herself to be a competent actor. And although I generally like him, I never quite bought Samuel Jackson as a Jedi Knight. He goes through the entire film with an odd look on his face and I get the distinct feeling he was always on the verge of breaking into laughter reading his lines. Christopher Lee and Ewan McGregor are the only actors worthy of the roles, along, of course, with the vocal talent that gives the CG Yoda life. Thankfully the insipid Jar Jar Binks is less prominent in this film, although even after five seconds he begins to grate on you. I guess he had to put in an appearance so they could pump another action figure into Toy 'R' Us stores around the world. As for the direction, Lucas needs to just give it up and let someone who knows what they are doing handle it. He is NOT a great director. His two best films, Empire and Raiders, were directed by someone other than him. There was some great screen chemistry in the original Star Wars but it must have just been stars-aligning dumb luck, since he has never been able to reproduce it since.

Reading this you might think I hated this movie, but I actually didn't. You just need to let yourself become a kid again for a few hours and ignore the bad things. Then it just becomes fun, and if you are expecting something more from a Star Wars film then you aren't being realistic. The first three Star Wars films also had lots of bad acting, bad screenwriting, uneven direction, cheesy special effects, and a ridiculous plot but we never saw that, because we were young and unjaded and had no preconceptions or expectations for the films to live up to, and we were experiencing instead of analyzing as we watched. If you can force yourself to do the same here, you'll enjoy it.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Dear George, Please don't write the screenplay to Ep.III
Review: Okay, here are the basics:
Pros
1) Good action and effects
2) as always, great saber battles.
3) Love the clone troopers!

Cons
1) No character development
2) Terrible dialogue
3) weak story

Here's my theory:
1) ILM runs the show at LucasArts.
2) Lucas has had this story in his head for too long and has forgotten why any of these characters should be doing any of the things they're doing. For instance: someone tell me WHY should Amidala fall in love with Anakin? What's to love? The sulk? The groan and moan?
3) Lucas can't direct actors. He can direct effects guys and puppets, but not humans, and especially not children (see Ep 1 for more than enough evidence of that!)

Lucas should have done with AOTC what he did with 'Empire Strikes Back'... provide the architecture of the story to an able writer who can pen the screenplay. And hand the directing duties over to a real director.

Overall, I just think Lucas has been reading too much of his own press.
But... I've been a Star Wars fan my whole life.. it's not like I can stop now.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Trash Wars
Review: I've been a Star Wars fan since the first movie, what is now called a "New Hope", came out in 1977. I was thirteen at the time. The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi were both great movies, very worthy successors to the original movie.
I've just seen Attack of the Clones. It is one of the worst pieces of garbage I've ever seen. The acting, if you can call it that, was just plain bad. Dialog? Plot? Don't worry about stuff like that, this movie does not have any. It was like I was watching Friends.
My four year old loved it. The thing was written for people with the mentality of a four year old.
I've written far more than this dog deserves. Don't see it. It's bad.

I rate this move -6.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: FORMULA STILL WORK AND DIGITAL DAZZLES
Review: The first digitally filmed live action mainstream feature film to be transferred to DVD, STAR WARS EPISODE 11: ATTACK OF THE CLONES is itself a perfect clone and even better looking on disc than on the big theater screen.

What can you say about this popular series that has not already been said? Not much. More than anything else, this episode on DVD is a technological marvel that illustrates the fact that anything imagined can now be filmed in a photo realistic style. On the other extreme, I have been told that in some parts of the world, religious groups have begun meeting regularly with a systematic theology built around elements from the Star Wars films.

The production design of Attack of the Clones, and its digital realization, is stupendous in its scope and detail. The action scenes are often staggering in their sustained intensity and cleverness. However, the formula and structure reflect all the other Star Wars episodes. Perhaps that familiarity is intentional. Seen as a whole, single story (admittedly one episode short), it is still interesting to consider the fall and redemption themes around the character we already know will become Darth Vader. And the future son, Luke Skywalker (Luke Skywalker = Luke S = Lucas?) who rescues and "saves" his father. Possible personal themes aside, certainly elements of world myth and even primitive Christianity are embedded on Lucas' digital canvas.

Is it meaningful or relevant? Check out the political themes sometime. There's a blatant message unfolding. Unfortunately, most if not all of the talky scenes are boringly expository or seemingly pointless. But to its credit, the flow of eye-popping images carry the film in spite of the stiff, self-conscious performance from Hayden Christianson in the central role. In several scenes Natalie Portman actually glows, but she looks uncomfortable in action sequences.

When Lucas is done with his six part epic space opera in 2005, it might be fun to see the whole thing edited down to a two-hour feature. Lucas gives great extras and unlike Spielberg, is not so full of himself that he dare not narrate a commentary lest he "compromise" the movie's "integrity" and spoil the "purity" of the film experience. In fact, Lucas dares to actually explains the plot points from the author's perspective. Bravo. Recommended.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Forget The Critics Decide for Yourself
Review: Speaking of critics, is anything critically acclaimed ever worth watching? If you're a true fan of Star Wars you'll enjoy Episode 2. The Dvd is by far the best Dvd I own and surpasses the Episode 1 DvD. The second disk features many documentaries, deleted scenes(which are definitle worth viewing), trailers, tv spots, and more. There's also a blooper real you can unlock like the one on Phantom Menace. The picture and sound quality are magnificent. The money and effort put into this dvd are well worth the purchase.
Now about the story. There's many things I love about the story that add to the original trilogy. Of course we get to see the beginning of The Clone Wars which is my favorite action part of this movie besides the many lightsaber duels, even one including Yoda. I beleive the third episode will hold the most action and will be the darkest off all the films. The commentary gives you much insight and hints of things to come.
The origin of Boba Fett. And speaking of Boba Fett there was a scene on Kamino I remember watching in the theatres but is not on the DvD. It's where Boba and Jango are preparing to leave Kamino and Obi Wan comes out on the deck. Boba is talking about the controls on the Slave 1 and this scene helps to show how fast Boba is adapting to technology and Jango is proud of him.
Anakin's first steps down the dark side and his friendship with Chancelor Palpatine.
There are also many other great tidbits a Star Wars fan will enjoy. If you love Star Wars you'll love Episode 2.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Would You People Wake Up!
Review: I have read all these narrow minded cynical reviews from people. Who are one not fans and two don't know an excellent film when they see it. Okay TPM was flawed so many flaws I can't list but with this latest installment there is so much improvement and yet people still feel the need to put it down. These are people with nothing better to do.

AOTC is a better than most films that have come out this year and even for a Star Wars film it lives to the name what it doesn't live up to are the unrealistic expectations of people who are too hung up on the original trilogy yes it is not the old triogly but it still holds up why is it Lucas's fault that people have grown more negative and harsh over the years. These people need the wake if this was any other film people would say it was great but no they expect it to live up to this unrealistic stardard to live up to the name well news flash it did and you are just expecting to much out of this film if you can't see this film for what it is then you are just negative and worse you are not a true fan a true fan would see past the whatever flaws this film may have and still enjoy it as a great and nothing else.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: What's with the blocky subtitles?
Review: Fantastic picture and sound, the best. My complaint however, is whenever a non-english speaking character pipes up, the font looks like it's on a 320x240 screen. It's distractingly bad. I'm left wondering how that happened.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: "Gidget" meets "Gladiator" meets "The Jetsons"
Review: I used to be a Star Wars fanatic. But the script to Attack of Clones was incoherent, the acting - especially Hayden Christiansen - wasn't as good as what you could expect in most high school junior class plays, and the special effects were dazzling to the point of distraction. Nothing could detract from the fact that George Lucas has lost touch with what made the original movies so good. If you are a pre-teen to teen, the Young Miss crowd or its male equivilant, you'll love this. But if you are a fan of the previous movies, save yourself the disappointment...

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Great film but where is the widescreen Video version?
Review: My only compaint about the film is there is no widescreen video version. You loose half the picture.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Breathtaking DVD transfer - 5 Stars, Movie - 3 Stars
Review: Watching Attack of the Clones on DVD is an awesome experience as you can see the beautiful digital print transferred to digital format in all of its glory. This DVD transfer shows what DVDs can truly be and will make you want to go out and buy the biggest HDTV that you can get with a state-of-the-art sound system to go with it just to do justice to it. The asteroid belt scene is a truly spectacular example as not only do the special effects just look gorgeous you also have the sound transfer which is awesome, no more excellent an example can be found than when Jango uses the seismic charges and the moment of absolute "dead" right as the charge explodes and then the aftershock spreads. Always my favorite scene in the theatre and transfers beautifully to the home theatre experience. (I turned up my sound system and rewound a couple of times to just glory in it.)

The commentaries are interesting and insightful and the extras are good, though not quite on par with some of the stuff off of Episode I's DVD but nice altogether. The menus were nicely animated and fun. The deleted scenes were much better in quality than Episode I's deleted scenes but seeing them made me disagree with 3 of the scenes being cut while others being left in. I would personally have preferred the deleted scene of Obi-Wan and Mace on the Jedi Landing Platform than the one that was ultimately filmed in its place with Obi-Wan, Mace and Yoda in the Temple as I felt it worked better than the film version which always felt to me to be lacking (plus the beautiful shot of the Jedi Starfighter taking off and going out to orbit to match up with the hyperdrive module was awesome), the Extended Arrival on Naboo added to the story and wasn't so long as to make it drag (compared to a LOT of the painfully awkward "love" scenes dialogue) and should have been left intact and finally the scene at Padme's Parents' House should most certainly have been left in as it helped so much with the love story between Anakin and Padme, which was just not convincing in the theatrical print. The scene in Padme's Parents' House on the other hand DID make you feel the love story and it is a true shame it was cut. My personal preference would have been for Clones to have been the IMAX version with these three scenes left in or in addition to. The IMAX version basically is what Clones should have been as it got rid of all the very painful to watch, groan-inducing stilted love dialogue. The 3 deleted scenes I mention would have been a welcome addition to the IMAX version. While the other deleted scenes were okay, they were indeed best left cut along with the roughly 20 minutes cut out of the IMAX print.


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