“Star Wars: The Phantom Menace” – what remains of the film
The triumph of “The Matrix” at the Oscars was described as a “turning point”. The movie with the slow-motion gun bullets won in the special effects category over the one that previously dominated every year it competed at the Academy Awards: “Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.” “Star Wars” creator George Lucas was punished. The Wachowski brothers were named the makers of the best sci-fi film of 1999.
How times change: Precisely because the slo-mo trick (“bullet time”) with the camera rotating around a frozen object seemed so new back then, “The Matrix” has aged poorly. To this day, no other film could recreate these scenes without seeming like a bad plagiarism. But many have done it. That’s why “The Matrix” can no longer be identified as the original. Even the “Simpsons” had understood this and had long since shown a parody of the shooting duels. “The Matrix” is stuck in its time.
“The Phantom Menace” is of course also an old-fashioned film. Tragically, in contrast to the “Matrix” – in his time. All of the rigid actors, especially Liam Neeson (as Jedi Qui-Gonn Jinn), seem as if he couldn’t act in front of a green screen with placeholders and fantasy characters that had to be added later. Obi-Wan (Ewan McGregor) has short hair with pigtails, a hairstyle that should never have been accepted in 1999. The already hinted love story between a child (Jake Lloyd) and a young woman (Natalie Portman) is unreasonable. Director Lucas may not have dared to give the boy a girl of the same age because he wanted Portman there from part one.
Watto with the crooked nose
It is also debatable whether Lucas was prepared to stir up prejudices when depicting aliens. There’s the aimlessly strolling, good-natured but somewhat witless Jar-Jar Binks; many saw it as a parody of a Jamaican. The devious dealer Watto, always planning fraud, with the crooked nose and an Eastern Bloc accent; and the all-blocking Trade Federalists, who were given French accents. The French, when nothing else works, are still the Americans’ favorite enemies.
Trade Federation, even more: Galactic Senate and punitive tariffs, none of that sounded like “Star Wars” material. It wasn’t what you would have expected after a 16-year break from Star Wars. The saga was not political until then. She only knew black and white, good and evil. It was only “Rogue One” from 2016 that proved that politics could work there. But only because politics was conveyed through battle scenes that stood for Syria and Vietnam. Not because, as in “Menace”, aliens are debating in a cosmic plenary hall (which, at the level of movement of a “Playstation 2” effect, even Spielberg’s “ET” is present).
After all, George Lucas wanted to create a broad arc here, a more extensive mythology than the first three of his works contained. “The Phantom Menace” – “The Phantom Menace” is a good title because, unlike all the others, it doesn’t actually give anything away. That doesn’t save the film, but it shows greater courage than JJ Abrams with “The Force Awakens.” In 2015, Disney essentially retold the very first film, 1977’s A New Hope.
“There is always a bigger fish”
However, as a funny retro homage with cleverly used nostalgic images (Star Destroyers stranded in the sand) as well as a novel staging of old icons (TIE fighter in the “Apocalypse Now” sunset), this work was still far ahead of all three prequels. Because it was staged in a modern way: everything looked good, was multi-ethnic, sounded good, and actors like John Boyega and Daisy Ridley, although the same age as McGregor and Portman back then, were relaxed, even when dealing with the old people, i.e. Leia , Han and Luke.
There are isolated moments that make “The Phantom Menace” a film that is better than its reputation. “There is always a bigger fish,” says Qui-Gonn as he and his companions escape from a sea beast that was targeting them and then gets eaten. A simple saying, but no less stupid than some of what Yoda said. Qui-Gonn realized that survival is luck and that even as a Jedi you cannot control your fate.
Darth Maul may be more popular than Kylo Ren
In the final spurt of the film, Lucas dares to stage a battle from four narrative perspectives (laser sword duel, Anakin in space, forest and meadow battle, Padme in the palace), something that has never happened before or since in “Star Wars”. Assembly even works. Laser sword duel: It was the right decision not to build the Sith Lord Darth Maul as Darth Vader’s successor, that would have no chance, that’s why he dies – unexpectedly? – right at the end of the first prequel.
But his few words are so precise, his fighting style is so convincing, his origins are so unclear that his myth has grown over the years. No wonder Maul’s surprise appearance in last year’s Solo film was considered a highlight. Darth Maul may be more popular than Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), the young adult antagonist from the new “Star Wars” films. It would probably be the only victory for a prequel character over The Force Awakens. In addition, on the plus side there is the battle motif “Duel of the Fates”, Maul against Obi-Wan and Qui-Gonn, the last memorable “Star Wars” melody by John Williams to date, for which the composer (perhaps inspired by his music). “Amistad” two years earlier) put a choir in the spotlight more prominently than ever before.
“Star Wars: The Phantom Menace”: not a good children’s film?
Princess Padme is framed by two maids, which means: Natalie Portman with the not yet well-known Keira Knightley and Sofia Coppola in the same picture. It’s a great ensemble. But there is still a point of criticism from many fans and critics that is worth arguing about. The essential one.
Did George Lucas “betray the legacy of Star Wars” because “The Phantom Menace” became a “children’s film”? With an eleven-year-old main character who shouts “Whoa!” when he fires the laser cannon and also handles everything else like in a teleplay? In a world that is entirely childlike, with cute aliens from the sea and even imperial robots that are clumsy?
By 1983’s “Return of the Jedi” it should have been clear that Lucas always wanted cute story elements for his narrative. With the Ewoks and Jabba’s creatures he achieved his goal, the masks were ready. “Threat” is therefore a development of “Jedi Knight” and has nothing to do with “treason” (as if you could betray someone to whom you had promised nothing).
“I’m sorry, but this isn’t a good children’s film.”
What’s more annoying is the claim to be able to judge that this film doesn’t work because it’s a children’s film. Most of these critical experts are adults. One can of course be disappointed that “The Phantom Menace” is aimed at a slightly younger audience than “A New Hope”, after all the first “Star Wars” to which Lucas owes his career and his billions (even if he initially made his fortune through toys -Licensing built up, lake!). But whether “Menace” with Sebulba, the Gungans and Little Ani and his Midis is suitable as a children’s film, this decision should best be left to the relevant age group. It is also difficult to imagine that aging SW fanboys had previously supported their theses with representative surveys among minors. There are no reports that a single girl or boy ever protested: “I’m sorry, but this isn’t a good children’s film.”
It’s worth watching the “threat” with children. You don’t think the film is any better because of that. But learn this: It could happen that children find Jar-Jar Binks more exciting than Boba Fett.