So I went to see The Last Jedi, at the Screening Rooms, a more expensive experience than the main cinema, but the more comfortable chairs, and smaller number of seats both appealed to me. I didn't take advantage of the wait service to your seat for snacks and drinks, but I think they make a lot of their money that way. Anyway the audience were well behaved, I heard no random talking during the film and the going to the cinema experience was very positive. All of which was good as this is a longish film, not Lord of the Rings long, but apparently the second longest Star Wars film.
I had been carefully avoiding reviews, or even random posts on facebook about the film. So now I am reading them, a couple of positive reviews in the Guardian. Then I came across this one which was the one from the 2601 reviews that IMDB decided to show me.
It is a one star review.
The shameful end of the beloved story.If you follow the link above the person, or people, using this identity have posted two reviews, the other one spends quite a lot of time praising the Russian empire before the revolutions that led to Soviet Russia. I do find it funny that someone who genuinely thinks an evil empire was the best version of Russia has written a Star Wars review.
The movie seems to be made by a neural network. It's sewn from the same familiar patches: a space battle here, a joke there, a teacher and a student story, a battle between light and dark side of the force. The winner of the battle? A new, SHITTY side of the force.
Evil characters are not serious and just pathetic. The story is not real anymore: it's just another comic book where the laws of the universe are changing on the fly, and there's no real risk. Storylines mostly make no sense, rendering the characters' feelings as fake and overblown, giving the movie a touch of a soap opera.
It's quite obvious that here the director has nothing to say. Seems like a board of executives were voting up and down for every episode, fiddling with the movie in a fear that it won't earn enough. And here we are: the film is a politically correct product of corporate cowardice and creative impotence.
It's all especially painful for those who grew with the pure miracle and magic of the original movies. You know, there's always a faith. But this time it was destroyed in a really mean way.
So this all got me to thinking about the accusations of "politically correct product of corporate cowardice and creative impotence."
So corporate cowardice, yes it is a shame that many of the films currently being made at this level of blockbuster are franchise movies. I don't think the accusation that each scene was being ruthlessly fiddled with holds water.
So creative impotence and political correctness (spoilers start now).
Lots of strong female characters. Not only that though, Poe Dameron gets told off and demoted for a successful attack on a dreadnought because of the number of rebels killed, and because vice admiral Holdo won't tell him the secret plan he acts like a jerk and almost gets everyone killed. (There are other examples that androcentric people will not have enjoyed.)
The other big politically correct moment is when it becomes apparent that Rey is not descended from some famous Jedi. I know this has stirred up some controversy but I felt this was one of the best ideas in the film.
The other thing I felt was an interesting creative move was the end of the rebel fleet, because now the rebellion will have to be from the ground up.
There were bits I did not like, Leia's use of the force to save herself felt a bit hollow. And the pacing was a bit off.
All in all this is my favourite of the franchise.
