Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace in 3D review

9th Feb 2012

George Lucas must surely be into some sort of nasty S&M. If you go back to 1997 when the “Special Editions” of the original Star Wars trilogy hit theatres there was a bit of a backlash on the changes he had made to these films. Then the “Prequel Trilogy” came along and he suffered an immense amount of backlash for that. Then he tinkered with the original trilogy again for home release to tie them closer to the new films and suffered more scathing comments. Then just mere months ago he made even more amendments to the films for the Blu-ray release (including a repetition of that god awful “Noooooooo!” that everyone laughed at him for.) More recently he has been having yet more fan and critic backlash about the film he has produced, Red Tails. Honestly how much stick can one man take?

Well in Lucas’ case, obviously this is not enough. No, not content with all of that he has decided that, even with the critic and fan’s sceptical view on 3D as nothing more than a money making tool, he will go back and retrofit 3D to all six of the Star Wars movies and we are going to get these one a year. So, potentially it’s personal torture for the next six years. George, you are a sicko!

Accepting the fact that this film will have very little altered, if anything, about the plot and it is realistically all about whether it will work in 3D – this review won’t waste too much time on plot details. Suffice to say it is the first chapter of the journey of Anakin Skywalker’s trip to the dark side of the force.

It is worth noting that whilst Episode I is perhaps one of the least well regarded of the franchise it does look good on a big screen. There are a few effects shots that haven’t dated too well, and sometimes it can look like a bit of a cartoon. But on the big screen is where these films belong, there is no denying that. There is also no denying John Williams very strong score for this film.

The cast are varied, with Liam Neeson coming out on top – but a special note must go out to the costume designer for Natalie Portman’s character who looks sumptuous in the variety of Eastern and oriental influenced garbs she gets to wear, a shame her heavy American accent gets in the way when she drops her guise.

Now to the 3D. Well this one isn’t going to convert any non believers. Those who are easily pleased by the 3D of any film will obviously find much to get on with. The problem with post conversion is that it can all still look a bit too flat. Far too often they have the object closest to the camera stand out (often the back of someone’s head whilst another actor faces them doing the talking.) But all too often the second character and the entire background are completely flat therefore destroying any sense of there being a third dimension to the scene outside of one small element. I had to remove the glasses to confirm this in several places and the only blurred section of the screen was that one element that was worked on; the rest of the screen was in perfect focus.

A shame then that such a haphazard approach was applied. With some luck Lucasfilm will work on this over the next year for the Episode II conversion. In the meantime we can look forward to what James Cameron has done with Titanic when it reaches us in April.

Star Wars Ep I 3D is still going to be a hit as there is just such a devoted fan base to the franchise. Lucasfilm could have made far less effort than they have here and got away with it. But it may well be the fan reaction that helps to dictate what is done or altered with the next release.