IV, V, VI, III, II, I
There was recently a marathon of all six Star Wars films on cable. I was interested to see how many stars each got. On a system of one to four, here's what my TV told me:
I: 3 stars
II: 2 stars
III: 3 stars
IV: 4 stars
V: 4 stars
VI: 3 stars
I don't think anyone's gonna argue with IV or V, and I got no problem with VI. But the ranking of the first trilogy is odd. All three films have considerable weaknesses, but it seems to me each is better than the last, so the first beating the second seems a bit odd. (On the other hand, the worst moments of II are worse than than anything else in the series, so maybe they have a point.)
posted by LAGuy @ 12:03 AM
4 Comments:
Seems a pretty fair ranking except for Episode I (which I would give only 1 star-for all its expositional necessity, it nearly wrecked the franchise) and 2.5 for Episode II which had some fun action with strange beasts despite some other cloying scenes. My 10 ten year old son would probably say Episode III was the best (what do kids know?) and while think it was far better than Episodes I and II, it can't recapture the shock and awe of the very first movie- episode IV- (which, as much as I like it, as I have written before, doesn't really travel as well to the newer generations).
Is "Gone With The Wind" still popular with younger women? While the story is about Civil War society, the film seems to capture 1930s notions of romance and propriety (much the same way the original Star Wars captured the 1970s)
We are blind to our current circumstances so I can't tell if future generations will think any of our current crop of films (I mean the ones ostensibly about other subjects) captures the Oughts.
Fire away.
I would go with your "other hand." I couldn't get past learning the royalty was elected on Naboo (why call Amidala (sp?) a Queen if she is a President or Prime Minister). It made sense to have this teenager ruling the whole planet if she inherited the position, but otherwise it was never explained how she got the position.
I also was mostly unimpressed with III. Only saw it once, don't feel like seeing it again ("NOOOOOOOOO"). I'd give them both 2/4, and Episode I could get by with a 3/4.
I think it's appropriate to defer to the target audience, the kids, on this one. My 7-year-old ranks them as IV, V, III, VI, I then finally II, although he thinks they're all good, and his top ten favorite scenes include the big light-saber fight with all of the Jedi and the development of the clones, both in II.
My least favorite part of the newer Star Wars movies is that they seem to have started the "prequel movement", so now we have to suffer through Hannibal, Rocky and other "how it all began" sagas.
Along the "lines of demarcation" theme mentioned in the oldies-vs.-classic-rock thread, the first Star Wars movie (IV) marked the arrival of ultra-mega special effects never before seen. We all experienced the shock and awe because we were young and because it was so spectacular. The three newer Star Wars movies happened after we got older and reached "special effects fatigue", demanding instead good script writing and acting, something kids care little about.
The question about whether or not younger women appreciate the romance of GWTW is interesting, although I loved watching 30's, 40's & 50's-era movies when I was a kid, so girls these days may as well. It's hard to say how much girs today appreciate the past. Hollywood must not think they do--I was very upset by recent movie trailers for the new Nancy Drew movie, which portrays Nancy as a socially clueless girl even though her status or her concern with such things was never brought up in the books (and I would know since I read all of my mother's, in which she sported a "Titian bob" hairdo and drove a roadster, and my own complete library, in which she has a strawberry blonde flip hairdo and drives a convertible).
Geez, how'd I get from Star Wars to Nancy Drew? Too much coffee today....
I think young fanboys still love Star Wars IV and V. (Remember how huge these films were when rereleased in the late 90s?) I also believe young women still like Gone With The Wind. If New England Guy has any evidence otherwise I'd like to hear it.
III is the best of that trilogy, but I agree with denver guy that the "Noooooo" moment is a low point. In fact, it's especially egregious since nothing that had ever come out of that mask up to that point had been uncool.
It sounds like Lynette's 7-year-old gave out the stars. And he's right--there are some pretty good sabre fights in I and II.
I myself still love old movies--some from before my parents' time--and I believe that most people would like the best films of the past if they could just see them, and see them under the right circumstances (preferably with an audience).
I saw the trailer for Nancy Drew. It seemed to me they were giving her the Brady Bunch treatment, where she's essentially from another time. Is she considered so hopelessly square they felt they had to acknowledge it?
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