Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with my thoughts on the biggest indie flick to come out this year... perhaps of all time. And before someone demands my head for calling STAR WARS EPISODE III: REVENGE OF THE SITH an indie flick, remember it was all funded out of Lucas' own pocket... that 20th Century Fox logo is the distribution deal Lucas struck. If that ain't indie, I don't know what is.

Anyway, I'm going to be dropping light spoilers throughout, but there are a couple scenes I have to spotlight near the end of the movie... don't worry, I'll drop some big red spoiler alerts before I delve into that subject matter.

My history with STAR WARS... I'll try to keep it brief, but I think it's a good idea to know where I'm coming from as a fan, especially since there seems to be different levels of STAR WARS fans. Having been born in 1981, I don't have a memory of seeing any of the original trilogy for the first time. I have no pre-STAR WARS memory. As long as I've been able to retain memories STAR WARS has been in my life. I had hundreds of toys as a kid... I wore out at least 3 copies of each movie on VHS.

I have vivid memories of visiting STAR TOURS at Disneyland and for the majority of my childhood I had a couple STAR WARS prints bought at the STAR TOURS attraction that featured Ralph McQuarrie artwork (Luke on the Taun-Taun) up on my bedroom wall.

Cut to today. I've graduated somewhat. Instead of mass produced prints I have an original STAR WARS 3-sheet, an EMPIRE STRIKES BACK 1-sheet and Lobby Cards up on my walls. I love all three Original Trilogy films (sans SE... yeah, I'm one of those people that can't stand the cartoons Lucas plopped into the OT, but that's a whole other rant that I won't start here).

I waited in line for over 2 weeks for THE PHANTOM MENACE. That was a good time and then the movie. I tried so very hard to like THE PHANTOM MENACE. I tried to logically excuse some of the criticisms I had... "Jake Lloyd played a kid... that's what he wanted, that's what he was... a child... a whiny, bratty, overacting child..." I went back and watched it a few times theatrically... I kept thinking "I love STAR WARS, I love Ewan McGregor, I love Natalie Portman... why am I not loving this movie?"

I was weary when going into ATTACK OF THE CLONES and while I didn't have such a negative reaction, I didn't really like it. I hated that while they took away Jar Jar, they seemed to have put his spirit into C-3PO. "What a drag!" makes me steaming mad. It's one thing to appeal to children, it's another thing entirely to pander to them. The romance felt cold, the dialogue difficult to swallow and Anakin was not what was promised in the Original Trilogy.

THE CLONE WARS. Fantastic. Moments of stupidity (3PO stripping down to show off his gold plating to sexy jazz) surrounded by the most imaginative and exciting takes on the Jedi and what I've always imagined the most powerful Jedi at the top of their games would be doing. The story I always wanted to see told, scenes that I'm pissed I don't get in live action (Anakin's initiation into the Jedi Knighthood, for instance) and badass Jedi action. I didn't mind the Jedi being super powerful... actually if you pay attention to EMPIRE ("No different. Only different in your mind.") this is exactly what I was expecting to see from the Jedi, what the promise of those who were most in tune with the force should have been able to achieve.

So, all that is to say I'm a gonzo fan for the OT, not so hot on the prequels, although there are moments in each that are great, casting that is great and some set-up that is genuinely subtle and perfect. Here are my ratings of each film as they stand at this very moment (keep in mind I've only seen ROTS once) on a scale from 1-10.

THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: 10

STAR WARS (A New Hope): 9.5

RETURN OF THE JEDI: 8.5

REVENGE OF THE SITH: 8.0

ATTACK OF THE CLONES: 5.5

THE PHANTOM MENACE: 3

As you can see, I'm quite happy with REVENGE OF THE SITH... I know some will call foul on placing RETURN OF THE JEDI above it, but I'll get to why in a minute.

The first half of REVENGE OF THE SITH is exactly what I wanted from the prequels. The relationship between Obi-Wan and Anakin feels comfortable and friendly. We are finally shown the decent person inside Anakin for the first time in any of the prequels, which helps sell lines like "He's like a brother to me." His whining is kept to a minimum and his pilot skills are shown in their full glory promised when Sir Alec Guiness reminisced about the person Anakin was way back in EMPIRE.

The Dooku fight is good, with Christopher Lee really upping the taunts (which I loved in ATTACK OF THE CLONES... I love the idea of a Sith taunting the Jedi he's fighting). However this fight really doesn't have any drama to it. I never got a sense of the give and take of a good sword battle. Christopher Lee has been slammed for his performance in this film in some of the early reviews, but the look in his eyes... Just look at his face at the end of the sword fight. He's great. Some of the CG doubles stand out a little too much in this scene, but for the most part it's a solid bit of action that leads to some great drama for Anakin and a nice bit from Palpatine. So, you could say the real drama in this duel is what it leads in to, which is fair.

I guess this is good a place as any to talk about the lightsaber duels. Intense and the best stuff since Maul v. Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon. Everybody does good work, be it Mace, Yoda, Anakin, Obi-Wan, Grievous or Palpatine. However, I did really notice a lack of drama to most of the duels in the film (with the exception being the Anakin Obi-Wan duel... although even that wasn't fully what I wanted it to be). There are a few moments in the big duel in PHANTOM MENACE that are not topped. I love the big moments, like the Qui-Gon meditating while Maul aggressively paces back and forth, but I also loved the small things, especially where the force is used, like when Maul opens the door with quick motion that sends a droid's head to hit the door release. I was expecting to see them build upon that in this film and didn't really get it, just more force pushes.

The final duel between Obi-Wan and Anakin is fantastic, however the part that most sticks to mind isn't any part of the duel, but the moments preceding it (a great stare-down by both as they circle each other) and the moments directly after it. The end of the duel is heartbreaking, but not because of what happens to Anakin, but because of how Obi-Wan reacts to it. I miss that drama peppered into the duels, though. And here is where I'll get my nuts roasted... This is why I prefer RETURN OF THE JEDI to ROTS.

I can understand people not liking Ewoks. I understand people hating the neutering of Han Solo even more... But I hold that the best material in any of the STAR WARS films is the drama between Luke and Vader, the son trying to redeem his father. Then when you get the triangle of Luke, Vader and the Emperor... I just love the poking and prodding there, the mind-fucking the Emperor gives Luke and how he knows how to push the right buttons to nudge him into acting out. While the duel in ROTJ might not be as flashy and fast-paced "grab you by the nuthairs exciting" as the prequel's fights, so much more was at stake. The very crippling of the Rebel Alliance or Empire hinged on Luke, who was in a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. Luke's temptation to use his anger, his decision to throw away his saber... So much about his character, Palpatine's character and Vader's character is shown in that sequence. Shown, not told. I love it.

Speaking of the Emperor... Let's talk about him for a minute, shall we? I agree with most of the reviews saying that REVENGE OF THE SITH is Ian McDiarmid's movie. Out of everyone, he excels the most. There's a point where he tells Anakin a story about a Sith and this Sith's apprentice that is probably my favorite part of the movie, possibly my favorite moment in any of the prequels, and you know what? The story is told mostly in close-ups, cutting between McDiarmid and Christensen. No CG, no big effects. There is a dazzling digital display going on right in front of them, but when Palpatine starts telling this story everything is tuned out except Palpatine telling the story and Anakin taking it in. A good actor with good lines did more to engage me in the script than the most awe-inspiring visual flair.

One thing that Lucas has really gotten right in the prequels is Palpatine's rise to power. The subtlety used throughout all of the prequels is sorely missed in other areas, like Anakin's rise and fall (which includes showing his humanity in more than the first half hour of the last prequel).

I was really surprised by a choice Anakin makes in the film (A LITTLE MORE THAN A TINY SPOILER HERE: the choice made between Palpatine's revelation of being a Sith and Anakin submitting to being Palpatine's apprentice: END OF THIS BITE-SIZED SPOILER). I don't want to give too much away, but it's one of the moments where you're fully rooting for Anakin to be the good person you were shown at the beginning of the film, where you see him make the right choice and you just wish he could stick with it. This scene goes a long way to making Anakin's fall more tragic than I was expecting it to be based on my reaction to him in the first two prequels.

However, I still don't think they gave Anakin enough of a reason to fall so fully into the dark side of the force. Let me rephrase that... He had reason, but we don't see the inner struggle as much as this scene needed... But I don't fault this movie with that. In one of the early reviews we got someone said that the main faults with REVENGE OF THE SITH can be attributed to the first two prequels and I totally agree. It felt like Lucas tried to cram as much as he could into building up Anakin as a likable character and then throwing in the seeds of his destruction too late into his story. I realize the death of his mother in EPISODE 2 plays a big role in Anakin's fall, but I don't think I'll be alone in thinking Anakin's turn feels too complete too quickly.

If Lucas had been concentrating more on us seeing Anakin's humanity for the first two prequels, with Palpatine slowly digging his fingers into him, then the turn might have had a little more weight to it. Like I said, the situation if great. The lead-up is great. The subtle Palpatine nudgings are great... Just wished for a little more "Umph."

But we're getting into nitpicky territory here. There are little crappy moments scattered throughout... One bad line of dialogue here, one bad decision there (Whoever decided that R2 should say "Uh-oh!" should be socked in the taint... and slap whoever had Yoda say "Not if anything to say about it I have"). But there's nothing in 137 of the 140 minutes that topples the good they do in the film. There are two moments that come dangerously close, but I'll get to that in a second.

The atmosphere is nice, the lighting is great (for the most part), the acting is leaps and bounds better, even from Hayden Christensen and Natalie Portman. They have a few rough deliveries, but nothing to get your panties in a bunch over. Certainly nothing like "Spinning's a good trick! Whoaaa!" or "I've been dying a little bit each day since you came back into my life." Nothing spells romance better than dying inside.

Williams' music is pounding and gives a lot of soul to the film. I was obsessively listening to the soundtrack weeks before I saw it and it hasn't dropped off much from my playlist or usage in the CD player. Also love the bit of Duel of the Fates he throws into the Yoda/Emperor duel.

A friend of mine commented after the press screening that the film really feels like the Original Trilogy had a wild night with the Prequel Trilogy and then spawned this film, an amalgam of the prequels and OT. Obi-Wan riding a weird bird-lizard thing is very prequel trilogy, but the opening space battle feels so damn OT it's not even funny. I could have bet you that I was looking at model work for most of it, it looked that good. From the first frame you know you're watching a real goddamn STAR WARS movie. Finally!

Okay... Now for the scenes I have to mention, the part where I go pretty negative on a few terrible choices made in the film. This is real super duper spoiler territory here, so don't read if you don't want to know... here's your official warning.

SPOILERS BELOW DON'T READ THEM! I'M TELLING YOU, YOU DON'T WANT TO READ THEM. I'M SERIOUS. STOP NOW. OK, I TOLD YOU SO...

These are going to be the two things I predict will whip the fans into a frenzy. They certainly had me puzzled in the theater. The first, and lesser of the two evils, involves Padme's death.

Now, even though Lucas had two very easy outs (one being her dying of injuries inflicted by Anakin and the other being the predicted complications during childbirth) for some goddamn reason we have a droid tell us that "Medically she's fine... but we're still losing her... it's like she's lost the will to live..." So... she just decides to die, then? Wha-Wha-Whaddafuck? Why?

The other is the one that'll really piss people off. It's the only bit that I label "So-goddamn-ridiculous", a condition that ran so rampant in the first two prequels ("Exsqueeze Me!" Fart jokes... "Wizard!"... "I'm beside myself," etc), and was, thankfully, mostly missing from REVENGE OF THE SITH. In many ways this one bit is worse than Jar Jar and Anakin accidentally being a good pilot and hero because it affects the one thing that's still pure and untainted by either the SEs or prequels... Darth Vader in his full attire has about 3 minutes in the film (if you've seen both trailers for REVENGE OF THE SITH you've seen almost half of Vader's screen time) and in those 3 minutes they do something with him that literally made me wince in embarrassment it was so bad.

Do you remember back in '97 when the Special Editions were released and they did all those commercial tie-ins, kinda like what they're doing now with ROTS, what with the 7-11 Darth Vader slurpee and the Burger King commercials? Remember the Duracell commerical that had Darth Vader in the Carbon Freezing room and his lightsaber blinks out... he twists the cap off the bottom and two brand name batteries fall into his palm... Remember his reaction? Think that, but with the overused Hollywood cliche twist onto it. I really don't understand how that bit made it into the movie. I really don't. It's that goddamn stupid and unfortunately it's also at the very end of a mostly damn good (if not great) movie, so you leave the theater with that stuff on your mind.

What's frustrating about it is the scene with Vader (when I say Vader I mean breathing-suit, not Hayden with a hood on) is a genuinely good character moment that is ruined by something so over the top and out of place it makes you want to punch someone. The scene could have been done exactly as events unfold around Vader, but without the stupid cry to the heavens. It would have been much creepier and simpler to see him be still and watch the room tear itself apart around him.

END MAJOR SPOILERS

That's about the end of things for this review. I know it must have come across conflicted, but that's how I feel right now. I must stress that the movie is THE best prequel and the only one I think is worthy of the name STAR WARS. When I produce a batch of little Quint's later on in life, I will show them the Original Trilogy (the Original Original) over and over again, then when they get old enough I will show them The Clone Wars cartoons and REVENGE OF THE SITH. Sometime later, when they can truly understand what they're seeing it'll be time to dust off THE PHANTOM MENACE and ATTACK OF THE CLONES. Hopefully I'll strike the perfect age where they'll be able to enjoy those two flicks because they'll be in the target age range, but still understand the difference between them and the originals.

For instance, my little brother was 8 when THE PHANTOM MENACE came out and to my dismay he thought it was the best STAR WARS movie ever, even though he was brought up with the originals. Now, at age 14, he sees its flaws, but still has the nostalgic attachment to the film. In a way I envy him that. If I could talk myself into blindly loving anything with STAR WARS in the title, I would. But I can't.

REVENGE OF THE SITH is worth getting excited about, but it's not perfect... however, compared to the first two ROTS is damn near a masterpiece of modern cinema. You'll have a good time and for those of us burned by the other prequels... it'll finally feel like you're watching a STAR WARS film again. Thank God.

-Quint