"Attack of the Clones". manages to recreate the dreamlike feeling that characterized the first in the "Star Wars" film series
by Uri Klein
"Star Wars: Attack of the Clones". Directed by: George Lucas. Screenplay: George Lucas, Jonathan Hales. Photo: David Tetrasol. Music: John Williams. Actors: Hayden Christensen, Natalie Portman, Ewan McGregor, Christopher Lee, Samuel L. Jackson, Jimmy Smits, Pernilla August, Jack Thompson
First the good news: the fifth film in the "Star Wars" film series,
The second in the current trilogy, is a more successful cinematic product than "War".
The Stars: The Phantom Menace", which was released two years ago. but being
that the previous film was so poor and tedious (which, of course, did not prevent it from winning
with tremendous financial success), this compliment means very little. It seems that only
A special effort could have made the current film more limited than its predecessor.
The fact that "Attack of the Clones" is tighter in terms of script, incl
More design brilliance and raising more topics for discussion is not surprising.
And yet, it is not a rich, complex or satisfying cinematic experience
really.
Throughout the history of American cinema, a large number of futuristic fantasies have been produced, sometimes as individual films and sometimes as part of series. The main virtue of these films stemmed precisely from their low budget - they conveyed the feeling that their plot takes place within the landscapes of a dream. Thanks to the poorness of the production, felt in the artificiality of the settings and the cheapness of the special effects, they seemed to take place in completely invented territory, which often reflected what was going on in the minds of the characters.
George Lucas's sympathy for these popular film products motivated his desire to create the Star Wars film series (and initiate the production of the Indiana Jones film series, directed by Steven Spielberg). The paradox is that, except for the first film in the series, which was produced in 1977 with a relatively small budget and was surprisingly a box office success, all subsequent films were produced with huge budgets whose goal was to recreate the feeling created in the past with much smaller means.
This fact says something about the paradoxical, and perhaps also distorted and decadent, tone that characterizes the entire capitalist system today - a system directly represented by the American film industry, and George Lucas in it. But beyond the reluctance caused by the very phenomenon, it seems that in "Attack of the Clones" Lucas actually succeeds in recreating that dreamy feeling.
The plot of the film takes place in urban, desert and other landscapes, which are designed
with a wit that gives them an almost completely abstract character. This abstraction is
which makes it clear to viewers that "Attack of the Clones", in addition to being an episode in the adventure
going on and on, is also another stage in the development of mythology, which seeks
to reveal the mechanisms that shape it and discuss them.
Each of the "Star Wars" movies is an allegory about coming of age. "Attack
The clones" is especially characterized in this way - it serves as a middle point in the process
The design of the main hero, Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen).
The film's plot pits Anakin against three symbolic figures: a figure
The father who is represented by his spiritual teacher, Obi-Wan Kenobi (Yuan
McGregor); his mother (Pernilla August), from whom he cut off in the previous film; And Padme
(Natalie Portman), the young woman he loves.
"Attack of the Clones" is the middle part of the trilogy that takes place from
Chronologically before the original "Star Wars" trilogy. so,
Movie watchers know that Anakin will eventually become Darth
Vader, the representative of the dark forces, whose identity as Luke Skywalker's father was revealed
At the end of "Return of the Jedi", who signed the first trilogy in 1983.
When watching the new film, viewers look for signs of the beginning of the process,
which would make Anakin a tormented and morally divided character. Lucas
Places these signs in Anakin's relationship with the three characters
the most significant in his life. In "Attack of the Clones" he got into a confrontation with
The three of them. The concepts underlying his relationship with them - such as loyalty
And betrayal, continuity and abandonment - candidates here for the test.
The plot of the film runs in two parallel tracks. One of them describes the
Anakin's attempt to protect Padme, the former queen who becomes
The senator and the enemies of the republic want to assassinate her. The second track
Describes Obi-Wan Kenobi's attempt to find out who is behind it
The plot to assassinate Padme. In the first two thirds of the film passes
"Attack of the Clones" from one storyline to the other. Although
The fact that it was done too schematically from a script perspective is another
The stories are gradually able to be used in contexts that mirror each other.
The story of Padme's defense puts Anakin's masculinity to the test and proves
the extent of his independence apart from Obi-Wan Kenobi, his symbolic father. In the story
The second Obi-Wan Kenobi discovers the existence of the clone army, whose role it is
In a highly ambivalent film: he threatens the Republic, but can also
come to her aid. The use of the image of clones highlights how much the second chapter
In the current trilogy he deals with issues of similarity and difference, and of continuity
and disconnection, between fathers and sons, between mothers and fathers and between men and women,
and identifies in these issues the source of the development of the drama of puberty,
which allows a boy to become a man who is able to create a valid and meaningful relationship
with a woman
Lucas does not seek to describe this process in a smooth way that would allow the
Anakin's direct transformation into a mythological hero, an object of identification
and admiration. On the contrary even. He seeks to locate in each of the relationships of
Anakin with the three significant figures in his life - the symbolic father, the mother
The biological and the woman he loves - the source of the transformation that will withdraw him to
Dark forces.
In each of the relationships there are issues of guilt and sin involved,
whose results are not yet clearly felt, but the volume and significance
Their theories are present in the film. "Attack of the Clones", in other words, seeks to describe Anakin's Oedipal journey from youth to adulthood (and it even includes some amusing references to films that dealt with youth rebellion). Although the plot does not reach the Oedipal symbolic blindness, the film ends on an ambivalent and even slightly ironic emotional note. It has the imagery of a journey into Anakin's undecided and developing mind, and there are parts where Lucas manages to visually represent this process in an impressive and witty way.
The film suffers from a rather dismal lack of humor (the James Bond-style jokes that the film's protagonists make in moments of danger seem very forced), but sometimes it seems that the whole thing is one long joke, which, according to the best Freudian tradition, seeks to reveal the connection between it and the subconscious that shapes it. The trouble is that the overall description of the mental process that Anakin goes through is not very in-depth.
"Attack of the Clones" undoubtedly succeeds in continuing the mythology of "Star Wars", but not really thickening it conceptually and emotionally. The main reason for this is the paucity of the characters and the limitations of the actors who play them. It is not clear if this is the fault of Hayden Christensen, Natalie Portman and Ewan McGregor, or if Lucas deliberately instructed them not to try to act at all. The reason for this may be Lucas's sympathy for the low-budget and pretentious futuristic fantasy of the past, which often featured actors with almost no talent.
Christensen, Portman and McGregor, like most of the other actors in the film, recite the text almost without any expression, and even in the action sequences they seem to be puppets on a string obeying Lucas' orders. This style highlights the theoretical nature of "Attack of the Clones" (there were moments in the film that reminded a little of the films of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, who used such tricks for purposes of alienation and alienation), but also prevents real involvement in the fate of Anakin and the fate of the other characters that shape his story.
All this creates in "Attack of the Clones" a sense of flatness, which makes watching it intriguing, but almost never exciting. Of course, this will not prevent the film from being a great financial success - whether it breaks all the box office records that preceded it or not. However, it seems that the "Star Wars" phenomenon is at a dead end, from which it will be very difficult to get out.
