Come to think of it, though, I did review Hamlet last week. So I might as well do Star Wars too....

I've always thought that Star Wars was less a movie than a modern fairy tale. Its simplicity is the source of its power, and its fans go to see it over and over for the same reason that children ask to have their favorite fairy tales read to them so many times: it has a purity of storyline and a purity of theme that appeal to us all, combined with characters that are archetypal, yet somehow so fresh and new and imaginative and, above all, real, that they keep it from being merely an extended cliche. Star Wars probably has more memorable characters than any single movie since The Wizard of Oz, and it is these characters that make the movies truly come alive.

The special edition re-release is a treat to see again, even if the hype over the cleaned up print and the new effects was way overblown. The new material was very thin, and added virtually nothing to the original. The inserted scene of Han and Jabba the Hutt in the first movie was the only addition of any significance, and even it could have stayed on the cutting room floor without any harm.

The star of Star Wars, of course, is Darth Vader, and, as is so often the case in fiction, he's far more interesting than any of the heroes. Vader may be a man of few words, but he always gets the best lines. In fact, he has my favorite line in all three of the movies:

• Star Wars: "I find your lack of faith disturbing."
• Empire: "Luke, it is your destiny."
• Jedi: "The emperor is not as forgiving as I am."

Which movie is the best of the three? It sort of seems like voting between Hamlet, Othello, and Macbeth (oh, OK, not really), but I'd rank them like this:

1. Return of the Jedi. The arc of the story is beautiful, far more compelling than the others, and the showdown in the emperor's throne room is the best sequence in the entire trilogy. The throne room battle is also a stunning visual sequence (see picture above), and I could watch it over and over and over without getting tired of it. I could do without the Ewoks, though....
   
   
2. Star Wars. The only one of the three that's complete by itself. It invents a wonderful new world and wonderful new characters, and that's a rare achievement.
   
   
3. The Empire Strikes Back. In some technical way it might be the best of the three, but it suffers from middle movie-itis: it can't invent new characters and a new world, like the first movie, and it can't resolve anything, like the third. The whole thing is designed to set up the climax in Return of the Jedi, and that's a tough job.

And now the $64 question: did Lucas really have the entire trilogy in mind when he filmed Star Wars in 1977? He says so, but I still have my doubts. The first movie is too self-contained, too free of loose ends that need tying up, to seem like the first part of a series. Plus, I've always thought the "Darth Vader killed your father" deal was pretty much a giveaway. You'd have to be unusually credulous to buy Obi-Wan Kenobi's "from a certain point of view" explanation of this in Return of the Jedi, and I've got to believe that if Lucas had had the entire story in mind from the beginning he would have written the dialog differently in the first movie. On the other hand, I have to admit that the shot of Vader's fighter spinning away from the Death Star at the end of the first movie certainly has "sequel" written all over it. So maybe Lucas did have a series in mind, but didn't quite have the whole story worked out ahead of time....

Cast of characters
Star Wars reviews, Empire reviews, Jedi reviews

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