original article on Boston Herald.com I was invited to an early -- May 15, 1999 -- press screening of Episode
I for a 'fan' interview with the Boston Herald. Regina Franchi is a friend
of mine who helps run The Nostalgia
Factory. I was one of the first people in the country to dislike Jar
Jar Binks. Does that make me lucky? :-) But possibly the most tragic part
of the evening, was, upon exiting the theater, walking past all the people
who were gathering to spend the night in line to buy tickets.
Force-ful arguments: 'Star Wars' prequel packs
Wednesday, May 19, 1999 Does Jar Jar Binks stink? Is Darth Maul all face-paint and no ferocity? "Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace'' finally (finally!) arrives in theaters today, and no matter which direction critics' thumbs are pointing, what will determine the fate of the hyped-to-death tale is the reaction of its fans: those starwars.com-addicted, collectibles-crazy Gen Xers who've sat rapt through the original trilogy, oh, a hundred times. With that in mind, we invited three hard-core "Star Wars'' devotees - Derrick Alderman, Regina Franchi and Lee Stanford - to last week's press screening to glean a fan's-eye view of whether "The Phantom Menace'' is a Force worth reckoning or a disappointment of Jabba the Hutt-sized proportions. The prequel, according to these aficionados, is a little of both. "I can't wait for the next one!'' said a breathless Franchi, 29, of Boston, who rated the film three stars out of four. "I totally feel like a kid again!'' Stanford, 32, of Boston, who also showered the film with three stars, was more reserved. "When it first started, I was a little worried about it,'' he said. "It seemed to start in progress, and there were a ton of little jokes in the first 10 minutes. I was worried no character was going to be 100 percent serious, but then I gained more confidence in it. By the end, I liked it.'' Alderman, 24, of Medford, who gave the film two stars, had the opposite response. "I started out really, really excited about it. In more ways than one, it had the essence of the original 'Star Wars' movies. But after 45 minutes or so . . . I kind of lost interest a little bit and never gained my original enthusiasm for it.'' He singled out the film's often oblique plot about intergalactic politics and trade disputes as the reason for his declining interest. "I think they could have made two more movies out of this one and taken more time to go through the stuff,'' he said. His fellow critics agreed the film's narrative became a tad unwieldy. "It sure was a complicated setup!'' Stanford said. "The other films were more straightforward. This one was straight out of the Wall Street Journal.'' Franchi, who saw the first "Star Wars'' when she was 7, said, "I don't know if my 6-year-old nephew is going to get it.'' But while the film's story line merited some reservations from this crowd, its computer-generated special effects won effusive praise, especially the "pod'' race scene and the swashbuckler-inspired duel between Liam Neeson's Jedi knight Qui-Gon Jinn and Ray Park's Luciferlike Darth Maul. "I was completely amazed,'' said Franchi. Alderman agreed, "The effects were very, very impressive. They blew me away, and for the most part, they were pretty seamless.'' However, he said, "I think (director George Lucas) relied a lot more on the effects and less on characters to drive the movie. He left out a lot of the character development that they had in the first three movies. I never really got a sense that these people were working as a team.'' Stanford shook his head. "I disagree,'' he said. "Very rarely was I distracted by the effects. I was definitely into the plot, though I'd have to agree it's missing some of the original camaraderie.'' And that brings us to Jar Jar Binks, the donkey-faced, Jamaican-accented computer creation whose buffoonish ways prompted early worry among "Stars Wars'' fans that Lucas had lost it. What's the verdict? Said Stanford: "You have Jar Jar, who is very, very child-oriented, and then you have this overall story line about a political and trade dispute. I thought that it was really weird that those two things were put together.'' Alderman offered: "I think they took Jar Jar too far down the silly sidekick path. . . . He's a bumbling idiot who's a hero quite by accident. I wish they took him more seriously and made him a little more understandable.'' But it was Franchi who put it most bluntly: "Jar Jar Binks has to be the most annoying creature Lucas has ever created.'' Stanford also noted the director's decision to give many of the computer-generated creatures ethnic accents was odd. "There were some weird stereotypes going on with some of the characters,'' he said. "Their accents were caricatures. If the characters with the Asian accents had really been Asian people or all the Gungans, Jar Jar's clan, were really dreadlocked Jamaicans, they would have probably been offensive.'' All three conceded that fans should go into today's premiere with expectations in check. "There's no way it could live up to the hype,'' Stanford said. "It was a little bit of a disappointment just because no matter what they did, I wouldn't have been completely satisfied. It was definitely fun, though.'' Then, speaking like a true fan, he said, "In fact, the more we talk
about it, the more I want to see it again.''
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