The New York Times has another glowing review of Star Wars: Episode Three – Revenge of the Sith:
This is by far the best film in the more recent trilogy, and also the best of the four episodes Mr. Lucas has directed. That’s right (and my inner 11-year-old shudders as I type this): it’s better than “Star Wars.”
“Revenge of the Sith,” which had its premiere here yesterday at the Cannes International Film Festival, ranks with “The Empire Strikes Back” (directed by Irvin Kershner in 1980) as the richest and most challenging movie in the cycle. It comes closer than any of the other episodes to realizing Mr. Lucas’s frequently reiterated dream of bringing the combination of vigorous spectacle and mythic resonance he found in the films of Akira Kurosawa into American commercial cinema.
Of course, since it’s The New York Times, we have to have some anti-Bush politicizing:
“This is how liberty dies – to thunderous applause,” Padmé observes as senators, their fears and dreams of glory deftly manipulated by Palpatine, vote to give him sweeping new powers. “Revenge of the Sith” is about how a republic dismantles its own democratic principles, about how politics becomes militarized, about how a Manichaean ideology undermines the rational exercise of power. Mr. Lucas is clearly jabbing his light saber in the direction of some real-world political leaders. At one point, Darth Vader, already deep in the thrall of the dark side and echoing the words of George W. Bush, hisses at Obi-Wan, “If you’re not with me, you’re my enemy.” Obi-Wan’s response is likely to surface as a bumper sticker during the next election campaign: “Only a Sith thinks in absolutes.” You may applaud this editorializing, or you may find it overwrought, but give Mr. Lucas his due. For decades he has been blamed (unjustly) for helping to lead American movies away from their early-70’s engagement with political matters, and he deserves credit for trying to bring them back.
Ugh, and they had my hopes up for a minute there. The last thing anyone needs is a lesson in how capitalism is bad (from a multimillionaire who’s whored the Star Wars universe out to sell everything from candy to cars) and how there are no such things in absolutes from a man who creates characters who scream “HELLO! BAD GUY!” with every ruffle of their suitably villianous dark cloak.
Star Wars is and always shall be popcorn space opera – and hopefully that’s what we’ll all get this Thursday.
So let me get this straight…..based on a review from a second-hand source that suggested the new Star Wars film imposes George Lucas’ critique of the current Bush foreign policy, you have surmised that Lucas is on an anti-capitalist crusade? That anyone who dissents from the concept of “pre-emptive warfare” is necessarily in ideological alignment with the late Joseph Stalin when it comes to economic policy? This from a guy constantly pounding on the “strawman” drum when debating others.
Certainly, few should be surprised by such a flimsy argument from you, but it does go a long way towards explaining your months-long tirade against the 2004 film which you also hadn’t seen (at least for long after your outbursts)…Fahrenheit 9/11. This seems to be a pattern with you….and Bob Dole for that matter too. Must be a Republican elitist thing.
The first two movies have plenty of anti-capitalist subtext as well. Thankfully, like the rest of the plot, it’s underdeveloped and easy to miss.
Lay off the shrooms.
I don’t think you grasp the irony of that sentence combined with the one preceding it.
Only liberals will see critiques of the Bush Administration in this movie, because they see what they want. If you want to see the Emperor as a Republican, then feel free to see the arrogance and inability to grasp reality in the Democrat Jedi (yeah, right, a bunch of democrats dedicated to a religion and celibate, sure I see your easy, absolutist analogy).
Better parallels are Hitler and his enabling act. Or, god forbid, the suspension of habeas corpus and other fundamental rights in the Civil War. Lucas is creating a myth, based on historic archetypes, not a Fahrenheit 9/11 for the moveon.org crowd with a shelf life of next week.. It is a rorschak test and if you see the Bush Administration anywhere in this movie, you are a conspiracy addled liberal.
“yeah, right, a bunch of democrats dedicated to a religion and celibate”
Never met any Buddhists or Jesuits, I take it? 🙂
Kidding aside, I don’t think that the subtext of the prequels is anti-capitalist as much as it is anti-monopolist- the Trade Federation and other syndicates are trying to crush the independent businesses of the galaxy, ala Wal-Mart. Historically, a lot of midwestern conservatism has been based on this same principle- keep it in the community, support small business over big business, etc- I wouldn’t really call it a liberal sentiment at all, except perhaps today (when liberal and conservative have become largely meaningless terms). I think it’s possible to be vigorously pro-free enterprise while not thinking much of huge conglomerates- this has historically been the tradition of both Teddy Roosevelt and midwestern Republicanism.
So, I don’t think there’s any anti-capitalism in wanting autonomy and economic liberty for the good people of Naboo, Alderaan, Chandrila, Corellia, and the rest of the free-wheeling worlds crushed under the heel of the Trade Federation and the Empire- it strikes me as home-grown libertarianism at it’s core.
Looking for an analog? Trade Federation = Microsoft.
(Damn, and I bought another freakin’ PC – alas, the inexpensive devil-I-know).
Why are the same papers (and Liberals) that say that Cheney is the brains behind Bush linking the Emperor in Star Wars to Bush? To be consistent, shouldn’t they be linking Cheney to the Emperor? It just goes to show that Liberals will do anything to bash Bush, even if it means being blatantly inconsistent with their own positions.