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Reviews
28 Days Later... (2002)
I'd rather think about it than watch it, for once...
Yeah, you read the summary right. I came out of this film almost laughing at how utterly bad it was. Only when I thought about it later did the odd subtlety of the piece occur to me - the fact that the virus in '28 days later' is called 'the rage', while 'le rage' is the French for 'rabies', which also saw Britain placed under 'quarantine'; the whole moral quandary of how we behave under duress, and indeed the question of man's place in the universe. These weren't bad ideas by any means, and some incredible films have been made on much much worse premises. So there you have it - '28 days later' has a fine director who knows how to capture true, gritty, desolation no less than he did years ago on Trainspotting; it has a decent enough idea of a plot; it has some whimsical black comedy, some poignant touches, and not a bad sense of drama; ultimately, it asks some cutting questions.
So why did I come out of this film thinking it was so, so bad? Well, sad to say, it fails from the word go on some of the most basic counts. The acting is appalling, inexcusable, sub-soap-opera, diabolical, more zombified than the numerous extras, terrible, excruciating... a thesaurus would barely do justice to how absolutely dire the acting performances were. Usually in a dodgy piece of independent cinema, at least we come out thinking 'how's about so-and-so for a fine future talent' - well the same couldn't be said about '28 days'. The soldiers and both female leads are particularly poor. This is sad, since with some decent acting the film could have had some good things come out of it - it would certainly not have been removed to the level of farce it had been after the first twenty minutes by the panto-style fare it offered.
Also alarming were Danny Boyle's shortcomings. Usually such a fine connoiseur of character-building, he happily resorts to feeble stereotypes - the boisterous, two-dimensional squaddies, the sinister tyrannical CO, the hardened feminist heroine. The only attempt at any sort of interesting characterisation lies in the hero's escapades towards the end, and in the tragic father-daughter relationship (though this becomes less impressive once you realise its complete dependence on 'Dusk Til Dawn'). All the characters suffer from severe lapses in rationality, not even explained by the exceptional circumstances they all find themselves in - in fact even less so: it simply doesn't make sense that in that sort of danger, 'Jim' would ever even consider going on his 'cheeseburger quest'. Besides the poor characters, the dialogue is hardly glowing either - I always say that a reliable sign of a poor film is an excess use of the line 'let's get outta here'; in '28 days later', I counted dozens of utterances. What could have been some genuinely scary bits, too, were so long in coming that we yawned rather than jumped when 'frightened'. To be honest, I've woken up next to scarier things than this movie - despite being billed as a horror film, this doesn't even pretend to be; poor publicity there. Plus, check on the 'goofs' section of this webpage some time soon and doubtless someone who's thought about the film more than me will have given it the dressing-down it deserves in terms of plot holes. Also, the first half-hour left me stunned that we could still be subjected to such blatant product-placement in this enlightened day and age.
Saddest of all, though, is that even the neat ideas the film does have are far from original. The concepts of growing brutality without law and order smack of 'Lord of the Flies'-cum-'Mad Max'; the messages that 1) animal testing labs are evil sadistic torture-pits, 2) man has come to the end of his time, and 3) man is such a horrible violent species by nature.... spare me, all of them, please. Thirty years ago this film would have been epoch-shattering, now it just smells dated, cliched, low-budget and half-hearted. Oh, and just in case you think I hadn't noticed, the whole first half of the film, with all its desolation, potential dread and tension, and all those deserted streets, isn't even original - just ask Charlton Heston.
Basically, see this film if you're eager to see how your lottery money is being totally and utterly wasted, and don't mind a standard of acting performance which my little cousin's nativity play puts to shame. To be fair, I suppose you could see this film if long-exhausted ethical debates interest you, or if you never thought it was possible to stop all the traffic in a part of london for a few hours. DON'T watch it if you want your confidence in independent cinema given a boost - see Donnie Darko if that's what you're in to. Ultimately, though, if you really want to see something bleak, desolate, with a quirky post-apocalyptic edge after a deadly disease... watch Heston's 'Omega Man'. Give '28 days later' a miss - if it was a pet, it would have been put out of its misery a long time ago. Deader than the zombies. Five farts out of ten.
Signs (2002)
Wonderfully crafted piece on shifty premise
It's only after walking away from the cinema, right before drafting this review, that i did as much as cast my mind over the actual plot of 'Signs'. If you do the same after seeing it, you'll realise that the story (and even, tragically, the ending) come straight out of a 50s B-movie. The script is captivating, but nevertheless falls victim to that other big hollywood temptation - to be disgustingly slushy. Sometimes you just wish they'd all grow up and face certain annihilation like real brain-dead action heroes rather than the well-acted, well-knitted characters they actually are. In fact, to niggle over such trivial details such as the entire plot and entire script would, amazingly, be to detract from just what a great film this is. Offsetting the disappointingly simple plot and could-see-it-from-a-mile-off-ending (though this may be unfair; after all, when i watched Sixth Sense, Shyamalan's best film previously, I figured out the twist in the end within the first few minutes; thousands others didn't, so there you go - i'm just petty) are some good interjections of wry humour in the screenplay, and marvellous cinematography and musical score throughout. This director, I believe, is starting to make a name for himself as THE ultimate atmosphere-builder, essentially the sort of director Hitchcock would be now were he to have access to the same standard of FX (Shyamalan clearly aspires to this standard - the trademark device of images reflected in TV sets, and the presently encouraging use of himself as a character, show indications of this admiration). What separates these two great directors at the moment, though, is that Hitchcock picked good scripts and good intriguing stories, and at the end of the day there is nothing vaguely innovative about this film. What makes it so worth watching is the sheer, permanent tension of the movie - if anything, a bit too heavy; the audience needs a break occasionally - but as it happens I think this overwhelming atmosphere puts you right there with the feelings of the characters Shyamalan is portraying to us. 'Signs' is awesome. Go and see it if you want your breath taken away, but only if you don't mind a pretty lame conclusion to the storyline, and if you don't mind seeing more emotional outpourings than is really necessary. All the same, well worth my four quid.
The Man Who Knew Too Little (1997)
Cheerful, funny example of a lost genre.
They just don't make them like they used to. At least, if you haven't seen 'The Man Who Knew Too Little', you'd probably think that. Many bemoan the decline of that classic genre of film - the old-fashioned British farce. It seems they lost favour for being just that bit too calamitous, too bawdy and too self-indulgently ridiculous. This film is an attempt to recreate the laid-back, cheerful, innocent silliness of those old comedy classics - but how does it avoid those aspects of past farces that made them less palatable to modern viewers and critics? If this film has any failings at all, then it is maybe that it does not avoid the temptation to be just that crucial margin too unbelievable for the viewer. Admittedly, the humour can only work if Murray's character is as truly stupid as he appears to be in failing to grasp the reality of the situation by the end, and if no-one, not even his brother or the call-girl, informs him of it, but although it works wonderfully up to a point, in a way I was hoping he would twig eventually. But that's a minor point. What is more ridiculous still is, of course, the zany manner of his consistent escapes from danger. Now don't get me wrong. I'm not a killjoy and I completely recognise how ludicrous a film of this sort has to be in order to work. Indeed, the utter cluelessness of the lead was a delight to watch, and the comedy was slick, even if the budget was lower than the movie deserved and a few performances (even Richard Wilson, surprisingly) were somewhat wooden. But this didn't detract from a wonderful piece of sit-back-and-enjoy laugh-fest. Whatever its flaws, above all else it is impossible not to get a real feel-good buzz from this film, and a lot of laughs besides. The script manages to stay consistent, and does not - as would be very easy - slip up at all when holding together a quite complicated set of circumstances designed to delude Bill Murray's unlikely superhero. The scenes towards the end clearly owe something to 'Naked Gun', but that is never a bad thing - I thoroughly enjoyed watching this, and the one question you probably want to ask now is: so why criticise at all? Well, while this is a beautiful example of the lost art of farce-making, it also represents a lost opportunity. To have been better still, this movie should ideally have combined the fluid innocence of the chaotic comedy with something newer - maybe make the whole 'cold war' plot idea advance a bit. While I thought the whole subplot that Murray has no clue about was ample for the purposes of the movie, and was suitably unserious, the audiences of today want something more substantial, on the whole, and maybe 'The Man Who Knew Too Little' could have been a box office smash if it had had something innovative like this. As it is, nothing new, not a whole lot you haven't seen before, but this doesn't matter - this film is the best of what the old days comedy had to offer, and it made me laugh lots. Really worth seeing - if only more would follow.
Dude, Where's My Car? (2000)
Neatish experiment that doesn't quite hit the spot
First things first - who is this film aimed at? I'd say fans of Porky's, Animal House and American Pie (a veteran of which plays Chester here) looking for the same kind of testosterone-happy, slobbish teen humour. And the film doesn't quite pull it off. That doesn't mean to say it's a bad piece. The sheer ludicrous nature of the comedy makes it cheerful and refreshing, and the disingenuous leads make for some madcap foolishness that mixes American teen comedy with elements of old-style black-and-white farce - the 'taking out the rubbish' scene with the dropped bottle top does this beautifully. There is also a touch of the detatched, Austin Powers style, and anyone who liked Mike Myers' work would probably get most out of 'Dude, Where's My Car?'. Like I said, though, it doesn't quite make the grade of 'Porky's', etc, for a few reasons. The calamitous side of the film doesn't quite come off because of our lack of interest in the characters. In 'American Pie', for example, there is an agonising build-up to each of Biggs' misfortunes which the audience are really sucked into. Chester and Jesse in 'Dude', though, are not built up as individuals in the slightest. Now you may say quite rightly that this is hardly the film that needs deep depictions of the thought process of each character, but making the parts completely two-dimensional is a mistake. The set-piece gags still work, but for the film as a whole to be engaging and slick, not only does it need a more flowing, dynamic script, but we need to have just that tiny iota of character detail to keep us truly entertained as well as simply content, even if it is totally puerile stuff we're looking for in general. And about that script. Again, some of the set-pieces are great, and it's a matter of fact that the script's not predictable in the slightest, but it still alienates occasionally. The 'and then' Chinese restuarant and the 'Dude/Sweet' tattoo scenes just wound me up. Comedy of this sort needs to be more quickfire, and not fall into the Austin Powers trap of laughing at its own jokes, as this film seems to do too often. Basically, this film aims for a niche audience, and doesn't hit it. The movie doesn't have drama, tension, depth or anything remotely sophisticated, but that doesn't matter in itself - what matters is that 'Dude, Where's My Car?' is just that tiny bit too shallow, too indifferent and too insipid to provide the laugh-fest that a premise like this (and it is a very nifty idea for a film) should produce. Of course, this doesn't make it unwatchable. If you want something to engage you, don't watch it. If you want some really great comedy, don't watch it. If you disapprove of the smutty filth that's on TV today, don't watch it (and also get a life). If you want something deep and meaningful, don't watch it. If you've got a brain cell dying to be used, don't watch it. Watch it if you've got a pizza to eat and some beer to drink, most of which you will later fling around the room like the free spirit you are. Above all, watch it without any great expectations, just being prepared to take the laughs as it comes. Not a bad shot from the interesting work-out-what-happened-as-you-go angle. Guaranteed to entertain people whose parents wouldn't approve of them seeing it, and also anyone who likes stoner jokes.
Fargo (1996)
It was all going so nicely...
This film is a fine, fine, piece of cinema from a couple of the neatest, slickest and most original directors in the business. Only one thing stops it from claiming its rightful place among the industry's finest - that makes it a great film rather than a classic film - and that's that it's too damn short! Admittedly, it doesn't cut you off with the same degree of frustrating incompletion that, say, 'Unbreakable' does, but to compare the two films at all would be insulting to the Coens. All the same though, the style and quality of the film just makes its brevity all the worse. Frances McDormand turns in one of the finest acting performances of recent years as the just-too-damn-smart detective, and the whole film is staged superbly - the Coen brothers' creation of a very dark movie in a very white setting is slick to the point of arty, but engaging enough to become too over-indulgently picturesque. The film is neat, clipped and wonderfully aesthetic. The comedy is as dark as it comes, but all the same entertaining - you find yourself laughing out loud at stuff you might feel you really shouldn't; it's more of an atmosphere of set-piece humour at times in the film, rather than anything deliberately comic about the script. So hey, maybe I'm being slightly picky about criticising the abrupt end to the film. Maybe it shouldn't really be any longer - perhaps to be longer would be to be make 'Fargo' less well-formed, and that would be unforgivable. I suppose it's just a personal thing - as a tragic product of the MTV generation I was hoping for a more dramatic ending, though the classic 'disposal' scene certainly added a certain uniqueness to the film, though it would be shame if such a fine work were to be remembered for just a woodchipper. Again coming from an MTV-generation point of view, I suppose the one thing this film lacks is a feeling of suspense, an adrenalin rush of some kind. But then a film doesn't need that sort of thrill factor to be good. This is not a film you see if you want the kind of high-octane entertainment that, say, 'Bad Boys' or 'Terminator' will supply. Having said that, I can think of few people who would crack open the beers and watch 'Schindler's List' with a pizza - this is a film treat, an artistic, phenomenally slick and polished work with a well-picked, select cast that features not a single wooden line, and along with McDormand's masterful performance there are fine roles by Buscemi and Macy as the cuss-filled crook and the chirpy-to-the-point-of-irritating loser car salesman who hires him. A great lesson in how to make a film - the plot is very simple, but the way it unravels, as well as the style of the piece as a whole, make Fargo a winner. Watch with a glass of something warming, while in a contemplative, patient mood for best results.
The Sum of All Fears (2002)
Better than you could really expect
Warning - Some minor spoilers below...
OK, I had my opinion of 'Sum of All Fears' well and truly finalised before I saw it. Another patriotism-heavy Yank action thriller, probably going to be quite good fun, but nothing else to speak of, and maybe quite sickeningly stoic in the face of the new adversity blah blah blah blah. In part, I was right, I suppose. Ben Affleck provides very typical American smouldering-but-wooden star fare, in fact he was disappointingly off his best form, not that it would have made much difference since the fella could never have made himself look all that great when paired with Morgan Freeman, who produced the sort of fantastic role that we have come to expect of the film legend. But did the film fall victim to the temptation of a 'Stars and Stripes' flag-waving-fest, a sort of Pearl Harbour amplified by the emotions of the war on terror? Yes and No. Of course, the film leaves you with a very serious concern about nuclear proliferation and global terrorism - probably just what Cheney, Rumsfield and co. would love us to be feeling right now - and the film evokes a very palpable poignancy with lines such as 'there has been a terrorist attack on America' which clearly plays on the 'gulp factor'. However, the film is far from merely a shameless wallowing in national pride in the wake of terrorism. Let us not forget that the villains of the piece are primarily Europeans, not Arabs, and the film breaks fresh ground in acknowledging the US's own culpability for the spread of nuclear weapons outside the superpowers. Above all else, the film - in particular the sound and cinematography, which should both get Oscars - is captivating, and it is a rare thing indeed that I have actually been moved by a film as much as I was two-thirds of the way through this one. The Baltimore episode left me absolutely awestruck - to be honest I just didn't see it coming - and really quite emotionally drained. Such a catharsis is just not something you expect from a self-proclaimed action thriller 'Sum of All Fears'. A few loose ends around the edges demand a slight willing suspension of disbelief, but it is a suspension I for one was more than willing to give after the middle section of the film. As well as the usual top class performance from Freeman, Liev Schreiber was for me a surprise class act, capturing a character few films have focussed on in the 'invisible' secret agent. Indeed, the portrayal of the secret services is one of the highlights of this movie, and the wry post-West Wing humanisation of the political heavyweights in the movie (another more-than-decent performance in James Cromwell's President, for example) only adds to a great all-round spectacle. One to watch if you want something to make you go 'wow'. Trust me, it will.
Apt Pupil (1998)
Brooding study in evil down the years
Stephen King seems to get lucky with movies. His bog-standard novels seem to get transformed into some screen gems, of which Green Mile is by far the most superior, but other shorts like 'Carrie', 'Sometimes They Come Back' and 'Thinner' have risen from nothing special on the page, to something well worth watching in movie form. Apt Pupil is no exception to this rule - not Schindler's List by a long shot, but at times utterly captivating. On the down side, the film is a little too convenient to be true - the scenes with the pigeon, the cat, the tramp and the old Jew can be seen coming from a mile off, and how handy that the one person to happen upon Dussander's true identity is the same who has a morbid obsession with power and death. But of course this is the point the film makes - how evil spreads almost through osmosis between people and between generations. The parallels between Dussander and the 'pupil', especially in Renfro's confrontation with David Schwimmer's guidance counsellor at the end, are fascinating, but at the same time somewhat predictable. We've read King, we've seen his films before, we know what is bound to happen. Nevertheless, the progression Renfro's character makes from bright spark to obsessive power-junkie is not overall as trudgingly inevitable as it might have been. The 'uniform' scene is a classic set-piece, and through some good performances from Renfro and Mckellan we get, in a simple snapshot, a good idea of the characters of both. The film is an uneasy mix of grittiness and high school horror cliche at times, but as a whole is haunting, thought-provoking chiller, especially effective at combining the old Nazi's feebleness and sadism in the same figure. To be viewed as a balancer between the depravity of 'Salon Kitty', and the magnificence of 'Schindler's List' as part of a very cutting insight into the Nazi mindset.
Legally Blonde (2001)
Enjoyable cheese-fest
Reese Witherspoon does everything she has to do in this neat, satisfying, feel-good exercise. The film is cliche-ridden, but in a way too insincere for it to be a flaw in the overall effect. The director clearly revels, as do the characters, in the quirky stereotyping in the fashion-school scenes near the beginning, and in Witherspoon's part as the dim-looking-but-actually-very-sharp blonde law wannabe. The plot is not meant to be taken seriously, and should not be if it is to be enjoyed. There is little likelihood of the heroine succeeding in getting into Harvard on a whim, and in the charismatic way that she does, and the courtroom scenes must be viewed with a serious pinch of salt. But I don't think we as the audience are meant to bother with the minutiae of this piece - it is simply to be enjoyed. You can see the ending coming from a mile off, and nothing in the now-dated text 'fill-ins' at the bottom of the screen at the end for each character contained any surprises for me. Some critics (who have clearly looked far deeper into this film than is sensibly possible) claim the film to contain a message of hope for blondes everywhere, or even a moral that charisma will always triumph over the all-encompassing greytone colours against which Witherspoon's gloriously colourful character is set. And yet this is nonsense. If anything, the film is more of a light-hearted dig at the charismatic 'blonde' mentality than a defence of it. But this is besides the point; there is no philosophy in 'Legally Blonde', other than the shameless shot at the class-obsessed socialite mentality of Witherspoon's college sweetheart in the movie. You do not come out of this film having learned anything, or been made to think. You just come out of it feeling happy, entertained and amused (the script, if predictable and surreal at times, is dynamic and boisterously good fun), and that to me makes it well worth watching.
Monster's Ball (2001)
Art, pure and simple
What, in a film context, is art? Art in a film means a combination of fine cinematography, (optional - c.f. Lynch: Blue Velvet) realism - preferably, but not necessarily, of the gritty variety - and above all else the highest class of acting. It doesn't necessarily require ensuing charisma, an ever-complicating plotline, or even a plotline that captivates at all. Monsters Ball, though, does captivate. The plot, compared to the other aspects of the piece, doesn't hit the same heights, but is nevertheless intriguing and enough to really suck in the viewer. The plot developments are predictable to the degree that they have something of an inevitability about them, and the 'salvation' of Thornton's character Hank is somewhat too smooth a process. But this doesn't matter. For long periods of the film, at times, the plot stayed static, the dialogue was everyday, and the whole ethos was remarkably unspectacular, and yet I was utterly enthralled. It is precisely the everyday, nondescript, nonprofound nature of the dialogue in particular that holds the attention in a way far more action-packed films fail to do. But what stands out most of all from this piece of pure film poetry is the top-level acting - the performances by Thornton and Berry are rightly acknowledged as two of the year's finest, but the supporting roles by Boyle as the vile, hate-filled father, and even by the surprisingly adept Sean 'Puff Daddy' Combs, also deserve comment. The film starts heavy, and you worry for a while that it will be too deep and emotion-ridden to last a full 111 minutes, but have no fear. It's no action movie, and certainly not for the young (indeed, the sex scenes make you wonder how it got away with as low as a 15 certificate in the UK), but for those who appreciate the finer things in life, films don't come much finer than Monsters Ball, a piece worth watching for the acting performances alone. To be honest, if the plot was that of 'Attack of the Killer Tomatoes', I'd still want to see this piece. A real beauty.
Mulholland Dr. (2001)
The world's finest director gives it to us twisted - I love it!
First, a disclaimer. Only a certain sort of person can watch and appreciate a Lynch film. I don't think intelligence is a factor - I like to think of myself as quite a smart guy, and was well pleased with myself for following this film through the twist in the last half hour, but then when the film got REALLY weird in the final few minutes, I lost any idea I might ever have had about what was going on. I think to appreciate Lynch you need to be open-minded enough to accept whatever surreality he's going to throw at you next, but not analytical enough to think everything has to have an answer. Sometimes, just to irritate the audience, I'm sure Lynch just chucks in a random element which doesn't make any sense at all. Mulholland Drive requires you to concentrate, otherwise you'll think you've just gone mad in parts of it. It also requires you to enjoy having your mind twisted inside out, churned around in a food mixer, and served to you 'Hannibal'-style on a plate. If you prefer easy-watching, sit-back-and-enjoy-the-spectacle films, stay well away. This is a thought-provoking, thought-mangling, masterpiece. I don't know what the underlying metaphors are meant to be (maybe there just aren't any) but I detect a cynicism, about what fame and stardom can do to you, very prevalent in this piece. What is unique among Lynch films of Mulholland Drive is that it makes you laugh with some genuinely funny set-pieces - the botched contract killing near the start had me in stitches, and the scenes that take place within the director's house are great too. Ultimately, what sets this out from some more mainstream surreal films is the absence of any explicit explanation - there is no conveniently-scripted description of what the hell's been going on, like there is in the Sixth Sense, Matrix or Fight Club. Imagine trying to figure out the Matrix with no Morbius, no phones or anyone telling Keanu Reeves what's happening, multiply your confusion by a hundred and you have a rough idea what you'll be feeling watching Mullholland Drive. I can't wait for this to be mass-released, cos I want to see it again to see if I can make any more sense. I'm sure I'm not the only one with my head fried. Go see it - and don't say I didn't warn you.
Fight Club (1999)
Awesome study of insanity
This film is one you'll have to see a second time. I did. You'll see the twist in the end, just not believe it, then have to watch it all over again to see how it could be. Thing is, I usually lose my enthusiasm for a film the second time I watch it, cos its all still fresh in my memory, but this wasn't the case at all with Fight Club. The three leads are in my opinion three of the finest film actors on earth, and the director is right up there with two other Davids - Cronenberg and Lynch - as one of the best directors in history, and I can say that confidently after just seeing Se7en, Fight Club and The Game, all of which are brilliant psychological pieces. Fight Club is original, clever and intriguing. I'm not quite sure of Finscher's politics, but his artistry and intelligence are beyond doubt. This film will amaze you.
Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002)
Enjoyed it; purists wouldn't
First, I thoroughly enjoyed watching Star Wars, Episode II - the visual effects were spectacular, and though I had seen the first installment, I would have appreciated it just as much with no prior Star Wars knowledge. It says something about George Lucas that he can make it supply the vital links between parts past and future, as well as making the film a decent stand-alone piece. The film also made me laugh. Star Wars purists would be appalled by this - surely the genre is meant to be full of meaning, metaphor and sincerity. I'm more flexible myself, however there are only so many times that yet another character or force joins a single battle (which we had been led to believe was won, yet again) before it descends into something slightly ridiculous. The cinema erupted in hysterics in master yoda's fight scene - surely not the intention of the director? I think maybe Lucas was trying too hard to 'fill in the gaps' and provide viewers with an easy guide to who's going to be who in future - Obi Wan's comment to his troublesome pupil 'you're going to be the death of me' after a high-octane chase scene bordered on the poststructuralist surreal. Having said that, though, I appreciate Lucas had a difficult job to do, which he performed to aplomb - making the movie exciting when anyone who has seen 'Star Wars' (don't read on if you haven't) knows damn well that Obi Wan, Yoda and Anakin will survive in order to feature in the original films. Despite knowing that she must survive in order to conceive Luke, I was still enthralled watching Senator Amidala's struggle to survive. In all, then, a film definitely worth watching - just suspend your sense of disbelief, and avoid being pedantic, and Star Wars II: Attack of the Clones is one of those films you can just sit back and enjoy, regardless of the occasional ludicrousies. Mind you, it would have been far better with some good acting - I am an actor and director myself and can imagine how hard it is to act against a character whose presence is only digitally added later, but even taking that into account, the standard of acting was, on the whole, sub-soap opera level, which even the cinema audience picked up on (more hysterical laughter) when Amidala suddenly and unconvincingly declared 'aaah...ahhh, er, I'm fine' on the desert sands towards the end. Nevertheless, a forcefully fun film to watch.