THE PHANTOM MENACE (1999) **1/2 Luke Skywalker, of lineage of a virgin birth? I doubt it. George Lucas was never shooting for Shakespeare territory with all this Star Wars stuff, more like Batman. And he definitely hit it, look around you. The plot is an interesting amalgam of religious myths and cultural complexities cast across the shadows of the stars, but the acting has less depth than the consistently provided computer graphics. Doesn't matter, much, this stuff is all about Lucas' entertaining vision of alternate and interstellar worlds that weren't able to think of anything that we haven't already thought of, and his technical genius in being able to make those worlds manifest before our eyes. I actually got used to Liam Neeson's lack of flair, and figured him to be a pretty bad dude by the end of the film. There's no explanation, however, for Ewan McGregor turning into Alec Guinness in later films, unless there's going to be some kind of DNA-altering genetic explosion that includes a brain transplant and acting lessons. Given the rest of my feelings, I don't feel at all betrayed by the absurdity of a little kid always saving the day. My only complaint, really, is that Lucas obviously has an excellent sense of the dynamic of government gone off the track, and I wonder if there might be an even better medium for expressing such a thing than this one.
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