Star Wars Episode I - The Phantom Menace

Platform: Disney+

Director: George Lucas

Release Year: 1999

Watch Date: April 24, 2021

My Rating: 4.2

You know how they say a microwave minute is the longest minute of your life? Well…..I’m pretty sure I sat through 134 microwave minutes watching this movie…..to put that into perspective for you, I would gladly watch Titanic another 7 times in the movie theater (that’s how many times I went to see it the year it came out…..one day I went twice) than sit through this movie again. For those of you wondering, that’s 1,358 minutes of Titanic (I was obsessed with the actual ship and used to read everything I could about it….when that movie was released I was super stoked….it did not disappoint).

I have officially come to the end of Star Wars movies I have actually seen. I hated this one so much when it came out that I refused to watch any more of them. I did the same thing with Harry Potter after Goblet of Fire….I stopped watching the movies and reading the books. Back to this movie. I originally gave it a 3.6 but added .6 for the amazingness of R2-D2 and the naked 3PO.

The casting was great. I do think that there are some stellar actors in this movie…but the scripting and the characters…….not so great. JarJar is obnoxious and problematic from the second you see him. He seems almost intentionally klutzy. Listening to him talk feels like someone is using a cheese grater on my eardrums…although I feel this way about his people too.

Qui-Gon Jinn (the significance of his last name is not lost on me, we’ll discuss later) and his relentless desire to train Anakin even though the other Jedi didn’t think it was a good idea was frustrating. I know both JarJar and the training of Anakin are essential to the plot…but sometimes I just wish people had better intuition. I was also frustrated when Obi-Wan abandoned all reason and decided to pick up the responsibility of training Anakin. Sigh.

I found Amibooboo’s (yes, I know her name isn’t Amibooboo) attachment to Anakin a little creepy…especially knowing that they would one day have Luke and Leia…she seems a little more like a friend or surrogate mom material. I did appreciate how she became bold and wanted to rescue her people even though the Senator wanted her to stay…but was frustrated that she couldn’t see the Senator’s blatant manipulation of her.

Lastly, there is Anakin. For being such a small kid, he has some pretty arrogant confidence. I know, I know….major plot point. What his mother saw as kindness toward others though seemed more like manipulation to me. I felt like his interest in Qui-Gon’s Jedi abilities led him to invite Qui-Gon, Amibooboo, and R2-D2 back home with him. Then he just “happened” to come up with the idea of racing for the money Qui-Gon needed for the parts to fix the ship. All manipulation to get what he wanted….like Aladdin and his Genie, Anakin had his Jinn (Google “what is a Jinn”) to grant his wishes and catapult him into a better life. He was completely insincere when he left 3PO behind…at least he was sincere about being sad his mom had to stay behind.

I will not be watching this movie again.

Photo Credit: imdb.com