‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ Review | Последние новости сегодня в мире культуры



‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ Review
‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ Review
BY: Sonny Bunch December 15, 20174:59 am The following piece of criticism will include the discussion of plot points and the fates of characters; please do not complain to me about spoilers if you read beyond this sentence. The Last Jedi feels cobbled together from bits and pieces of The Empire Strikes Back and The Return of the Jedi: we get training sequences in a remote location headed by a reticent Jedi master; we get trench battles featuring hopelessly outnumbered rebels facing down AT-ATs; we get a final duel in the throne room of a star ship as a hero of the Alliance watches her fleet be destroyed, her allies snuffed out hundreds at a time. And I probably could have lived with that, to be totally honest, if it wasnt for the fact that writer/director Rian Johnson also borrows from the prequel trilogys shoddier storytelling impulses and action set pieces. Our heroes are divided into three plotlines. The Resistance is on the run (again) and the Empire remnant the First Order has laid claim to the Galaxy (again) following the destruction of the Republic (again). The First Order has recuperated remarkably quickly, given the fact that its Starkiller base was just blown to hell; an entire fleet of Star Destroyers pops above the planet Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) and Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher) are trying to evacuate. Needless to say, the Resistance makes its escape (again), and when Finn (John Boyega) awakens from the coma we left him in at the end of Force Awakens he discovers that the First Order is not only on their tail still but able to track them through hyperspace. (How has this one foolproof escape hatch present throughout every other Star Wars movie been nullified? Oh, it doesnt matter. Science, or something.) In order to slip the First Order once and for all, Finn and Rose (Kelly Marie Tran) must travel to a casino planet and find a hacker who can get them aboard Supreme Leader Snokes (Andy Serkis) flagship, which will allow them to deactivate the tracking device and let the remnant of the Resistance flee to safety. Rey (Daisy Ridley), meanwhile, picks up where we last saw her on Arch-To: shes handing Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) his lightsaber, ready for her training. But hes just not that into her, having sworn off the whole Jedi thing and closed his mind to the Force. Needless to say, like his master before him, Luke relents and does some modest amount of training before Rey, frustrated by her lack of progress and annoyed at his unwillingness to rejoin the fight, leaves to try and turn Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) back to the light side of the Force. The best parts of The Last Jedi revolve around Rey, Luke, and Kylo, around the mental connection shared by Rey and Kylo, around Lukes feelings of failure and his inability to keep Kylo from succumbing to the dark side, around Kylos anger at living in the shadow of his grandfather and his uncle. Rey and Kylo have real chemistry—that is, there seems to be a mutual attraction, even as they struggle against each others plans—unlike Rey and Finn, who hug so awkwardly and platonically at the films end youd think they were coworkers worried about getting slapped with a #MeToo complaint from Leias HR department. Unfortunately, we keep getting dragged away from the only emotionally resonant portion of the film to watch Finn and Rose engage in sub-prequel hijinks on the casino planet. Everything here is forced and awful, visually uninteresting and often dark to the point of unwatchability, lousy with mawkish little kids making bug eyes at the camera as we marvel at the horror of economic inequality, and drowned in an atrocious patina of truly terrible CGI. It calls to mind the droid factory in Attack of the Clones and the pre-podrace sequence in The Phantom Menace. Most offensively, the whole Finn/Rose diversion has absolutely no importance to the forward momentum of the plot—its utterly irrelevant, even nonsensical.* By constantly yanking us away from Rey and Kylo, their showdown with Snoke loses any resonance it might have had. We know nothing of Snoke, nothing of his plans and plots, his hopes and desires. We have no idea why hes so angry. All we know is that he … is kind of gross looking. And strong in the Force. Theres nothing to motivate him and therefore nothing for us to care about when he meets his fate; hes your standard-issue, MCU-style, evil CGI/motion capture construct. Hes a twirling mustache brought to life. And no one cares when a mustache gets trimmed. Also—and this is a peeve that might not resonate with some of you but it vexed me greatly—Johnson tries too hard on the humor front. Just one, brief, example: The whole opening sequences involves Poe doing conference call shtick while trolling Admiral Hux (Domhnall Gleeson). Its weirdly un-Star-Wars in the sense that it feels like something you could see on any dreadful sitcom here on planet Earth; this sequence is more fit for The Big Bang Theory than a supposedly dark entry in the Star Wars canon. The Star Wars movies have always been funny, of course, and there are moments when Johnson makes it work in a Star-Wars-sort-of-way (Id watch a whole spinoff about the put-upon Jedi nuns who live on Arch-To and have to clean up after Luke and Rey). On the whole, though, it feels desperate and forced. All that being said: The Porgs were pretty cute. Good job there, guys. You earned every one of those merchandising dollars that Disneys going to rake in. *So, the whole reason, from a plot structure point of view, to get Finn, Rose, and the hacker on Snokes ship is to have the hacker betray the Resistance to the First Order. Which, okay, fine: theres something interesting in this whole bit about shades of gray and its nice to see our heroes fail at literally anything for once. Except, theres no way the hacker in question would have known about the Resistances plan to escape to the mineral planet—they were captured before Poe discovered what Admiral Effie Trinket (Laura Dern) was up to—or that the ships in question were cloaked. My point is not so much to scream "PLOT HOLE!!1!!1" as to ask why, in this 2.5-hour movie, we spend 30 minutes on something with no narrative impact whatsoever? Why are we taken away again and again from something more emotionally compelling (Rey/Kylo/Luke, yes, but also Poe/Leia/Effie) for this sub-Star-Wars-cartoon interlude? You know why we dont really care about Snokes croak, why it feels so weightless? Because the time we could have spent learning to hate him—or learning literally anything about him, since there is no big reveal, no secret identity: Snoke is just Snoke—was wasted on the two shittiest, most boring characters in the entirety of Star Wars history: Rose and Finn.
    2017-12-15 13:10:32


Tamino: The new Sound of the Nile?
Tamino: The new Sound of the Nile?
The singer and grandson of celebrated Egyptian star Moharam Fouad on mixing his European upbringing with his middle eastern roots.
    2018-12-06 16:05:48


Blackfishing: The women accused of pretending to be black
Blackfishing: The women accused of pretending to be black
Newsbeat speaks to two influencers accused of blackfishing and looks at why its so controversial.
    2018-12-06 16:05:38


Katie Price: The ups and downs of her life
Katie Price: The ups and downs of her life
From a £1million wedding to narrowly escaping bankruptcy - the Pricey has had a turbulent life and career.
    2018-12-06 16:05:22


RuPaul’s Drag Race coming to BBC Three in 2019
RuPaul’s Drag Race coming to BBC Three in 2019
The global reality TV hit will be on the hunt for a new Queen of Great Britain.
    2018-12-05 12:35:43


BBC drops plans for Brexit TV debate between May and Corbyn
BBC drops plans for Brexit TV debate between May and Corbyn
The broadcaster offered to air a debate, but Labour had criticised the proposed format.
    2018-12-05 01:35:18


Cromer Pier a star of BBC One this Christmas
Cromer Pier a star of BBC One this Christmas
Cromer appears in BBC One idents before programmes and a short film about spending time with family.
    2018-12-05 01:07:05


Turner Prize 2018: Film-using art activists in the running
Turner Prize 2018: Film-using art activists in the running
Video and film dominate the shortlist for this years prize, whose winner is announced later.
    2018-12-04 13:36:16


YouTube top earners: The seven-year-old making $22m
YouTube top earners: The seven-year-old making $22m
An American boy who reviews toys is this years highest-earning YouTube star, according to Forbes.
    2018-12-03 22:05:34


2018 WAFCA Winners
2018 WAFCA Winners

As a film critic of medium-low importance, one of my most sacred duties is participating in the Washington Area Film Critics Association (WAFCA) year-end awards extravaganza. During this hallowed time of year, I watch dozens of movies and mine my own recollection of the good, the bad, and the ugly to determine what, precisely, the best films of the year were. At the end of this grueling process—this death march through endless stacks of DVDs, searching for the rarest pearl in an ever-increasing sea of muck—we WAFCA members nominate up to five films/people in each category. The five films/people who earn the most votes in every category are then voted upon by the whole of the membership, the winners are chosen, the press release is sent out, and blessed, blessed relief descends upon us as we put the exercise to rest for 11 months.

    2018-12-03 18:07:03


PewDiePie in battle with T-Series to keep top YouTube spot
PewDiePie in battle with T-Series to keep top YouTube spot
PewDiePie is battling Indian channel T-Series in a bid to remain the YouTuber with the most subscribers.
    2018-12-03 15:36:30


Take That have fastest-selling album of 2018 so far
Take That have fastest-selling album of 2018 so far
Howard Donald, Gary Barlow and Mark Owens greatest hits tops the UK chart on its first week of release.
    2018-11-30 20:06:52

Что будем читать?

Список новостей
Прокрутить вверх