Third in a series of posts that will offer a review of the newly released Star Wars: The Complete Saga on Blu-ray. I'll be avoiding detailed plot rundowns as I assume that most reading have seen the movies. If you haven't be warned that these reviews may contain spoilers.
Entry 1 can be found here: Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace
Entry 2 can be found here: Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones
The anticipation level was high when Star Wars: Episode 3 - Revenge of the Sith arrived in theaters in 2005. We all knew where the story was going and this would be the film that finally got us there.
Like Attack of the Clones I saw Revenge of the Sith at a midnight screening. I had high hopes for the film and it delivered. If anything Revenge of the Sith could be considered the only "essential" film of the 3 prequel films. After a series that included many pointless moment Sith is a lean and focused movie. It also carries most of the emotional weight of the entire series for me. Natalie Portman, Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen deliver moving performances in the moments leading up to and during Obi-Wan and Darth Vader's epic battle on Mustafar. We'll see how Luke and Vader's final moments together resonate with me when I get to Return of the Jedi but for now it might be the second most emotionally moving set of scenes in the entire series. (The first being Luke discovering that Vader is his father at the end of The Empire Strikes Back.)
Hands down this is the best looking of the prequels on Blu-ray. It is a stunning transfer and will be my go to disc when showing off my system. The image is sharp and well defined and some of the sequences are truly breathtaking. The Wookie home world Kashyyyk is simply stunning here and might just include some of the best imagery of the prequels.
Like the earlier films in the set the special features provide a glimpse into the creation of the movie. At this point I'd say that the DVD releases of these films provided a much more in-depth look at how much effort goes into making a Star Wars movie. The Blu-ray bonus features provide a very condensed version.
Two commentary tracks are included on the main Attack of the Clones disc. The first is carried over from the original 2002 DVD release and features George Lucas, Rick McCallum, Rob Coleman, John Knoll and Roger Guyett. The second is new for this Blu-ray release and is made up of archival interviews with the cast and crew. Just like the tracks on Menace and Clones each commentator is identified by an on-screen subtitle. I have yet to listen to any of the new tracks from this release but assume that they will provide a lot of information and possibly make up for the loss of the DVD bonus features.
The remaining special features are found on the 7th disc in the set. This disc includes all of the non-commentary features for the prequels. The special features for each of the 6 films are laid out the same way. Features to a specific planet are in there own section. For Revenge of the Sith the planets are Coruscant, Utapau, Mustafar and Kashyyyk.
Each planet has the same layout and feature headings: Interviews, Deleted Scenes, The Collection and Concept Art Gallery.
Once again the Interviews don't really offer anything too revelatory. The original DVD included multiple documentaries and a series of featurettes that provided an in depth look at the making of the film. None are included here. As stated in earlier reviews I appreciate being spared redundant features but the docs are missed. They thoroughly covered the making of the film and can't really be replaced by a series of short interviews. Each interview runs about 3-5 minutes.
The Deleted Scenes are brand new for this Blu-ray and do not include the 6 that were featured on the original DVD. Coruscant includes: "Elevator Antics", "Escape Through the Hanger and "Changes to the Constitution". Utapau includes: "Utapau Chase Animatics". Mustafar includes: "Mustafar Duel Animatics" and "Mustafar Duel/Lava River Animatics". Finally Kashyyyk includes: "Kashyyyk Attack and Order 66 Animatic", "Anakin Kills Shaak Ti", "Jedi Imposters at the Temple", "Senate Duel Animatic" and "Yoda Communes with Qui-Gon"As stated in the titles for most of these scenes we get a lot of animatics instead of actual scenes. Animatics provide a rough computer sketch of what the finished scene will look like. Of note here are: "Elevator Antics" (which might include the silliest moment from ANY Star Wars movie), "Utapau Chase Animatics" (an 8 minute sequence directed by Stevn Spielberg!) and "Anakin Kills Shaak Ti" (which is different than her death on the DVD's deleted scene). Also not to get anyone's hopes up "Yoda Communes with Qui-Gon" was deleted early on and does not feature Liam Neeson. A voice actor provides all of his dialog here.
The Collection is made up of key costumes, characters and spacecraft. Each includes a 3D fly around feature that really gives the opportunity to check out the detail. Select pieces also include video commentary that go into the creative process behind their creation. I'll stress again that this is turning out to be my favorite feature on the set.
Finally Concept Art Gallery provides pre-production artwork for select characters, costumes and spacecraft. Concept art is always interesting in that many times it greatly differs from what eventually ended up on screen.
As previously mentioned you can access all of the special features on each planet individually. A "Play All" feature lumps all of the interviews, deleted scenes, etc. from all of the planets of the entire prequel trilogy together for a seamless viewing experience.
Join me next time for a look at Star Wars: Episode 4 - A New Hope.
No comments:
Post a Comment