STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS
When does a movie become more of an homage than just nodding to the original film? I feel that FA (Force Awakens) threads this fine line. I'm not sure this is a new film, but rather the same film I have seen before, but rehashed for a newer audience.
Let me explain: I had watched A New Hope hours before I saw FA with my little sister who has never seen a Star Wars film. I wanted her to see what the original was about so she could be familiar with the characters and he style of movie. What I didn't know is that the film would be almost be the same as I had shown her.
A droid has vital information and stumbles into our hero/heroine by accident. Sounds familiar, the scenario applies to FA and A New Hope. A large space station with highly destructible capabilities is threatening our heroes. Same plot in both films. An older man acts like a father figure to our hero/heroine (the same one that discovered the droid) only to die in the final act? Why, that sounds like A New Hope to me.
Let's shift from the similarities. Was FA fantastic? Yes. Was it a great start to the new trilogy to follow? Absolutely. Was it as original as we hoped it to be? No. It just didn't cut it. We should expect this after seeing JJ Abrams Star Trek movies. Those films are also not as original as we want them to be.
Let me shift focus away from that for a moment. The acting was phenomenal is this film. After watching the prequels, it was nice to see people act like people and not act like whatever it was that the prequels brought. I think Harrison Ford was better in this film than the other films. He was concentrated and cocky, which of course he says never to be.
The other big names were wasted however. Captain Phantasma is just a faceless character with a forced plot line. Serkis played a hologram with I think will play a bigger role later, but I feel he was also wasted.
This film kept the action going from beginning to end. It added little to the Jedi lore or history of Star Wars, but when introducing a new trilogy I think that lore and history will be made up in the other two films. Overall this film succeeding in what it wanted to do. It was entertaining and it was fun. Something that the prequels forgot how to do. However, I worry. The film needs its own identity. It needs to carve its own path, if it doesn't, I only have one phrase to describe that situation:
I have a bad feeling about this.
