Right so last night I finally got around to seeing the new Star Wars film: The Force Awakens and so obviously this will be what this post is about and it is easily one of the most anticipated films in many a year. So how does it stack up???? Let's gear up and find out!
Oh and don't worry given it is a new film I will NOT give most of the plot away and keep any spoilers to a bare MINIMUM, honest!
So here we go....
STORY
Right! So I will try and keep this down to just two paragraphs max and leave it at that and just a few things about the movie's story without giving too much away but there will still be one or two details that could be construed as SPOILERS so if you don't want to know anymore than what I've written here, read on to my thoughts section of the film.....
So the story is set about 30 years after the events of the Return of the Jedi and the opening scroll tells us that Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) has disappeared. Also a new evil regime has risen from the fallen Galactic Empire called the First Order who are intent on eliminating Luke aswell as the New Republic. The resistance are aided by Luke's twin sister, Lei Organa (Carrie Fisher) who is against the New Order and is also determined to try and find Luke. Meanwhile on the planet Jakku in a village a resistance fighter pilot, Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) obtains a map with the location of Luke, and the village is soon ambushed by First Order stormtroopers lead by the evil Kylo Ren (Adam Driver). Kylo takes Poe captive but not before Poe stores the map data inside his droid BB-8 who escapes the scene where Ren orders the massacre of the villagers. BB8 later meets a scavenger, Rey (Daisey Ridley) on Jakku who reluctantly takes the droid with her.
Meanwhile Ren tortures Poe and forces him to reveal BB-8 and then sends an airstrikes to Jakku. Poe however manages to escape with the help of a stormtrooper, FN-2187 (John Boyega) who Joe nicknames "Fin" in a stolen TIE fighter. Fin reveals to Poe that he felt he couldn't kill anyone in his first mission as a stormtrooper and that's why he is helping Poe. Fin and Poe then crash land their TIE fighter on Jakku where Fin loses sight of Poe and soon encounter Rey and the two of them along with BB-8 escape in the Millenium Falcon. The Falcon however is soon captured by a larger ship, which turns out to be manned by Han Solo (Harrison Ford) and his good friend and Wookie, Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew). Together they escape from gangs wanting Han to pay smuggling debts and Han tells Rey and Fin of Luke and how he did create a Jedi order where he trained students but one of them betrayed the order and that is why Luke went into hiding. And its from here than Han, Rey, Fin and Chewie travel to join up with the resistance to help them to fight against the threat of the First Order aswell as locate Luke.....
THOUGHTS
As the first sequel in quite some time in the Star Wars trilogy, The Force Awakens is a very entertaining, charming and worthy successor to the Return of the Jedi which sees the introduction of some new engaging characters aswell as the welcome return of some olders ones. The film also manages to succeed in evoking the atmosphere of the original trilogy and it nicely brings in the characters of Han, Chewie and Leia. The First Order also make for a fairly effective new evil regime that has taken over from the fallen Galactic Empire and its main villain Kylo Ren makes for the most part, a chilling and also complex villain. And its the film's story where the film really does score big even more so than the film's action scenes where are for the most part pretty good but maybe they lack the epic feel of the original trilogy's fight scenes. But overall its exciting to see Star Wars back on the big screen at any rate no matter what the mix of action, character development and story is.
PERFORMANCES
Right so for a change I will restrict the use of noteworthy scenes as that might resort to giving some key plot points away so instead will just say more about the performances themselves and maybe mention a bit of dialogue here and there.
So to start off Harrison Ford is great as Han Solo once more and you get the feel that Ford had never really been away from the part as he plays Solo very much the way he did before with a mix of charm, good humour aswell as the rough and ready quality that Solo's character has. Ford naturally has some great moments such as his opening scene where he arrives oboard the Falcon and he smiles at Chewie saying "Chewie, we're home!". Then there is the scene where Rey excitedly says when they are onboard the Falcon "This is the ship that made the Kessel run in fourteen parsecs!" and Han angrily corrects by shouting "TWELVE!" and he walks off irritated and says under his breath "fourteen!". Another good scene comes when Fin who pretends he is a resistance fighter to Rey, speaks to Han who has him sussed out and tells him "Women always figure out the truth! Always!". And then there is the scene when some gangs show up to claim their debts from Han and Rey asks "What are you going to do?" and Han says "Same thing I always do, talk my way out of it!". And lastly there is a scene where Fin and Rey are reunited and they hug each other and Han warns them "Escape now, hug later!".
Daisy Ridley (who bears a close resemblance to Hilary Swank!) in her first major debut screen role is excellent as the plucky young scavenger, Rey who get's caught up with the resistance and their cause to fight the First Order. Ridley also has some fun moments in the film but I won't go into them in much detail but I will mention the scene when Rey and Fin are being chased by stormtroopers and TIE fighters and Fin asks if they should escape in one ship that is offscreen and Rey says "That one is garbage!". However the ship they are running for is blown up leaving Rey no choice but to say "The garbage one will do!". There are other scenes that she has but they are quite important to the plot so I won't give them away but suffice to say Ridley makes a great new addition to the Star Wars franchise and no doubt she should continue to do well should be in the future films.
John Boyega however for me was a bit of a weak link in the cast as the stormtrooper, Finn who has a change of heart and wants to help the resistance fight the First Order, as there is something that is a bit grating about his performance but he does ok overall I guess. I think the problem for me with Boyega is that he spends alot of time onscreen running and gasping and not a great deal else for most of the movie, he is OK in it but in comparison to the other cast members he doesn't quite stack up as well. But Boyega still has some fun moments in the film regardless. And one example is where Chewie is injured and Fin tries to help treat on the Falcon but Chewie is defensive about it and keeps trying to choke Fin as he doesn't appreciate his help. So Fin shouts "He almost killed me six times!" and Chewie grabs his throat again and Fin says "Which is ok!". Then there is the moment where Fin helps Poe escape from the First Order and he says "OK stay calm, stay calm" and Poe says "I am calm" and Fin says "I was talking to myself".
Adam Driver on the other hand is great in his role as the villainous Kylo Ren who is a commander of the First Order and is strong with the dark side of the force. Driver early proves to be a very scary and effective villain although Ren's effectiveness does ware off a little as the film goes on but he nevertheless still remains a fascinating character and interesting one to watch. I won't mention too many of Driver's scenes either because they do involve big plot spoilers but I will mention a couple such as the rather scary one where a nervous officer approaches Ren to inform him that Fin, Rey and BB-8 got away and Ren proceeds to violently smash up a console in the room with his lightsaber out of rage. And then there is the one where he feels conflict over his emotions and he says to something or someone off screen "Forgive me. I feel it again... the call from light. Supreme Leader senses it. Show me again the power of the darkness, and I'll let nothing stand in our way. Show me, grandfather, and I will finish what you started!" and we see the twisted burned remains of Darth Vader's mask.
Carrie Fisher is also pretty good and its great to see her return as Leia although it has to be said she probably hasn't aged quite as well as Harrison Ford has in appearance and her voice has grown a bit weary sounding with age too. Regardless of that though Fisher plays Leia with a nice sense of maturity and the old feisty and bitchy Leia is no longer there and instead we have a more serious and mature character. Fisher also has some good moments in the film that include her first scene where she is reunited with Han and she says to him "General Solo, it is such an honor to see you again". And as they stand and look at each other Han smiles and says to her "You changed your hair" and Leia quips back at him "Same jacket!". And later Leia says to Han "You know, as much as we fought, I always hated it when you left" and Han smiles and says to her "That's why I did it, so you'd miss me" and Leia says "I do miss you".
Andy Serkis who does the voice of the character, Supreme Leader Snoke, who is strongly associated with the dark side is excellent and makes the character very sinister and makes for a decent replacement for the Emperor. Again Snoke's character involves some plot spoilers so I won't really mention any of his scenes here.
Domhnall Gleeson is not too bad as General Hux, the commander of the First Order's starkiller base but his character is not anywhere near as effective Kylo Ren's as he comes across morely just as an officious bureaucrat and an equivalent of the pompous Imperial officers we had seen in the original trilogy.
Oscar Isaac on the other hand is really good as Poe Dameron, the resistance fighter pilot who plays a key part in the resistance's fight against the First Order. Isaac plays Poe in a simialr vein as Han Solo, a cocky and plucky pilot who has a good sense of humour but does what he has to in the face of danger. Isaac also has some good moments in the film such as the scene where Poe is captured by Ren who uses his force powers on him but before hand Poe says nervously to Ren "Do I talk first or you talk first? I talk first?". Then there is the scene where Finn helps Poe escape and Finn asks him "Can you fly a TIE fighter?" and Poe confidently says "I can fly anything!". And as they escape Poe asks Finn what his name is who gives him his Stormtrooper code name and Poe says "What kind of name is that?! You need a name! I'm gonna call you....Finn!".
And I will mention quickly, Peter Mayhew who nicely reprises his role as Chewbacca and this time round Chewie is a bit more responsive as the big Wookie and is given a little more to do and Chewie's crossbow weapon is given some real use so much so there is even a moment when Han uses it! Anthony Daniels also does well in his role as the trusty C-3PO (or if you want to be crude the gay robot in the franchise!) and provides the odd comedic moment in the film such as when Threepio first appears one of his arms are red but he doesn't really explain why. And then there is Dave Chapman and Brian Herri who were the puppeteers for the new droid, BB-8 who just happens to be one of the most likeable robots you will see in any film. BB-8 actually even manages to succeed in being a better droid than either Threepio or R2-D2 and the droid has some funny moments in the film such as when it uses its mechanical arms to keep itself from falling over onboard the Falcon. ANd most notably in another Finn gives BB-8 a thumbs up and BB-8 brings out a small flametorch that is shaped like a thumb to thumbs up back at Finn, which is easily one of the film's funniest moments.
And last of all there is Mark Hamill who doesn't appear long in the film but he does make his presence well known when we finally see him in it (well that was short!).
DIRECTOR AND MUSIC
As for the film's director, J.J. Abrahams has done a great job here in producing a brand new Star Wars film and it was no doubt a daunting task but J.J. proved to be more than up to the task here as he really does pull out the stops to create a highly entertaining movie. J.J. who is no stranger to action films present the film's action really well but more importantly he has created a film that is filled with engaging characters and he does a great job at getting the audience engrossed in its story. Visually J.J. also has made the film spetacular to look as its visuals and effects are terrific and yes for once he has kept his usually annoying usage of lens flare down to a very minimum here (as he promised so well done J.J!).
And lastly getting onto the music it features a fine music score by the franchise's regular composer, John Williams which does reuse alot of the previous' films themes which does leave the film's original tracks a little less standout-ish. However this isn't really a big problem and it still makes for another good Williams score even if it isn't one of his very best.
FLAWS
As for the flaws....well yes the film does have some problems even though it is very good and to start off I think in a way the film does borrow alot from Episode IV and it does recycle some of the scenes that we had seen in that film yet again. And it uses similar plot devices such as the Starkiller base which can be used to destroy whole planets just a bit like that Death Star thing! You also get the reusage of certain lines of dialogue which are almost looking out for such as Han say "I've got a bad feeling about this!" as you just know its going to be in there somewhere.
I also felt that Finn's character was a bit of a weak link and it comes down to the fact that his character usually does nothing but run, gasp and look around anxiously although he does do a fair bit of fighting and the odd bit of wisecracking. But I just felt also in a way that the idea of a stormtrooper with a conscience seemed a bit pat and they could use Finn later as a plot device to help the resistance fight the First Order. I have nothing really against Finn's character but I just felt next to the others he wasn't quite as strong.
Another issue probably is to do with Kylo Ren's character as I thought at first he came across as being quite scary and sinister but as the film progresses he becomes a bit more of a wuss than he did at first. Don't get me wrong I think Ren is still an effective villain and by the end of the film you'll be sure he is well on his way to becoming a real badass. But I think the way in which Ren's character progressed during the film made him appear less intimidating then he did in his first few scenes where you really felt this guy would make Darth Vader look like an adorable puppy by comparison!
And last of all I felt the film's action scenes while they were good there was some room for improvement with them as I said earlier I felt they lacked that epic feel of excitement that the fight scenes had in the original trilogy. And in particular I felt that the film could have even benefited from a few longer lightsaber fight scenes than what we got which kind of left you a bit shortchanged in how the climactic one (again I won't say who!) comes to an end.
Anyways that's it for the flaws.
SUM UP
So to sum up The Force Awakens is very entertaining and at times enthralling film which serves as a very fine follow up to The Return of the Jedi and it more than makes up for the mediocrity we had seen in the prequels (but yeah OK with Revenge of the Sith I will make an exception!). The film has some fine performances, great visuals, a sinister villain, some engaging new characters and the return of some of the old ones. And J.J. Abrahams here really has managed to make a film that feels like it does belong to the Star Wars series. And if you haven't seen it yet its well worth checking out.
So that's it for now and I hope I haven't given too much away (I've tried my best here I think!) and I will be back hopefully tomorrow with my last post of 2015.
Until the next one its bye for now and may the force....occh you know what I mean!
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