Revenge of the Sith
I have finally seen it. My reaction? The first half drags and the dialogue is rather bad. I’ll leave it to Mr. Filthy, who writes of the dialogue
It stinks like a Shriner Hall men’s room: the old, stale, rancid stench of a lifetime of undigested beef finally making its way out the ass. There are so many embarrassing, stiff lines it reminded of the one time I tried stand-up comedy and ended up using the last two minutes of my five curled in the fetal position at the corner of the stage, crying . And that’s the part that got the most laughs. A perfect example is when Christiansen turns to the Dark Side, while we can get the sense of what Lucas is doing, he makes it happen with corny and trite exchange ending with the young Jedi kneeling and saying, “I will do whatever you say, Master.”
Beyond that, the movie is quite good and visually spectacular. I will say that the ships look very much computer animated. I prefer the original where the ships were actual models and so looked somewhat real — at least to me. Computer animation is overrated. The second half of the movie was so spectacular that it made up for the first half. The transformation into Vader was captivating and tragic. Aeschylus it was not, but Aeschylus would have been proud. The play off of Padme and Anakin was quite good.
Of course, Lucas interjected his politics. The third or so line in the scroll was that “there are heroes on both sides” in the galactic war. Maybe so, but the protagonists are too busy slaughtering the murderous bad guys for us to figure out which murderous bad guy Lucas intended to be a hero. Oh, and there is that “Only Sith deal in absolutes” bit. But, that’s the thing. If Lucas was trying to bash the President, he wound up slaughtering his own side. The Sith come up like some Upper East Side or San Franciscan liberal. Check out this bit of dialogue:
PALPATINE: Anakin, if one is to understand the great mystery, one must study all its aspects, not just the dogmatic, narrow view of the Jedi. If you wish to become a complete and wise leader, you must embrace a larger view of the Force. Be careful of the Jedi, Anakin. (pausing) They fear you. In time they will destroy you. Let me train you.
Well my stars and garters! MoveOn.org couldn’t have said it better. That is the liberal view of the right, isn’t it? We are dogmatic and narrow minded. We have to be more open minded and be able to view things in morally relative light to really grow. As Josh Trevino pointed out to, a guy at Slate reviewed the movie and it seemed really to be about an old queen in search of a new boy toy — very left coast. If Lucas intended Palpatine and the Sith to be some sort of political caricature, he could have done no better in his typecasting the Sith as the modern left.
Consider also this
PALPATINE: Good is a point of view, Anakin. And the Jedi point of view is not the only valid one. The Dark Lords of the Sith believe in security and justice also, yet they are considered by the Jedi to be. . . ANAKIN: . . . evil. PALPATINE: . . . from a Jedi’s point of view. The Sith and the Jedi are similar in almost every way, including their quest for greater power. The difference between the two is the Sith are not afraid of the dark side of the Force. That is why they are more powerful. ANAKIN: The Sith rely on their passion for their strength. They think inward, only about themselves. PALPATINE: And the Jedi don’t? ANAKIN: The Jedi are selfless . . . they only care about others.
Well, there you go. “Good is a point of view” sounds like something Ralph Neas would say. Oh, and in our modern culture who is it thinking about themselves and how to gain politically from tragedy while the right is freeing 50 million people from tyranny and murderous regimes? You guessed it, the left, which has sought to recover political capital from the deaths of our soldiers, much like Palpatine does with the galactic war.
In the end, I do not take Star Wars to be a political commentary. But, if Lucas intended it to be an indictment of the right, he failed.
Laugh of the Day
Read the last line of this article.
“I am thinking, well, America has finally got to us,” said one old woman, as she sat on the ground outside her house.
Wal-Mart
I’m watching a program on CNBC about Wal-Mart. Did you know that Wal-Mart has the most sophisticated computer system next to the Pentagon?
At Wal-Mart, their headquarters track every purchase made within 15 minutes of that purchase and they share their data with their suppliers. They keep all the purchase transactions for two years and have discovered such little things as during hurricanes, purchasers buy lots of Kellogg’s Pop-Tarts, particularly strawberry ones. So, when Wal-Mart gets a weather forecast of a hurricane on the way, it sends out an order to Kellogg’s.
That efficiency has helped keep the company very competitive. Additionally, the opportunity to excel in the company and be promoted is readily available.
Good For Him
Remember the Sabbath, says the Pope.
Pope Benedict XVI, in his first trip outside Rome since being elected, was greeted by enthusiastic crowds in the southern Italian city of Bari yesterday. At an outdoor mass attended by an estimated 200,000 people, he called for the rediscovery of the religious meaning of Sundays as an antidote to the “rampant consumerism and religious indifference” that was making the modern world a spiritual desert.
France Votez Le Non
The EU tyranny has been defeated in France on fears that the socialism of the EU would not be as socialized as currently exists in France. Regardless, defeating tyranny is a beautiful thing.
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Get Over It
This should be a non-issue.
Maj. Robert Rogers, the frontiersman whose 18th century manual on guerrilla warfare has become a blueprint for Army Ranger fighting tactics, is getting what some consider a long-overdue honor: a statue in his memory. But some veterans believe unveiling the monument on Memorial Day is insensitive because Rogers was loyal to England during the Revolutionary War. “I think it’s a travesty that we would think about honoring a person, especially someone who fought against us, on that day,” said Bob Bearor, who served in the Army’s 101st Airborne Division in the 1960s. “It’s a sacred day. … Let’s honor our dead who died for our country.” The life-size bronze statue is scheduled to be unveiled during a ceremony on Rogers Island in the Hudson River, 40 miles north of Albany. The island served as the base camp for Rogers’ Rangers during the late 1750s, when the British and French fought for control of North America.
The guy’s manual led to the creation of the best light infantry in the world. Deal with it. He deserves to be honored.
Sources Say
Despite what you are hearing and reading, King Faud of Saudi Arabia is dead. Unconfirmed, but credible sources are saying it.
Ramesh has a UPI source over at RedHot saying so.
A Personal Note
Having a wireless connection at home means I can blog while in the bathroom.
Ain’t technology grand?!
Call And Leave A Message
One of my true and earnest pet peeves is the obsessive caller.
Call me and leave me a message. If you do not hear from me within 24 hours, call back. But, if you leave me a message, there is no reason to call back 15 more times in a single day.
End of rant. Actually no . . .
If you call and want me to call you back, leave me a message. I’m a lawyer. Lawyers actually are busy people. Do not call 15 times in a day and never leave a message. I’ll get back to you when I can. You are otherwise wasting your time and making me mad, especially if I’m on an hour plus phone conference and your name is popping up constantly on caller ID during that hour.
And never, ever, ever rotate between the office home and cell phone. Dammit. If I’m in the office I don’t need my cell. If I’m on my cell I can’t get to my office phone and both phones have (A) caller ID and (B) voicemail. Deal with it.
Now, end of rant.
Wiccan Prohibition
I certainly disagree that Wicca is anything more than a crap religion, but it troubles me greatly that a judge would prohibit two self-described Wiccans from teaching their son about Wicca.
An Indianapolis father is appealing a Marion County judge’s unusual order that prohibits him and his ex-wife from exposing their child to “non-mainstream religious beliefs and rituals.”The parents practice Wicca, a contemporary pagan religion that emphasizes a balance in nature and reverence for the earth.Cale J. Bradford, chief judge of the Marion Superior Court, kept the unusual provision in the couple’s divorce decree last year over their fierce objections, court records show. The order does not define a mainstream religion.
True, the boy will probably be screwed up for life. True, the parents are probably hippie leftovers who should be flogged for lunacy. But, a court system should not prohibit a parent from teaching their children about their “religion” however nutty it might be.