Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace will be 25 years old this spring. (If that doesn’t make you feel old, the original Star Wars will be 50 in 2027.) And naturally we’re getting the thing we often get for such a momentous anniversary of such an iconic film: a rerelease, starting Friday, May 3rd… so, over the weekend of May the Fourth (be with you). It’s unclear yet how wide the release will be, but it’s difficult to imagine that it won’t be as global as possible.
What are your memories of Star Wars: The Phantom Menace as we approach its 25th anniversary?
I wrote about the film twice that summer of 1999 — first a straight-up review, later a geeky rehash — but before that, I reviewed the trailer when it debuted earlier that spring, something I hadn’t done before (Flick Filosopher was already a year and a half old when the trailer landed) and haven’t done since. It’s almost impossible to convey the level of excitement and anticipation if you didn’t experience it, and perhaps you had to have been a kid for the first trilogy for the full impact of the continuous nerd rave that was 1999: We were getting a new ‘Star Wars’ movie!
That’s what I remember best: I was working at Yahoo! Internet Life magazine, where everyone was a huge geek, of course, and the day the trailer debuted, the strains of that famous theme music was all you could hear coming out of everyone’s office. We literally just sat watching the trailer over and over again. We were in our geeky glory.
Your turn…
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My perspective of TPM and the prequels and general were colored by my age and what was going on in my life at the time. We were actually around the same age when we discovered Star Wars. You got to see the OT in theaters as it came out. I got the Special Editions as a present for my tenth birthday. I fell in love with them. My family did not have much money when I was growing up, but they made sure I knew I was loved. The next summer my dad took me to see TPM. Afterwards, as a complete surprise to me, he took me to K-Mart and bought me an N-1 Starfighter. My mom also made a point to get me as many of the action figures as she could (I can still hear the voices from the chips with the communicator.) I loved to read and had basically memorized the junior novels. I also loved the Jedi Apprentice series. Tragically, dad would be diagnosed with cancer shortly before 9/11 and my 13th birthday. It was a hard battle that he would eventually lose two years later. In spring of 2002 I had worked my tail off academically and made the honor society. My reward was that dad took me to see AOTC. While arguably the weakest of the prequels, I’ll never forget sharing that with him.
As far as the movies themselves, while I think those who consider TPm a prologue are correct, time has improved the movie. Your point about characterization being fleshed out over the rest of the trilogy is well made. I would also say that The Clone Wars animated series has done that as well. I’ve also read most of the High Republic and am anticipating The Acolyte. The Guardian protocols that the Jedi were forced to use during THR era seem to have long reaching effects, but we haven’t seen the end yet. Reading and watching everything that’s come out since Disney acquired the franchise has been great. I was a bit too young for the Heir to the Empire and beyond. I’m hoping what shows like Ahsoka have done for the PT will eventually ST
All that to say, while far from perfect, TPM is one of the most important movies of my lifetime.
TPM was the film that first me to try to stop getting excited about films. There had been so much hype, so much expectation even apart from the hype because original Star Wars had been a huge part of people’s childhoods, that in the end the best film in the world would have been a disappointment.
The other element which I found memorable was the pod race: I watched it and thought “this is going to be a video game, isn’t it”. And of course it was.
One of the things I like best about your reviews is that you show me things I never notice when I watch a film. I can assess a movie in a general way and make cogent observations about things that impress me, but you have a trained focus that, seriously, enlightens a movie for me. You broaden its scope. This is maybe not crucial to my enjoyment of that film, but it adds to what I can enjoy about films in general. That’s cool, thanks.
But on the actual topic – I didn’t love Phantom Menace as much as A New Hope*, but I loved it anyway. I loved seeing the opening crawl, and I loved seeing that Lucas had kept the iris for the change of scenes. I had a similar response to the actors’ characterizations that you had, without analyzing why that was. I really appreciated seeing the expanded universe, and more different types of people. George Lucas did a very good job. I knew that this movie couldn’t have as great an impact as the first ones, since Star Wars as a whole has been integrated into our public psyche. But I’m grateful to have Lucas’ dream become a reality because with the first ones he let us into it, and we’re happy about it.
As for Jar Jar: I got no beef with him. Those who object to the ethnic characterization are entitled to, and I got no beef with them either. I expect George and the other people who were responsible for how he came to be got a rude shock when the objections started. Maybe they learned a lesson from it. But he was funny, and that whole sequence was funny, if too long. I remember wanting them to get out of there. And they did.
*(You know it’s a bitch to have to use these names. My brain says the first one is Star Wars, and then there’s the 2nd one and the 3rd one.)
I feel bad for the actors (Ahmed Best as Jar Jar, and Jake Lloyd as young Anakin) who got a lot of intense hate from the fans, simply for doing their job as actors and doing their best with the characters. They didn’t deserve that. Whatever flaws the films had rest on Lucas’s shoulders.
Although I have my criticisms about the new Star Wars shows on Disney Plus, one thing I do appreciate is their effort to bring back some of the actors from the prequel films and give them love. Ahmed Best got to appear as a badass Jedi who saves Grogu in The Mandalorian, and Hayden Christensen (after being widely panned in the films, as I remember) put in some favorably viewed performances as Anakin/Vader in Obi-Wan Kenobi and Ahsoka.
I hope Jake Lloyd is doing okay. *googles* Oh dear.
Thank you!
My wife and I drove from central PA to New Jersey (just outside the city) to see the High Def Video version. It was in one of only four theaters experimentally showing the “film.” There were two on the East Coast and two on the West Coast. It was impressive and we saw the future.