Opening Night

Last night my fiancée and I got in line at around 9:30 to see Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith. We only had to stand in line for about half an hour before we were seated in the theater. That was nice, because it would have been a bit tiring to have to stand in line for another two hours. Instead, we got to sit in the theater for two hours watching the same advertising on the screen repeat itself dozens of times. Besides watching advertisements and movie trivia for two hours, we were kept entertained by a couple of audience members who asked several Star Wars trivia questions. I got one correct and won a fantastic prize! It was a sticker with an image of Obi-Wan and Anakin fighting. Whoopee! This is part of the reason that I wanted to go to a midnight showing of Star Wars on opening night. You don’t see things like this happen at any other time. Eventually that did get old however. The original people asking trivia questions were interesting, as were some of the people shouting out bogus replies, but when some kid started asking questions, people kind of get fed up with the trivia.

Just after midnight, the theater lights began to dim, and we were “treated” to twenty minutes of commercials and previews. I really don’t mind the trailers for upcoming movies, but I didn’t pay eight dollars a ticket to watch commercials for Coca-Cola or to see Wayne Brady tell me how to diet healthfully. Around 12:20, the movie finally began.

It started out pretty good. George Lucas definitely didn’t waste any time getting right into the action, but I felt that there was just way too much humor in the first twenty minutes of the show. My fiancée didn’t think it was over done, but I could have done with fewer comedic moments courtesy of R2-D2 and an assortment of other droids.

As the movie progressed, it got much better. The comedy went away entirely, and the darker side of Star Wars finally came out. There were some moments that were truly disturbing. I could have done without some of the implied violence. Thankfully Lucas decided not to show the complete extent of the attacks on the Jedi.

I feel that Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith really tied the two trilogies together. The events leading up to the “birth” of Darth Vader was awesome and the movie did have quite a few terrific battle scenes. I think I may end up seeing it a few more times while it is in theaters. My mother would like to see it and so would Homercles.