Tuesdays with Media: The Force Awakens

The day after Christmas, Ian and I went to the local cineplex to watch the latest entry in the Star Wars saga, The Force Awakens.  We planned to see the first showing of the film in standard format, but it was sold out for the next seven hours, so we opted for the next 3-D showing instead.  We still had to wait in line, but only for about fifteen minutes and we still got the exact seats we wanted.  (As a side note, I was running a bit late that morning and I didn't have time to shower before the movie.  In most cases, this would be embarrassing, but I guarantee that I was not the only unwashed patron in that theater.)  Before I delve into the film, I want to share a few words about 3-D.  The fact that the standard format was sold out for several hours shows that most people don't want to pay extra for 3-D.  I didn't mind that we saw the movie in 3-D, but I still would have preferred seeing it in 2-D.

The last time Star Wars was in theaters, it was for the prequels, which most fans do their best to ignore.  It's not that the prequels were terrible, it's that they weren't able to achieve the same level of quality as the original trilogy.  Plus, since we knew where the story was going, big surprises were basically impossible.  In order to succeed, the new film needed to offer some surprises while still reaching the level of quality of the first films.

Thankfully, I can say that it did.  The way that I've summed up the movie to people that I've talked to about it is that it was able to balance introducing new things while staying true to the spirit of the original.  The story starts about thirty years after the end of the last movie in the series, Return of the Jedi (which makes sense since Jedi was released in 1983).  There are characters from the first films that return again (like Han Solo, Chewbacca, and Leia Organa) who help to introduce the audience to the new characters that we follow (like Rey, Finn, and Poe Dameron).

Speaking of new characters, the two leads of the movie are Rey and Finn, a woman and black man, respectively.  All of the previous Star Wars films have struggled with including women and minorities, so it was a nice change of pace that our main protagonists are not just more white men.  Not only that, but Rey is not simply a damsel in distress as Princess Leia and Queen Amidala often were.  I have been surrounded by strong women my whole life, so it's been frustrating that so many movies include women merely mere as plot points and not complete characters.  Thankfully, Rey is able to fight her own battles, without the need of anyone else.  Just as Luke Skywalker was a good character for me to look up to as a kid, Rey is good character for my nieces to look up to.

Rey (played by Daisy Ridley), ready for a fight.

One detail in the film that I appreciated was the way that technology was depicted.  Since the first Star Wars movie was made in 1977, all the computers looked like what people in the late seventies imagined computers would look like in the future (that is, with physical buttons and lousy screen resolution).  While there are some updates to the tech we see onscreen, a lot of it is reminiscent of what we saw in the first film.  The filmmakers could have made more changes since thirty years have passed in-story, but I'm happy that they chose to keep things looking more old fashioned, as it helped to make it feel more like Star Wars.

Some important changes that were made were to the special effects shots.  The special effects themselves were mostly computer-based, but the way the camera was used in those shots was really creative.  For example, in the trailer above, you can see a brief glimpse of the Millennium Falcon being chased by TIE fighters.  The way the camera follows the ships and changes angles was really clever.

You may have noticed that I haven't really gotten into the plot of film, but instead stuck to other elements of the movie.  The reason for that is that I liked it, and I want to give my support to the movie without ruining the experience for those who have not seen it yet.  The story isn't perfect and there were definitely some mistakes that were made in the presentation, but the overall experience was still really good.  See it for yourself and I'm sure you'll agree.

With so many geeks wailing that George Lucas destroyed their childhood with the prequels, will they now say that J. J. Abrams saved it?

Star Wars: The Force Awakens is distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures.