The director strikes back

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 16/12/2015 (3930 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Since we last checked into a galaxy far, far away, the Emperor’s grip had been broken, finally allowing the diverse citizens of the galaxy to breathe easily.

By “Emperor,” I am referring, of course, to George Lucas, the man who gave life to the Star Wars universe in 1977, and then took it to the brink of cultural irrelevance with the prequel trilogy, Episodes I-III (1999-2005).

When Lucas sold Lucasfilm and its properties to Disney, the event had the whiff of a last-second escape so common to the movies. The films, we hoped, were freed from Lucas’s strategy of doubling down on big visual effects — digital cinescapes buzzing with activity, yet devoid of life — while treating the story like a combination of religious canon and bloated political allegory.

Han Solo (Harrison Ford) said it best in Return of the Jedi: “Geez, I’m out of it for a little while and everyone gets delusions of grandeur.”

Precisely, Han. It’s no wonder savvy director J.J. Abrams, assuming firm command of the Star Wars universe, brought Ford back to essentially play the lead in Episode VII, The Force Awakens, set a few decades after the climax of Return of the Jedi.

It’s good to have the space smuggler back. Even if this adventure spans the galaxy, Ford’s presence tends to bring things down to earth.

Contrary to the happy ending of Return of the Jedi, the evil Empire has not been wiped out, but reborn as the First Order, a fascist force whose principal movers recall the unholy trinity of the first Star Wars. In place of Moff Tarkin, the Emperor and Darth Vader, say hello to the icy General Hux (Domhnall Gleeson), Supreme Leader Snoke (a motion-capture performance by the inevitable Andy Serkis) and the masked Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), a remorseless thug who, like the masked Vader, is wise to the dark, mystical applications of the Force.

Kylo is on the trail of a key member of the Rebel Alliance. His search will take him into the presence of the apparently orphaned young woman Rey (Daisy Ridley), who scrapes by as a scavenger on a desert planet, as well as an unexpectedly conscientious Stormtrooper dubbed Finn (John Boyega) who has deserted his brutal duties to take up with the rebels. As the cute robot R2-D2 serves as the McGuffin of A New Hope, a ball-shaped bot named BB-8 is the droid everyone is looking for, bearing, as he does, a valuable secret.

Rey and Finn manage to escape the First Order’s shock troops via a junked vessel that serves as their introduction to space rogue Solo and his hairy pal Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew may be going grey, but his venerable wookiee hasn’t aged a bit).

On the periphery of all this is a hotshot pilot called Poe Dameron

(Oscar Isaac) and a tiny but wise pirate called Maz Kanata (Lupita Nyong’o, also in motion capture) whose wizened features might make one think of Yoda, but without a trace of his Muppet quality. It’s a lovely character.

If the plot sounds like a playful echo of A New Hope, it is. Very much. The new characters may be different, but their adventures follow an Episode IV template, right down to a cantina scene, a desperate, surreptitious venture into enemy territory, and more.

But coming as it does after Lucas’s prequel trilogy, it still feels fresh and somehow grounded. Abrams, who scripted with original trilogy vet Lawrence Kasdan and Michael Arndt (Little Miss Sunshine), has his own way of staging space vehicle dogfights in a way that feels immediate and physically real. But he also knows how to work with actors, and he elicits emotional gravity from his cast, a quality that tended to elude George Lucas.

Ridley makes for a compelling heroine without the bossy-boots quality of Princess Leia. Boyega represents an interesting change-up in Star Wars heroes: his character’s predicament is reminiscent of the contemporary issue of child soldiers. Driver invests his Vader-like villain with decidedly un-Vader-like feeling. As for Ford’s suitability to the role of the aged Han Solo, again, the character says it best: “Chewie, we’re home.”

Of the cast, only Carrie Fisher (now General Organa, not Princess Leia) functions more as animatronic waxwork than an actress.

As for Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker… I’m not saying.

Already a box office hit in pre-sales, this should be a critical success too. Even so, Abrams’ participation will a cause for concern in subsequent chapters. Abrams won a lot of good will by re-invigorating another moribund sci-fi property in 2009 with Star Trek, and then proceeded to blow it with its sequel Star Trek Into Darkness, an unnecessary, ill-fitting and tiresome retread of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

Here’s hoping that whatever his role in future chapters, Abrams has figured out there’s a line between affectionate homage and slavish replication, and he won’t make the same mistake twice.

randall.king@freepress.mb.ca

Randall King
Writer

Randall King writes about film for the Winnipeg Free Press.