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This article was published 07/04/2016 (3810 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

When George Lucas sold Lucasfilm and its properties to the Walt Disney Company a few years ago, there was reason to hope future Star Wars films would be freed from the mediocrity of the prequel trilogy.

Episodes I through III (1999-2005) saw a 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 the original trilogy’s capper, Return of the Jedi: “Jeez, I’m out of it for a little while and everyone gets delusions of grandeur.”

It’s no wonder savvy director J.J. Abrams, assuming firm command of the Star Wars universe, brought Ford back essentially to 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 principle movers recall the unholy trinity of the original Star Wars. In place of Grand 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 ubiquitous 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.”

Ren 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. Like the cute robot R2-D2 in Episode IV — A New Hope, a ball-shaped bot named BB-8 is the droid everyone wants, 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 hotshot pilot 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 Lucas.

The Blu-ray/DVD combo pack has a whole disc of extras, catnip for the diehard fan. Make note especially of the doc Crafting Creatures, covering the old-school practical makeup effects employed in the film, with actor Simon Pegg offering an explanation as to why he was so eager to don pounds of latex to portray a heinous monster: “It’s Star Wars.” ★★★★

randall.king@freepress.mb.ca

@FreepKing