Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones (2002)

Director: George Lucas

Release Date: May 16th, 2002 (UK & US)

Genre: Action; Adventure; Fantasy

Starring: Ewan McGregor, Hayden Christensen, Natalie Portman

Set 10 years after the events of The Phantom Menace and in the midst of a Separatist rebellion, Attack of the Clones sees an older Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) undertake a mission to discover who is behind the assassination attempt on former Queen and now Senator Padme Amidala (Natalie Portman), whilst a talented-yet-over eager Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) is tasked with protecting Padme, whom he has strong feelings for. Meanwhile, the creation of a massive clone army and a potential conspiracy at the head of the Republic both threaten the beginning of a destructive and uncontrollable war.

Often regarded as an improvement on The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones certainly lays the foundations for a slightly more sinister Star Wars going forward — which is a good thing in my eyes. We see a number of these more sinister traits come to the forefront as the film progresses: elements of Anakin’s darker side and his ambition to “become the most powerful Jedi in the world,” the introduction of Jango Fett and his son Boba along with all that goes on surrounding them, and the themes of betrayal, conspiracy and abuse of power amongst leaders of the Rebellion. All three of the aforementioned plot-points are positives not only in terms of Attack of the Clones as a film on its own, but also in terms of the Star Wars saga going forward as they provide the basis for key narrative in the future.

Firstly, I do think that Hayden Christensen is a little bit hit-and-miss here. This is partly to do with the rather cliché-laden script — he is far better at the beginning of the film and towards the end, as opposed to the middle section where both he and Natalie Portman are hindered by, for lack of a better term, soppy dialogue. But his performance is also probably a result of his inexperience on the big stage — back in 2002, Attack of the Clones was only his fourth or fifth film, and his first significant one in terms of scale. Having said that, however, and having seen Christensen in other films later on in his career, I would like to think that his performance, which is a tad wooden at times, is on the whole an unfortunate product of an uninspired script. To clarify, the whole romance sub-plot between Christensen and Portman is absolutely fine, but the execution is poor and this is primarily down to the wishy-washy dialogue between the two. I like Christensen as an actor and am a big fan of Natalie Portman, but it just did not quite work this time for me. Ewan McGregor does well in carrying his half of the proceedings where the goings-on tend to be more exciting and eventful as he is involved in uncovering an assassination plot rather than a romance (just like it would be, right?). Yoda, voiced by Frank Oz, gets a bigger role this time around and, unlike Jar Jar Binks (who thankfully has a minor role here), is a necessary character who adds to the film. We also see Christopher Lee in a familiar bad-guy role, which he executes with charisma and typical bad-guy exuberance.

Although the script is questionable at times, in general, I do think that Attack of the Clones has a better story than its predecessor. More things are happening this time around — exemplified by the two main characters splitting up and following different agendas for the majority of the film, unlike The Phantom Menace — and, although there is more going on, the plot is still easy enough to follow and makes sense on the whole. With neat nuances such as Anakin’s exploits when he goes back Tatooine to look for his mother and Obi-Wan Kenobi’s trip to the ocean planet of Kamino, the key events of the film have not only more meaning than those in The Phantom Menace (we did not really need to see Anakin as a child or pod-racing), but also an increased sense of direction as the eventual intersection of the varying plot-lines makes sense. Although middle films in trilogies are often looked upon as not much more than a device to further the character development outlined by their predecessor and set up events for their successor, Attack of the Clones veers just enough away from this stereotype to be a success on its own — however there is an element of my latter point in the film.

Again, in tune with The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones is an awesome visual specimen from start until finish. It would even be fair to say that it overtakes The Phantom Menace in the looks department, which is expected considering a lot can happen in three years in regards to image and special effect technology (and evidently did happen, as Attack of the Clones was one of the very first films to be shot entirely on the high definition digital 24 frames-per-second system). Apart from the opening scene with the pod chase — which by all means looks fine, but drags on a little too long — the film moves forward at a decent pace and boasts a fair amount of enjoyable action sequences, with the Gladiator-style battle on Kamino between the Republic and the Separatists towards the end being the pick of the bunch. On that note, I do think Attack of the Clones is missing a really evil villain, and in that sense it does act as more of a buffer between the first and third films in the trilogy. Do not get me wrong, as I mentioned before, Christopher Lee does a fine job as the main villain of the piece, but he does not quite exude that total evilness and heartlessness that Darth Maul did in the previous instalment.

That is all I really have to say about Attack of the Clones. For me, this is perhaps a minor improvement on The Phantom Menace due to the overall more intriguing plot and the introduction/reinforcement of a few key characters, however the clichéd, flat dialogue between Christensen and Portman, which consumes a good proportion of the film, lets Attack of the Clones down slightly.