PT Your favorite little moment or detail in the PT? (image heavy)

And of course the fact that all three are killed by Anakin himself.

 

Double Post

 

Damn, that's incredibly subtle, but somehow you connected the link. Just look at the contrast of colors: blue/white vs. red/green. Ah, the symmetry of this poem!

 

Another thing that links Anakin and Obi-Wan up here is the hand gesture.

On the "heavenly" Kamino, Obi-Wan (chasing after Jango) aggressively forces a horizontally-parting door open with the Force, while Anakin, on the "hellish" Mustafar, serenely brings two vertically-sealing doors down, trapping the Separatist leaders inside.

Obi-Wan also later uses the Force (I suppose he needs to "balance" out Anakin's two doors) by gently pulling open and closing that storage compartment door on Padme's ship, in order to sneakily be taken straight to Anakin's location.

Part of the next movie's plot architecture (ANH) is taken up with doors being blasted apart (the Rebel Blockade Runner door through which the stormtroopers and Vader board) or declared "locked" with a stormtrooper instructing the rest of his men that they should "move on to the next one" (and Artoo and Threepio are hiding behind that door with the plans to the Death Star).

Nothing about this saga should ever be underestimated!

 

Little moments like this are what I love about the PT and what I was missing in TFA. It just really takes its time and lets the music play up the tension, complete with Ben Burtt's sound effects of the doors . Classic SW stuff that was in the OT and missing in TFA. And All these guys are doing is walking through a hallway and preparing to conduct a negotiation over "the taxation of trade routes". But the music and the generous framing of the image makes it a lot more interesting than that.

 

Indeed. There is a tremendous degree of mystery, atmosphere, and a sort of quietly-rolling, spacious beauty to that shot and the framing in general. The motion of the closing door, in fact, adds one kind of dream-motion punctuation to the shot; and then the camera itself takes over and adds another as it gently pans with these iconic (but as-yet-undeveloped) Jedi figures as they do something as simple (but revealing) as pace slowly toward a window (our first real moment of walking, talking, and window-gazing in the existential matrix of the prequel trilogy: as performed as it is ponderous). The languid, observed feel of an early scene like this, in my opinion, is exactly right; and the muted colours accentuate its cool philosophic, structural, emotional, and textural glaze. Welcome to the wonderful world of Star Wars.

The dialogue, too, of course, is outstanding at setting the scene (and by "scene" I mean "saga"):

"I have a bad feeling about this."
"Don't center on your anxieties, Obi-Wan." (the best anti-depression advice ever?)
"But not at the expense of the moment. Be mindful of the Living Force, young padawan."

I also love how Yoda gets an early name-drop.

And, in a way, this scene also illustrates something core about Obi-Wan. Not only is he a prime witness of various saga-defining events, but he seems to battle his own conflict across the saga, between adhering to the sagely wisdom of Qui-Gon and obeying the "straight path" of Jedi doctrine. If Qui-Gon wants to perhaps (subconsciously) give the purest application of his philosophies their greatest test in Anakin, then Yoda perhaps wants to mold Obi-Wan a little bit more than the other Jedi. Despite the fact that Yoda tersely tells Obi-Wan at the end of the movie that he doesn't "need" Qui-Gon's "defiance", Yoda does seem to perceive some value in Obi-Wan having been under Qui-Gon's tutelage; as if there is some connection to the Living Force which could make him develop into one of the Jedi Order's very finest mentors and practitioners. Perhaps there is even a tiny hint of self-awareness on Yoda's part that the Jedi Order needs some of Qui-Gon's rebellious spirit; even if he would never admit it outright.

So here, in short, we are witnessing two of the most powerful Jedi there has ever been. If any Jedi can survive a gas attack, and, indeed, multiple early murder attempts, and then safely escort a young queen over dangerous territory, even running a blockade and getting stranded on a difficult, unsympathetic desert planet with little to its name outside of moisture farming, scavenging, and crime syndicates, it's these two. These two are the Jedi badasses of the galaxy. Joining up with them so early on (they lead us into the sprawling saga) is, all by itself, a piece of dazzling story design; not to repeat (as above) their formative exchange which, clipped as it is, gives us the proper sampling of the "Star Wars" dialogue and information-relaying style, and sneakily lays out so much of the thematic carpet of the series in plain sight.

Did I mention the set design? It's so polished. An early sense of luxury and gross (yet beautiful; pristine, palpable) indulgence. The long table with its flawless array of empty chairs echoes Anakin and Obi-Wan -- another Jedi wrecking team -- literally battling it out and choking and kicking each other on Mustafar in another conference room when even the illusion of democracy and negotiation have faded; or been violently exposed for the tenuous shams (in this trilogy; long co-opted by dark forces) they are. The sense of big, ghostly rooms, faintly occupied, is a key prequel contrivance. It is already like characters have little to say to one another; they're already doing a kind of violence and aching for a more primal kind to fill the void. The space around them represents all that still-unrealized possibility; all the things not said, not explored, or denied. Yet that space around them isn't their salvation. Unrespected, un-cared-for, disregarded, it becomes part of their doom. Grand tragedy with an opulent gleam.

 

This a sort of part 2 of a comment I made in the AOTC lovers thread.

I think this may be far fetched but regardless , this simulated figure of Obi Wan seen from Slave One where Boba is at the controls and about to blast Obi Wan with lazer cannons. Notice the reddish background.....I'll get to that...



But what Boba is looking at is actually this:



Reddish background from the first pic, is what happens in ROTS!




Cheers!

MJ

 

You know what was cool looking back? The Outlander Club, I dont think it ever showed up in TCW. I bet there are tons off stories going on in that place.

 

Seeing images of its risqué clad inhabitants and thinking, "how is this movie PG?"

 

For some reason I always like the scene where Watto and Anakin reunite. I know Watto was a scumbag and held Anakin as a slave, but I do feel like there was some genuine friendship there. And when Watto sees him again it's almost like the old uncle is proud to see what Anakin has become.

 

i liked the bit where kenobi was on utapau and then jumps down to grievous

"Hello There"

 

Dooku: "You forget he was once my apprentice as you were once his" -- Wait for it.....

Qui Gon showing an actual Starship fully built but missing parts needed. To get Amidala to safety to Coruscant.











Dooku: "I'll take the designs (Not the actual Spacestation) with me to Coruscant they will be safer there with my Master"







Cheers!

MJ

 

GOSH DARN IT, MarcJordan!

You've been prying into my computer files, haven't you?

I have that same comparison saved of Qui-Gon flicking off the hologram of the queen's ship and Dooku switching off the Death Star hologram (talk about a rivalry between "PT" and "OT"; or "restful, exploratory" (blue) PT and hot-headed, dramatic (red) PT --> Or "Qui" (student) and "Doo" (master)).

However, it was only one image for each scenario; one frame. And I didn't muscle in any story details as you have just done so. Very crafty and clever of you as always!

Another arresting detail:

Someone is watching in the background.

And in the TPM scene, Anakin's blue eyes -- orbs/seismic charges/plasma torpedoes ("Oops!") -- are like little "Death Star" seeing-eyes (his head is deliberately spheroid-like given his "bowl" haircut: a bowl-haircut on a dust-bowl world). The "sphere" is seduced by the promise of escape/destruction. Is the Death Star itself conscious? Does it want to be blown up? It sure seems to "draw" the Millennium Falcon (another beautiful bird) within its super structure. And it's the MF that later helps defeat it (and its successor).

One could also read an inviting yin-yang harmony-duality between the queen's ship and the Millennium Falcon. The Falcon is the only (ostensibly) non-sentient object in the OT to be referred to by a feminine pronoun; yet its jury-rigged construction (to say nothing of its owner) and its sharp-edged, junky look are essentially "masculine" to the "feminine" sleekness and curvy, sinuous elegance of the queen's gleaming ship; which even a scraggly-bearded, pot-bellied, avaricious, small-time shop owner on a "coarse and irritating" Outer Rim world like Watto recognizes as being pleasing and desirable ("Not bad, not bad! Nubian, huh?"). I've been thinking about this. About this! Sith! And I've been wondering. What are midi-chlor--. No, wait. I've been wondering. Is Darth Vader my father? No, wait. Not that, either. Is Star Wars female? "It's a girl". Carrie is the first Skywalker to actually pass into the Force. Anyway, seriously. It gets to me when Anakin (Vader) says: "She was alive! I felt it!" It's like he has destroyed the deeper essence of Star Wars; or at least lost sight of it. I think this is what the PT is drawing attention to. Just some musings here based on some "reflections" of late.

One of the more obvious abstract manifestations of "phantom" imagery in TPM is actually the holograms. Sio Bibble and Senator Palpatine (old grey men and Prospero-like keepers/advisors/fathers/wizards of their enchanted-island realms: a kind of "Janus Prospero" two-headed podrace-announcer) both conspicuously appear to Padme/Amidala (and the decoy queen) as potentially misleading/untrustworthy transmissions (Palpatine) or recordings (Bibble); although only the latter induces anxiety in Padme/Amidala or anyone in her "court" (meaning Naboo and her ad-hoc court after her flight from Naboo under the keep of the Jedi). Yet it might actually be the image of the queen's ship (ship = shape? --> "A ship, a cup, a ship, a speeder") that causes the most "damage" in this fictional (or fictive) meta-universe. Note how, again, Anakin's eyes lock onto the ship in the background; and how later, thanks to Qui-Gon's semi-opaque machinations in front of Anakin and Watto in the shop, Anakin seems to be operating under the belief that the ship itself belongs to Qui-Gon: "You mean I get to go with you on your starship?" Yet Jedi are forbidden possessions. This early deceit of Qui-Gon's in the shop, small and subtle and as superficially "inclusive" of Anakin's "frame" as it is, has profound consequences for the history of the SW galaxy.

 

MarcJordan

Lucas: Wow.

Your on quite the roll "Midi"Jordan

 

I'm enjoying reading through this thread! Definitely makes me more inclined to re-watch the PT.

Yes, yes, I found the Plinket reviews enormously entertaining, but that doesn't change the fact that I'd much rather *enjoy* a movie, if I can manage it, then not enjoy it.

 

Well spotted, I've never noticed that.

 

Where's the wrench? Oh there it is!


The cause of Jar Jar's altercation with the energy binders.









Was the same cause for Watto hurting his foot!









Anakin has everything to do with both. Padme witnessing!

Cheers!

MJ

 

Obi-Wan drinks on the job.

 

Interesting to note that 'energy binder', is a very good description for the force as well. "It binds us, penetrates us." And the force is explicitly referred to as an energy field.

 

The question I have is; when Anakin & Obi-Wan fly through the power coupling on Coruscant, wouldn't their entire bodies go numb?

 

Did you say Power Couple?



Prequel Love. It's real!

Cheers!

MJ

 

Started a rewatch of the PT, with my favourite, TPM. Got some interesting nuggets to share.

Rune Haako: "Have you ever encountered a Jedi before sir?"
Nute Gunray: "No, but I don't-"

I love this little exchange, it immediately sets up the status of the two, Haako is the older more experienced one, and Gunray is the youthful new leader. It also shows Gunray's inexperience with dealing with Jedi, foreshadowing how little he understands his dealing with the Sith either

I love the design of this character, in a Skeleton Suit, reminds me of the Vashta Nerada from Doctor Who:


C-3PO: "He has to complete two more circuits?!"

I only just realised that 3PO's putting this in very droid-friendly terms. Circuits being vital to their existence. Why 3PO's covered in exposed circuits. He also longs for his completion.

As always, the Podrace continues to impress me more with each viewing. It really is a triumph of visuals and sound design. The way Sebulba's heavy pods chug along the course, while Anakin's streamlined pod is much quieter



I love when Maul's Probe droid floats right behind Qui-Gon at the arena. It's not remarked upon, but the foley for the probes mean it's easily recognisable, reminding the audience of Maul's hunt in a simple and effective way.

 

I love that Dooku says "You have interfered in our affairs for the last time" to Yoda in AOTC.

It's just such an over-the-top, cliche line, that's perfect for Star Wars, and Christopher sells the hell out of it.

 

I've wondered if it could be a Givin, but the eye sockets seem to be the wrong shape. http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Givin

 

"I've seen your eyes..."