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There is a scene in the 1977 release of Star Wars, later renamed Star Wars: A New Hope, in which Alex Guinness as Obi One Kenobi use the force to manipulate the thoughts of multiple Storm Troopers. With a wave of his hand and stating "These are not the droids you are looking for." the Stormtroopers allow the heroes to move along.
In many ways that is an adept trick that LucasFilms played on the audience with Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. This is not the film you were expecting regardless of how many times you watched the trailers, scoured the Internet, or read everything released by LucasFilms. That's a good thing. There are many surprises in the film and you have to wonder for a couple of them how on earth LucasFilms and one of the most scrutinized films in history kept them a secret.
Your enjoyment of this film will be dictated by how much you know about the Star Wars universe. Have you memorized every episode of Droids, read Cataclysm, have a signed copy of Splinter of the minds Eye, binged every episode of Star Wars: Rebels and know who Saw Gerrea is? If you answered yes to all those questions than you will think this Film is Oscar worthy, the more you said no the more likely you will say "It's an okay movie I don't get what all the hubbub is about."
There are several flaws in this film.
The film opens without a crawl. "In a Galaxy Far Far away." And away you go. There is no short background statement about what is going on. This was a novelty that many take for granted in the other Star Wars films, Kathleen Kennedy announced this months ago, and you know what it fails. If any of the Star Wars Films need that opening crawl, this was it. The less of a hard-core fan you are them more confused about whats happening in the beginning of the movie you will be. It really puts the casual fans behind the eight ball in understanding what is going on.
Michael Giacchino score needed more work. That's not saying it is a bad score by any means, it is just not as solid as John Williams work on the previous films. Considering he only had 4 weeks to get it done it was already a Herculean effort. Given another four weeks it probably would have melded into the film a lot better.
There are some problems with the script, particularly in the second (of three) acts. The middle part of the film slows down. This is a you love it or hate it kind of situation. Many will like the effort that the films writers, Chris Weitz and Tony Gilroy, put into the developing the story, but it is the pacing that has me concerned. The first act and the third act move along at fairly robust pace it makes the slower second act seem to drag on and on.
You are going to here many viewers questioning the lack of character development or rather the lack of explanation on character motivations. I'm one of those, but I understand the problem here. The movie is two hours and thirteen minutes long, to start bringing in that development and motivation for many of these characters you have to either replace something from this film or simply add to the length of the film. There are many people complaining about the length of the film already adding five more minutes to the second act won't set well with anyone.
Their are some minor issues with the CGI. There is caveat to this, no one has ever tried to do what they did with this film let alone at this scale. If what people are doing in say Jungle Book which many thought was shoe in for the Oscar this year is a 10 for difficulty and 10 for execution, than what is occurring in several scenes for Rogue One is 25 for difficulty and 8 or 9 for execution.
This film needs to be seen on a big screen. Your typical movie screen of yesteryear is 25 to 30 feet in width, big screens today are 30 to 40 feet wide and bigger for large format and iMax. You want to see this film on as big of screen as you can find. It doesn't need to be in 3D, but a 35 foot wide screen just makes this film "pop" more than a 25 foot screen.
What the film makers got right!
This films like a prequel to Star Wars:A New Hope. It feels like if they showed the 1977 Star Wars film immediately after the credits you would honestly have a hard time telling the movies were almost 30 years apart. That was something Gareth Edwards strove for when creating this film and he succeeded.
I really like the acting. I'm not suggesting Oscar worth, but they are multifaceted characters brought to life by the actors. You can tell these characters are fleshed out, you may not know why a character is doing what they are doing but you totally believe the characters.
The script is full of surprises. There are half-a-dozen times you will be asking if that just happened and Two times, at least, you will exclaim "holy sheets". It one of those things you have to experience to appreciate, and if you know it is going to happen it takes away from the film.
The final act, well if it wasn't bad form you'd be standing to watch it rather than sitting in your seat, honestly. Think of a great play at sports events and how the audience jumps to their feet to watch, same thing for 30 minutes. The audience will cheer and oww and ahh the first time they see it.
When this film is done, you may truly want to visit Star Wars land when it opens. You feel like you have been immersed into the universe and now you want to touch and feel and...
A few following thoughts
This is an adult version of Star Wars. While the original trilogy, more so the second (prequel) trilogy were accessible to your younger audience, this film is not. It is not Deadpool, but it is a dark war film more akin to Das Boot, Full Metal Jacket, The Dirty Dozen and the opening scenes to Saving Private Ryan than the feel good stories of Star Wars. There is sadness and lots of gray area in this film. Younger children may not be ready for it and if you take them bring the Kleenex. Heck you might be the one to need Kleenex.
Overall I gave this film 3 1/2 stars out of 4.
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| Movie Poster Courtesy impawards.com |
On the low end, including LucasFilms/Buena Vista/Disney executives are suggesting $125/$135 M Domestic and $300 M Worldwide. The opposite end of the scale, the high end, many predictors have the movie earning in the range of $165/$170 M and $300 M Worldwide.
To put that in perspective $130 M domestic opening would rank as the 22nd largest in history and $170 M would be the 13th largest. $130 M foreign opening would rank as the 36 largest while $170 M would rank as the 20th largest.
It is interesting that the predictors who are suggesting a better domestic opening are also suggesting a poorer foreign opening and vice versa.
Large, excited fan base? Check!
no competition at the box office? Check!
Star Power? Check!
Massive marketing campaign that has been carefully constructed not to revel too many details. Check!
Previous Movie set records at the box office? Check!
Solid Score on Rottentomatoes.com Metcritic, and every other site? Check!
So why is this movie not going to open better?
Like many prequels Rouge One: A Star Wars Story is stuck in an unenviable position of being stuck in the prequel trap. The hard core fans know the story well enough to repeat it back to you verbatim, well the regular fans only know the movie is about Star Wars and if they are lucky the plan to steal the Death Star Plans prior to Star Wars; A New Hope. Now you have to write a script to satisfy both groups. Very rarely is that done.
Pre-Hypeulation, it just made that term up, but it is an adept description of the problem. Two weeks ago the hype meter was pegged for this movie. It was the talk of virtually every Internet sci-fi/fantasy show, the actors were making the rounds on TV, both foreign and domestic. The hype for other sci-fi/fantasy movies was at a lull. In the past week we have had trailers for War for the Planet of the Apes, Spider-man: Homecoming, and a few others. Suddenly instead of being number 1 by a mile, they are number 3 or 4 as the movie opens.
Over all the reviews are good, upper 70's on rottentomatoes.com, 67 on Meta Critic, other aggregate sites are posting similar numbers, but those aren't game changing numbers. Scores below 50 could scare casual fans away, scores above 85 can draw fans in. You are in that middle ground where the reviews affect the potential viewership minimally if at all.
The more you know about Star Wars the more you are going to like this film. We have all heard it from the first viewings, from critics, from fans, from me, and that is going to scare the not so hard core fans.
So where does this film end up after the first weekend?
I think internationally this film is going to do better than expected. It has the features that international audience crave, when it comes to multicultural cast, solid directing, a good story, and the added bonus of an American funded high budget. International reviews have been more positive pushing the upper 80's (out of 100) on aggregate sites. $175 M to $215 M are the ranges if the models hold true and best guess is just under $185.
Domestically this film is not going to have some of the high end numbers some people are expecting. Even with its build audience its looking more towards the lower end of the scale. Models in the $125 M to $145 M seem in line with $137 seeming to be a best guess.
Domestic - $137
Foreign - $185
Worldwide - $322
Several sources are circulating the rumor that Frank Darabont is now in the director's chair for Gambit as well as re-writing the script.
Frank Darabont is an Oscar Nominated writer for his work on the Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile. Recently his work has included The Walking Dead and The Mist.
The long delayed Gambit project has Channing Tatum signed to play the lead of Remy LeBeau (Gambit). Other names that have been attached to the project include Léa Seydoux as Belladonna Boudreaux and Anna Paquin reprising her role of Marie (Rogue) from the X-Men movies.
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly Ryan Reynolds expressed his desire to see Hugh Jackman appear as Wolverine at least one more time.
“I want Deapdool and Wolverine in a movie together,” says Reynolds. “What we’re gonna have to do is convince Hugh. If anything, I’m going to need to do what I can to get my internet friends back on board to help rally another cause down the line.”
Hugh Jackman has stated that the upcoming Wolverine Standalone film, Logan, set to be released on March 3, 2017 will be his last appearance as the clawed mutant.
This is not the first time this has been suggested of course. Rhett Reese writer and Executive Producer of Deadpool
has said:
We might be showing up at Hugh’s ranch in Australia with a rag with chloroform on it. You just never know.
Okay, lets be honest here, you just read the title and immediately saw Ryan Reynolds dressed as Deadpool on the stage receiving the Golden Globe giving his acceptance speech.
Yes Deadpool was indeed nominated fro Best Motion Picture in the Musical or Comedy category, along with critic favorite La La Land, so don't expect a win.
Variety is reporting Luke Cage has been renewed for a second season on Netflix. The Marvel Entertainment television show becomes the third show behind Daredevil and Jessica Jones to receive a second season on the streaming service Netflix. Iron Fist and the Defenders are also in development for their first season.
Sweet Christmas arrived 21 days early! Season Two coming soon! Forward....Always.— Cheo Hodari Coker (@cheo_coker) December 4, 2016
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