Grossly Inaccurate Review: Star Wars: Attack of the Clones
Attack of the Clones
Lucasfilm
Natalie Portman
Samuel L. Jackson
We're all waist-deep in Attack of the Clones reviews, enough so that every conceivable opinion possible on the film can be supported with at least one concurrent review (including one in the West Wichita Press declaring it to be "...the best Morgan Freeman Gay Wrestling Epic since Gandhi.")
So I want to get away from the catch-phrase reviews and have a round-table discussion about the deeper ins and outs of the film, get kind of a consensus from a cross-section of fans. By now we've had a couple of days to digest Clones, having gained the perspective that, to me, is only possible with the figurative but very deliberate bile-soaked breakdown that occurs in the looping small intestine that is the human subconscious, finally surfacing at the intellect which I think of as the colon of the human psyche (though I would be remiss if I did not note that this is a much faster process than the 1,000-year digestion cycle of the almighty Sarlac from Return of the Jedi).
Joining me is John Cheese, PWOT collaborator and a man who once had a girl break up with him after he spent a Friday night consecutively quoting all three original Star Wars films word for word in a thick Jamaican accent. Next we have Kurt, John Cheese friend and long-time Star Wars fan, and Tammy, Kurt's girlfriend who didn't have a ride home.
Dave: First off, I wanna go around the room, get a one-word reaction from everybody. Kurt?
Kurt: Wow.
Dave: Tammy?
Tammy: No. I mean, so not-wow.
Kurt: She got like, seven words. Do I get six more? If so I want to say "wow" six more times.
Dave: No.
Kurt: Then I'll stick with my original "wow." Wow.
Dave: John?
John: Boobies.
Dave: Thank you, John. I'm sure my advertisers appreciate your viewpoint. Can we take a more cerebral route on this?
Kurt: I think one lesson we learned from the film is that if you're ever fightin' Yoda with light sabers, you'd best protect your crotch.
Dave: Okay, but let's get to the-
Kurt: -'Cuz he'll cut your dick off.
Dave: -right, now John you had complained that the film didn't hold true to the screenplay that had shown so much promise...
John: Indeed. I have a copy here; let me refer to page 109 and the climactic arena scene, wherein it describes the beast's claw as "catching Amidala's shirt, ripping it off." This insinuates bare, flopping boobs. What we get in the film is a thin swatch of lower shirt exposing some abdomen. Hell, I can see that in a Gap commercial.
Dave: Well, it's not implicit in the script and it wouldn't really be keeping in the child-like spirit of Lucas' films...
John: Let me quote, same paragraph. "Amidala's floppy boobies then go flopping about in a boobish fashion, flopping over the-"
Kurt: My copy didn't have that...
John: Quiet. I have the floor. Now I ask you, where was that up on the screen? I consider this to be the most boobtacular boob disappointment since the disasterous Halle Berry "my-boobs-are-reading-this-magazine" Swordfish incident. Lucas ruined what was a masterpiece on paper, the set directions actually containing the word "super boober boob fest."
Dave: You clearly wrote that in yourself. I can see it from here, it's in crayon, along with that crude pornographic illustration. Now no more breast talk, okay? Now Tammy, you've been quiet...
Tammy: I've never gotten into the whole Star Wars thing I guess. I'm into more serious sci-fi. I mean, that whole city planet thing they have, Coruscant? How could you have an entire planet with a total landmass of urban population density? We're talking a population of literally a trillion, trillion, trillion humanoids. There's just so much wrong with that, the food distribution, lack of vegetation... the excrement alone would be the volume of a small moon every week...
Kurt: Dude! They could make like a whole planet out of doodie!
John: I think now we need to discuss what that planet would be called...
Dave: Let's not.
Tammy: But seriously, in science fiction you must maintain a-
Kurt: -Turdonia.
John: The Planet Pooshittia.
Dave: Guys-
Kurt: Dungtron Six.
John: Southern Illinois.
Dave: Okay, okay, okay. About the plot-
Tammy: That whole love story was soooo bad....
Kurt: Yeah! And that scene with the Clones rippin' away with their blasters, that was BAD!
Tammy: Um...
Dave: So I think that brings up a legitimate question, can you call it a great film if it contains great spectacle, but is filled out with abrasive, painful moments of infantile dialogue?
Kurt: Poopiter.
Dave: What?
Kurt: You know, like Jupiter...
John: And it could have rings made of toilet paper. Or corn.
Dave: Can we get off the whole poop planet thing please?
John: Hey, that's exactly what the sad inhabitants of Assburger Alpha Five say every day. If only it were so easy, my friend. If only it were so easy.
(long, long pause)
Tammy: What?
Dave: Moving on... I've heard it said that Lucas might as well abandon the idea of a story and simply cut together a 45-minute special effects feature and charge admission, admit that it's more a carnival ride than drama. Would you all agree? Disagree?
Tammy: You know, Jupiter doesn't even have rings. I think I'll walk home.
John: Well, David, I think that once again George Lucas has wrapped his hands around the smooth, pale skin of the film industry, caressing the twin, firm mounds of publicity and production, smacking the pert nipples of the-
Dave: -Okay, boobs and human waste are both off limits for discussion, alright?
John: I'm sorry, I thought we were here to discuss a George Lucas movie.
Tammy: Ugh. Grow up. Kurt, I'll be waiting at my mom's house.
Kurt: Oh, crap. I just realized I never got my mom anything for mother's day!
John: You know what I got mine? A big box of "I didn't kill you again this year."
Dave: Okay, we're almost out of time. We'll average all the final scores to get a rating. Everybody?
Kurt: A million, jillion stars. Better than Demolition Man, Freddie Got Fingered, and Pearl Harbor combined. Well, maybe not Demolition Man.
John: A boobless tragedy of a film. I give it whatever I have to give it to make the average equal one star. Negative million jillion plus one, I guess.
Dave: Thank you all. Official PWOT rating:
One star.
*
