Chen G.

Since I'm not Christian nor grew up with Christian people around, I can't get "into" The Passion of the Christ. It actualy wasn't screened in Israel at the time. It just wasn't made for people like me. So I don't feel like I'm in a position to critique it, for better or worst. Otherwise, I'm happy to say I liked everything Mel Gibson has directed: Not just Braveheart (which words fail me in describing how much I love) but also Apocalypto and recently, Hacksaw Ridge, and even his debut in The Man Without a Face. Each of these films provided a different challenge for this fabolus director: one, in helming a large-scope production to tell a coherent and captivating story; the other, in coaxing good performances out of a cast of none-professional actors; the third, in making a large-scale film on a shoe-string budget, and the latter, in making cinematic a small domestic drama. Very impressive career, indeed!

That was to be expected. Jackson's vision is Middle Earth.

I’m not convinced.

Has anyone ever convinced anyone of anything at JWFan?

Yeah, Luke's story is the most effective part of the film.

That's called a character arc: you don't want your character's traits to be a constant, you want them to have highs and lows. Preferably, you want the character to exhibit some kind of personality change within the runtime of the film.

That it is. Not much more than that, though.

But it was wierd in a light adventure film to see Hitler giving an autograph. Not a politically-correct issue. Just a bit strange, is all. But the energy of the film is such that it doesn't linger with you, so its really a none-issue.

Oh, so now that I unabashedly love a popular film, its wrong, too? Just because I love it more than another film in the same series? To my mind, Raiders has nothing, in terms of stakes, that matches the inclusion of the father figure in this film. I will say, seeing them go to Nazi Berlin was odd, especially knowing Spielberg's later work. But that's not an issue with the film itself, its just me. As time passes and the memory of the deeds of the Nazis will be less tangiable, I believe people won't have the reaction that I had to it, especially if they don't live in Israel, as I do.

Its the bit that scores the framework story with old Bilbo and young Bilbo's encounter with Gandalf. Oh, wait, wrong franchise! Oh well, the original Star Wars ripped that off anyway!

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Simply put, I. LOVE. THIS. MOVIE. While I view escapist adventure films as the occasional "palette cleanser" between more serious, emotionally-hefty works, this film is - to my mind - the king of all palette cleansers. Part of why that is so is that while it fully acknowledges that its an escapist adventure film, it by no means lacks stakes, due to the inclusion of the father figure. I know Spielberg gets a lot of credit for Raiders of the Lost Ark, but something about that film doesn't quite click with me, whereas this film just does beat after beat. The best of the series!

I think all film series', even if they are original stories, reach a point where they're better off closing up shop, as it were. I feel like Star Wars (again, in terms of the main episodes) is at that point in its life.

I can easily see episode IX approaching the screentime of The Last Jedi.

I think final chapters need to have a bittersweet quality. Making it upbeat would undermine its sense of heft.

The way its explained to us, The Force sustains existence, so you could approach it more in terms of cutting off people's connection to it, rather than eliminating the force itself. I think its the best way to bring closure to this series, and if you want to do something unexpected yet inevitable, than I feel like that's the way to go.

They're on the Falcon at the end of the film...

But it would be a poignant one. You can write it so Rey discovers through the Jedi texts that the only way for true balance to be achieved is by cutting the galaxy off from the force altogether. It could play off of Luke's notion that the Jedi should end. I don't think the essential thrust of the saga has ever been the Skywalker lineage. Its more about the conflict of the light and the dark side. The episodes deal with this conflict directly, whereas the spin-offs use it as a backdrop.

Yeah, but to this day, they did not indicate that they want to make more episodes. Now that they've killed off the characters of the earlier films, there's little that distinguishes - in terms of branding - the episodes from the spin-offs, and so I imagine they intend to wrap up the episodes and continue with more spin-off properties; and they'd be right to do so. Its time for the episodes...to end.

Why not? He killed his father on-screen. There's no getting back from that, from a narrative standpoint. Few things are more satisfying in films that seeing a villain meet his end.

Revenge of the Sith ended that way... Even if Disney plans on making another trilogy of episodes (which they hadn't even talked about thus far), it'd probably take a while; so I doubt they'd end this trilogy without a strong sense of closure, so I'd say a tragic end is out of the question. But that doesn't mean some the characters' stories can't end in tragedy. If I were writing this episode to be the final say on all things Star Wars, I would have Rey and Kylo die, and create a cataclysmic event in which people's ability to attune themselves to The Force is undone.

I said "main cast". Leia is a secondary character to this trilogy.

You don't necessarily need too many deaths to create a sense of finality. But yes, if this last film is to have any sense of heft, some of our main cast should meet their end. On the one hand, it makes sense for Rey to be it. But on the other hand, it would only solidify the Marry Sue narrative, because that's literally what happens to the original Marry Sue.

Yeah, there's really nothing in the way of romantic tension there, and its all the better for it, too. Although they've kind of written Rey into a corner in the sense that its hard to imagine her in a romance of any kind, really.

Oh, its certainly a deliberate choice. But it was just a bit too much for me.

If it was the point of the story, it should have been better vowen into the story of Ben Hur, I feel. Other than the opening, Jesus gives him water during his journey, and that's it. You could keep that epilogue in there and make it work structurally, I suppose. But, to my mind, it didn't.