Film: Star Wars: The Force Awakens

There's nothing like the start of a new trilogy in a franchise to make you feel old. Was it really over 16 years ago that we were introduced to the much hated Jar Jar? Apparently so. Except I seem to have better memories of the middle (or first?) three films; I found that I enjoyed and loved them as much as the classic trilogy, which probably means I'm not a real fan or something.

This personal context is important when considering the latest in the series of such a genre defining set of films. Like everyone else I was excited, force feeding the previous six films (in order of release, naturally) to the kids in the next generation in order to nurture the same anticipation we would hope to have for the seventh. Regardless of whether it fell short or not we would have enjoyed the experience I'm sure.

And yes the film was good. It had the same pace and action as the previous, and invoked some of the feelings I was looking for. However I am quickly coming to the conclusion that I don't like Abrams messing with my memories; alongside Star Trek he has this unique ability to temper and mute any deeper feelings of poignancy I was looking for. As such, some bits did jar (a few not really his fault). The cast was pretty awesome apart from a few head scratchers, and all the standard ingredients of set pieces, dialogue and hammy acting were all there.

We chose to watch the 3D version which although was able to provide a few extra thrills during the action sequences was still a personal distraction and thus made the film more effort to watch than would have been otherwise.

But overall none of the detail matters really. The film is more than Star Wars enough and provides everything you would expect to some level. Recommended.