Film Review | Star Wars: The Last Jedi directed by Rian Johnson

This review is not going to go the way you think. I’m not going to condemn Rian Johnson’s anti-holistic, geek-aggravating approach to Star Wars; nor am I going to bemoan supposed plot holes that don’t even come close to rivalling Obi-Wan’s unlikely scheme to “hide” Darth Vader’s son on his home planet with his step family (and without even bothering to change his surname!) upon which the original trilogy was built. Instead, I’m going to whinge about how I had to sit for almost three hours next to a broken speaker which hissed at about 95dB whenever Poe Dameron so much as looked at an X-Wing. Like the other hundred or so people in the screening, I couldn’t get up to go and complain in case I missed anything, so I just had to sit there, my stomach in knots, the best afternoon of my year ruined from the start.

Or so I’d thought.

It was at least some consolation that The Last Jedi lived up to the critical acclaim instantly bestowed upon it - even with half its awesome battles drowning in static and interference.

JJ Abrams had a difficult enough task remixing and updating the original Star Wars movie for a new generation as The Force Awakens, but Rian Johnson’s mission to do the same for The Empire Strikes Back was altogether more problematical. Now almost universally celebrated for its darker tone; peerless villain; rough-and-ready space romance; and saga-shattering twist, my favourite Star Wars movie – no, my favourite movie - could not simply be reworked for a modern audience as A New Hope was. Not without being utterly predictable, anyway, which in of itself would make it unlike Empire. Yes, Johnson could use Episode V’s basic heroes-on-the-run / young-Jedi-wannabe-in-search-of-guidance / baddie-looking-for-someone-to-rule-with premise, but ultimately the only way to replicate the sense of shock and awe that Empire engendered was to turn it on its head - and that’s exactly what Johnson’s game-changing middle act does.

“You’re nobody. You have no place in this story. You’re nothing. But not to me.”

The Last Jedi’s twists and turns don’t even strike when you expect. Arguably the movie’s seminal scene sits just off-centre, rather than at its end. The writer and director makes fine art of toying with audience expectations, only to shatter them, leaving viewers feeling almost exactly as they did the first time that they heard Darth Vader claim, “I am your father.” Only this time, the twist is that Rey’s parents weren’t galactic despots conceived by the Force - our scrappy scavenger’s place in the story is not earned through her provenance but her heroic actions, and the saga is all the more thrilling for it. We’ve always known that anybody can be strong in the Force, but to see such “raw strength” under the microscope really drives home Johnson’s message that anyone has the potential to be anything, irrespective of their background or heredity. He may hit that particular note a little too often and far too loudly, the movie’s final scene being a case in point, but given where we leave the Resistance I can at least understand the desire to show how events on Crait have already begun to resonate amongst the galaxy’s oppressed.

Those who’ve lambasted Episode VIII because they aren’t happy with Rey’s lineage are too focused on the minutiae of the original trilogy to recognise its blazing spirit: the mechanics of this movie, and indeed the sequel trilogy thus far, remain the same. Luke and Rey both were raised in incredibly similar, far-flung wastelands before becoming embroiled in a galactic adventure. Luke entered Yoda’s dark-side cave in Empire and saw himself in Vader’s armour, because what he feared most at that point was falling to the dark side as Obi-Wan’s - at that point nameless - apprentice had. Rey was abandoned, she’s no-one, and so the depths of Acho-To’s dark-side pit showed her endless reflections of herself, bringing her solitude into sharp focus ahead of her ill-fated, Luke-like decision to face Kylo Ren. The Last Jedi serves its protagonist’s character just as Empire did its own, and in so doing retrospectively enriches the film which it follows, exactly as Empire did.

“I’ve seen this raw strength only once before, in Ben Solo. I wasn’t frightened enough then. I am now.”

Rey’s allure notwithstanding, going into the movie I was looking forward to catching up with a certain Skywalker more than anything else. The film’s mouth-watering trailers had painted the picture of Luke as a broken man who’s given up on all that he’s ever believed in, but, true to form, The Last Jedi fleshes this out in the most astonishing and inventive of ways. When we meet him, Luke has literally lost his religion, having cut himself off from the Force. Where there was once youthful exuberance, now there is only caustic humour and cynicism. Where there was once hope, there is only fear. Luke Skywalker has become an even more reluctant Yoda, almost an anti-Obi-Wan. He’s prickly, cold and tormented by the thought that he lost his nephew to the dark side. The beats of the original trilogy are still there, only heightened. Obi-Wan lost a brother-in-arms to evil. He perhaps let him down, but he wasn’t ultimately to blame. Luke lost actual family, and what’s eating him up is that he was directly responsible. That famous insight which served him so well in A New Hope and Return of the Jedi caused a momentary lapse of reason that left him, and the galaxy at large, with “consequence”. Despite his public reservations about the script, Mark Hamill’s returning performance is nothing short of mercurial. He may not have bought into Luke’s story when he read the script, but he certainly sells it on screen. Hands down, Episode VIII is Hamill’s finest turn.



I also applaud Johnson for having the gumption to make Luke accept the bare truth of what George Lucas would only dare to imply in his prequels. The Jedi are every bit as flawed as the Sith, at least as an institution, and were their order to endure the consequence would be a slew of Darth Vaders and Kylo Rens unleashed upon the galaxy. We already know how the Jedi Order’s mistreatment of Anakin Skywalker fuelled his descent into evil, and what The Last Jedi reveals of Ben Solo’s journey to the dark side is even more damning. Life and death, light and dark - the Force seeks balance, as Johnson so beautifully demonstrates. But such a notion is anathema to Jedi and Sith alike. Perhaps Luke’s epiphany that the Jedi Order must end – a view apparently endorsed by a very old and wise friend who makes a welcome return - will give rise to a new generation of Force-wielders who are not restrained by the “narrow, dogmatic” constraints of the Jedi Order or the self-defeating greed of the Sith. In 1977 good guys wore white, and villains black. For better or worse, 2017 is altogether greyer. Rigid notions of sexuality, gender and even morality are constantly shifting, and so it’s fitting that the sequel trilogy’s two central figures are reflective of this cultural blurring of the lines.

“Let the past die. Kill it, if you have to. It’s the only way to become what you were meant to be.”

But only the fan fictioneers who first dreamt up the idea of “ForceTime” foresaw the startling direction that The Last Jedi would take, although I daresay that even they were left reeling by how their idea would impact upon the saga’s two main players. Unwillingly connected through the Force across the galaxy, Rey and Kylo Ren find themselves bound to one another as effectively as if they were locked up together in a holding cell. Through Johnson’s ingeniously simple cuts, what begins as a jarring and slightly surreal interstellar dialogue soon develops into something as solid as a single-set scene. As walls of enmity and privacy fall, we start to see the glimmer of a mutual understanding and sympathy between our two adversaries; perhaps even affection. Rey starts to see the light in the dark, and Ren the darkness in the light. More so than with the planet-destroying, son-maiming Darth Vader, I found myself willing for this poor lost boy’s soul to be saved.

“You’re no Vader. You’re just a child in a mask.”

I would never have believed that anyone could make a movie that would have me championing the man who killed Han Solo, but as The Last Jedi’s unbelievable throne room gathered pace, that’s exactly what I did. Had Ben Solo finally seen the light? Would Rey succumb to the dark? As if Kylo Ren’s impromptu assassination of his scathing master, the supreme leader of the First Order, wasn’t enough to send shockwaves through cinemas everywhere, within moments he and Rey would fight back-to-back against Snoke’s guards; Rey would even put her lightsaber in his hand. But that same lightsaber - the legendary weapon forged by Anakin and passed onto Luke by Obi-Wan before being drawn to Rey - would soon be torn in half by the Force as the momentary allies resumed their opposing positions. We’re well past the passing of the torch now; that torch has been torn in half. Luke Skywalker set the stage himself in his very first act of the film.



The newly-minted Supreme Leader Ren’s refusal to redeem himself is more heartbreaking, in many ways, than Anakin’s Episode III heel turn. It’s almost cruel, given what has just been played out, and therein lies its genius. Whilst Kylo Ren may lack his grandfather’s awe-inspiring presence, his evident humanity is capable of reeling in not just the audience but his on-screen adversaries too, and through it he’s accomplished what Darth Vader never could: he rules the galaxy with a gloved fist. It’s a testament to how thoroughly transfixing both Daisy Ridley’s and Adam Driver’s performances are that their unique relationship eclipses the long-awaited return of a legend and the final appearance of another. The Last Jedi is dominated by “Reylo”, and if the same proves to be true of 2019’s Episode IX, then it has the potential to be the best of the saga - though I can’t see another director ever making a Star Wars movie that’s more visually arresting than this one. The Last Jedi is relentlessly breathtaking.

 



Those who go to see Carrie Fisher’s final performance won’t be disappointed, either. Her role is perhaps more understated than many would have hoped, given that The Last Jedi has proven to be Leia’s final adventure, at least on the silver screen, but it’s significant in more ways than one. Johnson definitely made the right call in not restructuring his movie to kill off Leia following the actress’s sudden death - he certainly had the raw footage to be able to do so, and for several long moments I even thought that he had. But in keeping Leia alive, in allowing her to play out her angle with Holdo and Poe as was always intended, and particularly in reuniting her with her brother to provide the few surviving rebels with the spark of hope that they so desperately need, Johnson has given Leia a send-off that is emblematic of her character’s role in the saga, if not quite the resolute ending that both character and performer deserved. There’ll always be threads hanging, now - it’s absolutely gutting to think that we’ll never get to see her nascent Force powers fully awakened on the big screen - but with books and CG TV shows there is always the possibility that Leia’s final story will be told in another medium one day.

In keeping with The Last Jedi’s spirit, what I liked most about Leia’s storyline was, in fact, Poe’s. Just as Luke’s character services Rey’s, Leia’s does Poe’s, and she does so in the most maternal of ways. I loved Oscar Isaac’s character right from his dry, “Who talks first?” line in The Force Awakens, and he’s just as quick to endear himself to Last Jedi viewers with his “Holding for General Hux” skit here. What follows, though, is an absorbing examination of heroism and heedlessness unlike anything ever before seen in a Star Wars movie. Again, Johnson turns the narrative on its head, using the audience’s connection with Poe to get us on his side, only for the angry matriarch of the Resistance to rise from her sick bed to slap him down and teach him a lesson you can’t help but feel she wished her late husband had learned long ago.

“Bad guys, good guys, it’s all a machine. Live free. Don’t join.”

I’m as much a fan of John Boyega’s Finn as I am Oscar Isaac’s Poe, and so I was delighted to see him paired up with a new foil - Kelly Marie Tran’s delightful Rose - and sent off on a hyperspace caper to Canto Bight in search of The Last Jedi’s answer to Lando Calrissian. This limb of the narrative seems to have been singled out for especial criticism by many, largely because the predominantly comic caper feels a little extraneous and doesn’t ultimately bear fruit within the story. Why send off Finn with Rose to find a master code breaker, when the script could have had a Resistance techie break the code in seconds? Why bother to break the code at all, when the Resistance had another plan in the works all along? Well, for one, through moments touching and hilarious we get to see Finn and Rose bond, setting up a poignant sequence in the Battle of Crait that will doubtless resonate into Episode IX. For another, without it Poe’s mutiny wouldn’t have had any purpose. Through Benicio Del Toro’s DJ, the director is able to explore the movie’s themes of perspective and morality in greater depth, and often explicitly. He’s able to have Finn battle Phasma in a stunning and (literally) explosive set piece. He can play tricks with irons that are both funny and dazzling. Best of all, he has the opportunity to pull the rug from under us yet again as, just for kicks, The Last Jedi’s answer to Lando actually does “do a Lando”.

There are, however, a couple of aspects that don’t sit well with me. The Last Jedi’s flashback scenes felt considerably out of place in a Star Wars saga movie, for instance. I can see why Johnson felt it appropriate to include them, given the lack of room for a “sequel prequel” trilogy (though I suppose in the Disney era there’s always the possibility of a bridging “Star Wars Story” or two), and the need to relay a key historical event from two opposing perspectives, but to me they killed a little of that distinguishing Star Wars saga feel, and worse still they closed the circle a little too neatly. Having Luke and Ren simply tell their sides of the story would have been enough for me. After all, Alec Guiness’s tales of Darth Vader’s dark deeds in A New Hope didn’t need any visual embellishment (though George Lucas will probably work in some prequel clips on the inevitable 4K release, if he still has the power to).

 

My main gripe though was the lack of an intimate, one-on-one lightsaber duel. I appreciate that the timing wasn’t right for another Rey / Ren showdown, but I do think that Luke could have been given some actual action. He doesn’t – can’t, in the circumstances – clash sabers with Ren. The film’s finale is clever, uplifting and - of course - surprising, but it does feel like a bit of a cheat, even if it does prove to be the cheat that lights the fire that will burn the First Order down.

Finally, I’m on the fence when it comes to Force ghosts’ apparent ability to physically interact with the living. I expect to be sold on the idea eventually, but at the moment we are missing too many pieces of the puzzle to be able to form a view. In the first Star Wars movie, Obi-Wan told Vader that if he struck him down, he’d become “more powerful than you could ever imagine”, only to return as a Force ghost and concede to Luke that he couldn’t interfere in his upcoming tangle with Vader. The question is why? Is it matter of ability, or ethics? Is it OK to burn down a tree, even a holy one, so long as you don’t use your ghostly powers to bring about regime change? Do you get Daniel Jacksoned if you cross the line? Even with what we’ve learned from Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels, Force ghosts are still largely a mystery, but now that we’ve seen Yoda wield lightning from beyond the grave, Episode IX is going to have to examine some basic cans and can’ts.

But as for comedy, Porgs and Fathiers - I really couldn’t give a damn. Star Wars movies are always funny – even Episode III has its Anakin’s-been-under-a-lot-of-stress Threepio gag – and this is a fundamental part of what makes them so universally enjoyable. All The Last Jedi does is shift gears – its humour is more modern, but no less pleasing for it. Luke’s dryness works particularly well, as does Finn’s slapstick and Chewie’s Porg problem. I don’t have any issue with the movie’s diversity, either – well, except that it’s illusory. Besides Snoke, and of course BB-8, the token droid, every single member of the core ensemble is human! Chewbacca the Wookie and the other droids have about three minutes’ collective screen time, and poor old Admiral Ackbar is killed off in even less than that and replaced with a human, albeit one with purple hair. I don’t even lament the lack of a back story for Snoke – he’s just a cipher. A wonderfully played and astonishingly realised cipher, aye, but ultimately one whose origins are best explored elsewhere. Even the evil Emperor had to wait fifteen years for his tale to be told in The Phantom Menace.

“The Rebellion is reborn. The war is just beginning. And I am not the last Jedi.”

At its most basic, telling a story is a simple as being able to say, “...and then.” A leads to B, B leads to C, and so on. Rian Johnson doesn’t do that. For every “and then”, there’s a “but.” Johnson’s movie has earned its place as the Empire of the sequel trilogy through not being it, which is exactly what the franchise needed after the awesome-but-familiar Episode VII. To some, the Star Wars movies may not quite “rhyme” as they once did anymore, but there’s no disputing that they pack more of a punch for it. And to fans lamenting Rey’s place outside the Skywalker / Solo family, think on this: there’s always marriage.