honestly i didn’t expect much from the first two prequals even when they were out in theaters because i pretty much figured they would be setting up for the payoff in number three where we see how darth vader is born…although i coulda done without the frankestein walk off and also thought that the anakin with his mask off and darth vader with his mask on theme that he started in rotj shoulda made it to this film…would have loved to see him scream NOOOO as the mask is lowered and his humanity stripped away for reals…
That has been spoofed more times than probably any other movie. There’s even one where Hitler is angry because of all the Downfall spoofs on youtube.
If you haven’t seen, you’ll need to. You’re a fellow History major, you’ll just have to. The acting is superb, it’s damn tense and realistic and some scenes are just so powerful you’re going to want to just vomit. Like when Martha Goebbels, wife of Doktor Joseph Goebbels, poisons her four or five little children, if that doesn’t make you want to throw up, I don’t know what will.
Also, it’ll give you a first hand look into the insanity of how the German war effort was managed since around 1942. If Hitler hadn’t taken over personal control over the Wehrmacht, they would have won the war. And I’m saying that it in a completely neutral way, it’s just something I’m very convinced of. Those German generals were some of the most brilliant military strategists in the world, Rommel, Manstein et al. - if Hitler hadn’t been the megalomaniac that he was, those generals would have been prudent enough to either win the war completely, or - more likely - stop the attacks at a point where they could have defended the gained territories until a cease fire would have been negotiated that would have let the Third Reich keep their gains.
A horrible scenario for sure, but it makes you wonder about the sheer psychological power that Hitler enjoyed over those brilliant military minds, most of which were nothing but honorable soldiers, not crazy ideological fanatics, not in the Wehrmacht. The Waffen-SS was a different matter. And the movie will let you appreciate the psychological forces at work between the military leaders and Hitler. Add to that the knowledge that Stalin did the exact opposite by giving his marshals complete operational freedom and you’ll get a feeling for how much of a close call WWII really was - though not in 1945, in which the movie is set.
Just watched RotS last night. I’ll admit that the second half of the movie is fantastic, but the early part suffers from much of the same issues that I & II do. It seems to me that Lucas had very little respect for his actors. In comparison, from watching the Lord of the Rings you get the sense that PJ had a clear image of what the final rendering of special effects laden shots would be, and he did a great job of imparting that to his actors such that final product always felt an organic whole. On the other hand it seems like Lucas just put his actors in front of a green screen and had them repeat the lines. This is particularly jarring when Anakin (crash) lands General Grevious’s ship on Corusicant (sp?). [BTW, don’t get me started on the mangling of the physics here, but then that would just be nitpicking. 
] Anyway the two things that annoy me is: 1) The ship is burning up with major chunks flying off and large red and white hot flames whipping up around the windows. Then after quite a few seconds of this Obiwan looks down at a screen and says, “We’ve entered the atmosphere.” Y’a THINK! And B) Anakin finally gets the ship down on the landing strip but in the process takes out what looks to be a quite substantial control tower which probably holds 100s of people and what is Obi-wan’s response? “Another happy landing.” Now I’m sure they added the destruction because it looks cool after the fact, but the disparity makes Obi-wan seem kind of cold hearted.
Anyway I guess I’ve spent more time typing these annoying nitpicks than it’s actually worth so I’ll just call it quits here…
The physics of starwars I always excuse because their is such a fantasy aspect to it. In ROTJ a Super Star destroyer falls (while being in space) into the deathstar . Also all of the sound in space and a bunch of other things like that.Only a few scifi movies/tv shows (firefly/ bsg) have tried to stay some what realistic. And that’s okay because big action epics like SW need the sound. Even Serenity made the final fight in a atmospheric cloud thing so it could have sound.
Anakin finally gets the ship down on the landing strip but in the process takes out what looks to be a quite substantial control tower which probably holds 100s of people and what is Obi-wan’s response? “Another happy landing.” Now I’m sure they added the destruction because it looks cool after the fact, but the disparity makes Obi-wan seem kind of cold hearted.
That’s one that always gets me in action movies in general. There is always some big explosion and then the Hero just shrugs off the incident like nothing happened. Heh, It’s like the Clerks second Deathstar debate. 