<Spoiler Alert: the following article reveals plot details about the current 'Star Wars' movie. If you have NOT seen 'Rogue One' yet, you may want to watch it first, then return to this Review.>
From its opening shot, ‘Rogue One: A Star Wars Story’ sets out to appear and feel different than any other film in the modern mythic series that George Lucas created almost forty (!) years ago. Right after the Lucasfilm logo and the “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…” preamble there is a quick cut to a vividly-coloured planet, floating in the immensity of space. No opening crawl, no stirring, iconic ‘Star Wars’ fanfare.
Minutes later as a menacing, vulture-like shuttlecraft swoops down over a bleak landscape to disgorge its cargo of obviously Bad People, it becomes clear that this is not your grandfather’s ‘Star Wars.’ Their quarry, renegade scientist Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen) and his small family look, and dress, like they just stepped out from an Akira Kurosawa samurai film. Anyone familiar with that genre knows that this encounter is not likely to go well.
Director Gareth (‘Godzilla’) Evans piles on the differences with the previous films in the series. Unlike the more brightly-shot prequels and original trilogy, ‘Rogue One’ is filmed in drab, largely washed-out hues where everything from cities to their inhabitants look as if life has been bled from them. Fitting perhaps, for a galaxy under the heel of the rapaciously evil Galactic Empire.
The ‘Star Wars’ universe has always maintained a grittier, more lived-in look than its rival ‘Star Trek’ franchise: clothing is grimier, well-worn, encrusted with sweat and dust; space ships are ungraceful, functionally-shaped, full of jagged edges, sharp angles with open exhaust ports spouting noxious-appearing fumes. Moreover, people behave more like contemporary times, prone to vice, living lives of quiet desperation punctuated by the occasional selfless act. In ‘Rogue One,’ – you guessed it, this downtrodden atmosphere is even more pronounced than before. The visuals convey just how nasty it would be to be trying to eke out an existence in wretched hives while walking through mud-caked streets full of animal droppings.
Yet all of this would have been mere artifice if ‘Rogue One'’s story was fluff – a hollow shell betrayed by weak narrative and cardboard characters. Thankfully, this film, unlike last year’s ‘The Force Awakens’ (which chose the “safe” path of rehashing what went before), breaks new ground in the franchise. Whereas every other SW movie is a space opera with a war as background, ‘Rogue One’ is a war movie with space opera elements. And, like every war movie, we are introduced to key members of a squad around which the action centres as the story unfolds.
Taken from a single line from the opening crawl of ‘Episode 4: A New Hope’ (the original 1977 ‘Star Wars’), ‘Rogue One’ follows Galen Erso’s daughter, Jyn, as she embarks on a mission to redeem her father’s seemingly traitorous act of creating a murderous superweapon capable of annihilating entire planets, by stealing the plans of this doomsday machine and conveying them to the freedom forces of the Rebel Alliance. Along the way, she teams up with a group of colourful characters (since when do such movies have the heroine leading, let say, accountants or parking attendants?) including: jaded, war-weary Rebel captain Cassian Andor (Diego Luna); his sarcastic sidekick Imperial droid K2-SO (Alan Tudyk); blind warrior/priest Chirrut Imwe (Donnie Yen) and close friend Baze Malbus (Jiang Wen); defector pilot Bohdi Rook (Riz Ahmed) whose initial contact with Rebel leader Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker) starts the ball rolling.
Oscar winner Felicity Jones (‘The Theory of Everything’) is good as heroine Jyn, bringing an unexpected intense physicality to an emotionally demanding role, though she is occasionally belied by her posh Oxford-educated accent. Director Edwards has surrounded her with an excellent ensemble cast peppered with filmic veterans and capable newcomers. Luna’s imbues Andor with an attractive blend of battle-worn, roguish charm which recalls a younger Harrison Ford as Han Solo; Tudyk has the best lines which he delivers with gusto; and Whitaker gamely walks the line between appearing wise and chewing the scenery as Saw, a character from the animated television series ‘The Clone Wars,’ who has perhaps spent one too many years in battle and finds his tactics perilously close to the same ruthlessness evinced by the Empire. Yet, perhaps most surprisingly, it is martial arts veteran Donnie Yen who provides the film’s centre, it’s emotional and spiritual heart, and connection to the rest of the franchise. As ‘Rogue One’ takes place in a time when the Jedi knights have been presumably exterminated and no one has yet heard of the Skywalker clan, Chirrut Îmwe expounds on the Force with the same quiet wisdom and mindfulness that Obi-wan Kenobi and Yoda will do in the ‘later’ movies. When it comes time for Chirrut to meet his moment of truth, the audience actually feels the weight of the sacrifice he has to make, and that moment is given far more meaning because his faith in a higher power gives him a centred peace that endows dignity to a noble character.
‘Rogue One’ is a ‘Star Wars’ movie for the times. Both Edwards and series producer J.J. Abrams have striven to make it more topical than the simple derring-do of the original movies. Unlike Abrams’ own ‘The Force Awakens’ with its jaunty heroics, ‘Rogue One’ has echoes of the present world in the ambivalence which characters have towards their roles and the techniques they employ in pursuit of their causes. There is a quietly powerful speech late in the run time when Captain Andor reflects on the evil inherent in civil wars where one man’s sacrifices for a perceived greater good are considered by another to be atrocities against humanity. War, whatever one calls it, is never civil and shades of grey abound even if one’s declared side is Light or Dark. Watching Saw Gerrera’s rebel cell ambush Imperial troops on the Jedi world of Jedha uncomfortably recalls the scenes played out everyday on our television screens as insurgent groups in the Middle and Near East battle against those they see as occupying powers. Everyone is right, from a certain point of view. How far would you go for your beliefs? It is a question seldom posed as subtext in science fiction.
In that vein, ‘Rogue One’ does not shy away from unflinching portrayals of violence. The ‘Star Wars’ universe has always possessed a certain prudence in shying away from death and destruction, preferring distant, offscreen, or stylized demises: Obi-wan Kenobi’s death at the hands of Darth Vader, the destruction of Alderaan, all were handled with a degree of stylistic discretion that ‘Rogue One’ confronts head-on. When people are hit with blaster bolts, the camera does not flinch – they scream, flail and fall to the ground in grotesque positions. Bodies are strewn about by vivid explosions, ships ruptured by lasers and collisions spew detritus into pristine vacuum, trailing damaged parts like escaping blood corpuscles. This is war,
The success of any genre film also depends upon the strength of its antagonists, and in this sense ‘Rogue One’ does not disappoint. Aussie actor Ben Mendelsohn is this instalment’s Big Bad. As Orson Krennic, the Director of Advanced Weapons Research for the Imperial Military, he is suitably villainous in the sociopathic, single task-focused kind of way only a crazed bureaucrat can be. From the start, it’s clear he doesn’t think he’s doing anything wrong. In his mind, he believes - despite every evidence to the contrary - that he is still Galen Erso’s friend, harnessing the scientist’s genius to build the Death Star and end the rebellion in one swift stroke, and by so doing save billions of lives. That others may be sacrificed along the way for this cause is but incidental. The Greater Good, hymn of so many misguided in their loyalties.
For all the salacious evil he drips in his scenes, Mendelson is undercut by the welcome return of two of ‘Star Wars’ most iconic villains. We knew from the trailers that Darth Vader would appear, but to witness unexpected interplay between Krennic and a breath-taking CGI recreation of the late Peter Cushing as Grand Moff Tarkin, caused audible gasps from fans world-wide, so realistic was the impact. Cushing was that rare breed of English actor whose angular appearance and perfect elocution combined to personify elegant evil and the sheer power of his charisma added menacing continuity with ‘A New Hope,’ for which ‘Rogue One’ is the direct prequel.
As for the Dark Lord himself, suffice it to say that, for the brief screen time he is allotted, Darth Vader has never been more gloriously menacing. For years fans have been clamouring to see him in action, not as the stilted slow-moving quasi-automaton in the original series’ films, but as the badass Jedi-killer we knew him to be from countless books and comics set in the Lucasverse. After all, we’ve been treated to great lightsabre battles with Obi-Wan Kenobi, Mace Windu, Anakin Skywalker, and Darth Maul, why not the original aqualung himself?
In this vein there is a scene, near the very end of the movie where Vader single-handedly boards the Rebel flagship and unleashes unbelievable mayhem with such casual abandon that audiences are left chilled. For many fans that 90 seconds almost threatens to overshadow the 113 that came before. And the pan-and-scan shot of him glaring out the shattered landing bay as a Rebel courier ship rockets away, with the wind whipping at his cloak is nothing more than pure epic fan service.
The final difference between ‘Rogue One’ and other ‘Star Wars’ films is that this was designed to be a standalone, self-contained story. Edwards reinforces this by sending every major character off to be one with the Force. No kidding. Like samurai movies of old, everybody dies. This is where the film wobbles a bit, for despite all of the changes he has wrought to cinematic format and style, Edwards’ protagonists go to their deaths with resigned nobility, as if at peace with the fact that they are sacrificing themselves for a Just Cause. One feels that, in keeping with the "‘War Is Hell!" narrative style, there needed to have been at least one major character who went to his (or her) end raging at the stars, screaming something like, “After going through all of this, this is IT?! That sucks!” It might have been preferable to that moment when Cassian and Jyn hug each other seconds before being vaporized by the Death Star’s onrushing beam.
For the record, here’s another quibble: why is it that almost every ‘Star Wars’ film’s third act must end with a shoot-out of galactic proportions? Don’t get me wrong: the battle between Imperial TIE fighters and Rebel X/Y wings is thrilling, spectacular and rousing with some of the best CG work ever put on screen, but the Empire building every oversized technological terror with a Fatal Flaw trope just has to end. Not that I’m suggesting that people ride into the sunset or spend screen time engaged in intellectually taxing moral debates a la ‘Star Trek’, but the ‘Empire Strikes Back’ proved that a quiet denouement can be every bit as impactful as high-octane aerial manoeuvres. Yet, given that contemporary audiences prefer pyrotechnics to reflection then it should be no surprise that the studio felt compelled to deliver the shock and awe. Intercut with scenes of various scenes of heroic demise, Edwards nonetheless manages to inject an acute sense of pathos into the proceedings, all of which makes the actual final scene all the more significant: as the Rebel ship escapes from its stricken flagship an unnamed trooper hands a hooded figure the Death Star plans that had been bought for at such a severe price. What’s on the data disc, he asks, only to be told by a CGl Princess Leia in full reveal that it represents, “Hope.” Michael Giaccino’s bombastic score swells…
Cue the opening crawl of Episode 4, ‘A New Hope.’
Cheesy perhaps, (not helped by the fact that that Leia, unlike Tarkin, looks like an animated wax figure), but the point is made, series continuity is forged, and we leave the theatre largely satisfied.
‘Rogue One’ is not fine art – it’s a summer popcorn flick masquerading as fall serious entertainment. Yet it’s also more than that. It’s good quality popular entertainment that aims to, for two hours and fifteen minutes transport viewers from their lives into the modern myth that is ‘Star Wars,’ much as the Homeric hymns once did for audiences huddled around a camp fire on a cold night.
In the final analysis, ‘Rogue One’ manages a difficult feat: being true in look and feel to the ‘Star Wars’ universe, yet breaking with tradition just enough to set a precedent for the individual films that will bridge the gap between each ‘Skywalker’ family installment. It’s hugely entertaining in a vicarious kind of way, and is chock full of so much detail that one feels that it may take multiple viewings over the fullness of time before its complete effect can be absorbed. As it is, ‘Rogue One’ is an excellent action movie with enough to satiate both a ‘Star Wars’ fan and first time viewer alike. It also considerably raises the bar for 2017’s ‘Episode 8.’
No pressure, Rian Johnson.
The Force is strong with this one.