Well, I sure wouldn't debate it. Nevertheless, TCM recently aired a Cary Grant-Doris Day flick that should at least have earned an honorable mention. Cary fan that I am I watched a few minutes but my mind kept screaming Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! until I finally had to give it up.

Romance is about hope. We all knew where the story was headed. There was no way for Lucas to give us hope. That's why the romance didn't work.

That said, neither actor is particularly sexy, and there was zero sexual tension between the two. It was almost like they were different species. In fact I think Bill Shattner had more sexual chemistry with some blue skinned female in an old Star Trek episode.

It's good to know that there's a consensus about Episode II. My impression was that other people thought it was okay, or at least not obviously the worst in the series.

It was unwatchable for other reasons as well, but the Portman-Christenson scenes were laugh out loud funny.

R2-D2 and C3PO had more chemistry and sexual tension.

Both are good actors (though Christensen is a poor choice for a romantic lead). The script was horrific, and the direction far too concerned with effects to do much with human drama. Lucas once had some aptitude for making human-sized stories (see American Graffiti, but it's long gone now.

The main blame I'd aim at the actors was in agreeing to do this material at all, though of course the paychecks would have been hard to say no to.

Clearly none of these people have ever seen Lily Tomlin and John Travolta in Moment by Moment.

All you need to know about Lucas' skill with actors is that an inarticulate seven-foot tall muppet and a beeping trash can gave the best performances of the Star Wars films he directed.

I'm attributing Yoda's supple skills to his early work with Irvin Kershner.

"...the most embarrassing pieces of dialog and acting I've ever witnessed..."

ok, call me stupid, but I accidentally ended up sitting through peewee herman's pinocchio (CA 1982), including james coburn playing a gypsy, carl reiner as gepetto and james belushi as something (I forget) no less.

I defy you to find anything worse.

"Romance is about hope. We all knew where the story was headed. There was no way for Lucas to give us hope. That's why the romance didn't work."

Hope is not a prerequisite for romance, see the entire category of tragic romance. In Romeo and Juliet, you know that there's no hope after 30 seconds, when it's announced that they both die. The romance in Episode II didn't work because the script and the acting sucked.

Supersurus.......Mickey Rourke played Saint Francis of Assisi!

In retrospect, all of Rock Hudson's romantic comedies look a little ridiculous.

It was unwatchable for other reasons as well, but the Portman-Christensen scenes were laugh out loud funny.

I was glad I saw this in the theater, as those scenes were only to be borne with the help of the laughter of the audience around me. Watching it alone would have been too depressing.

I'm not sure how Lucas utterly screwed up SW 1-3.. perhaps because it was the lack of people willing to critique him, like his wife and Gary Kurtz in ANH & Empire Strikes Back, which were great. Han Solo & Leia was at least enjoyable.

Former duo Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman also made the list with Eyes Wide Shut.

Am I the only one who thinks that the whole point of Eyes Wide Shut was to make Tom Cruise look like a buffoon?

There's an upcoming Steve Carrel film that features Juliette Binoche as Dane Cook's girlfriend. I think she becomes Carrel's love interest, but the initial pairing is beyond ridiculous.

Can I get a good realistic modern example of proper young-adult/teen romance? It seems easy to pick out the lame ones, but who does it well? And if it's done well, is it realistic? Most romances like that are an awkward mess in the real world--which is why I enjoy the relationship portrayals in spider-man 1 and 2, sure they are cheesy but by god people actually talk like that!

And I sit and sit awaiting the sequel to "Six Days, Seven Nights in Hell with Anne Heche" starring, once again, Harrison Ford.

OK, this goes back a ways -- Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant in Notting Hill? (In fact, Hugh Grant opposite almost anybody -- even Emma Thompson couldn't make him seem romantic in "Sense and Sensibility") although I thought he had found his metier as the cad in the first "Bridget Jones" flick).

I sat through that film with 10 friends, and we were all groaning and laughing through the entire scene, which annoyed people around us, who were able to take it seriously, so maybe there's some educational co-efficient at work.

If I remember correctly, Lucas brought in Carrie Fisher (Princess Leia), who isn't a terrible writer and who makes her living these days as a script doctor, to fix the scene after he felt he himself botched the first draft. One can only wonder what it looked like before she got ahold of it.

Those scenes are always interesting to me because they make me think about just who bears responsibility when a film fails. I think both Portman and Christensen are actually pretty good actors. Portman has impressed me in a number of roles, most recently in V for Vendetta, and Christensen was quite good in Shattered Glass. But if that was the only film I had seen those two in I would have thought they were the worst actors I could call to mind. I think I heard some comedian say once that they couldn't have had less chemistry if they were each in two separate movies.

Making a scene, let alone a whole story, work is a difficult task. There are a lot of moving parts and it isn't always fair to blame the most visible elements, in this case the actors, when the scene fails as it did spectacularly in that movie. I doubt seriously that any two actors could have made it work any better.

I'm not sure how Lucas utterly screwed up SW 1-3.. perhaps because it was the lack of people willing to critique him, like his wife and Gary Kurtz in ANH & Empire Strikes Back, which were great. Han Solo & Leia was at least enjoyable.

I think he had two things going against him. One, very few big-budget Hollywood movies sustain 3 sequels without utterly running out of creative gas. Godfather III anyone? There are some exceptions--the 3rd Bourne flic still has its sizzle--but it's a rare thing. And six sequels, even after a long hiatus, is just unlikely as all get out. Seems to work for cheap horror flicks and detective stories but very little else.

Two, though is a structural matter, I think. The whole concept was a mistake. The material that became SW 1-3 constituted the backstory for the first three movies. As such, it did what that kind of material is supposed to do: it gave them a sense of depth and epic consequence and mystery--a larger narrative we're catching glimpses of through the actions and characters in the foreground. But there's no backstory to the backstory, so you've suddenly dropped that whole dimension right out of the thing, flattening it out. At the same time you've set yourself the task of doing a mammoth exposition, filling in all the details of things you were just giving people hints of in the other three. And exposition is death, as any screenwriter knows.

Matrix II & III fell into more or less the same trap. Telling the backstory is a temptation. These things are often worked out in vast and minute detail and naturally there's a siren call to put it in front of the public, especially when big money's involved. But artistically it's a mistake. You glimpse a bit of this stuff and fill in the rest with your imagination and the whole thing seems spacious and grand. That's how it's supposed to work. You lay it all out in public and chances are the feeling is going to be, "Wait, is that all there is to it?"

I defy you to find anything worse.

Without a doubt, Valkenvania is the worst movie that I ever saw in a theatre. That is the movie that made me vow never to again see a movie cold. Afterwards, I saw a review of the movie entitled, "Stay the Hell Away From This Movie!"

(It was so bad that they renamed it to Nothing But Trouble after it bombed in the theatres, presumably in order to con renters into giving it a try.)

At the risk of sexual stereotyping, in that movie Annakin sounds like the woman in the realtionship.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Overall, Episodes I-III reduce Darth Vader from a figure of supreme menace to one of supreme petulance. In the 15 or 20 seconds it takes Alec Guinness to tell the back story in the original Star Wars, we get a sense of grandeur, mystery and tragedy. And it's all undone by the six hours or so that Lucas lavished on the rise and/or fall of Darth Vader.

Jar Jar Binks deserved better...

Natalie Portman is to me, and considered by most, a reasonably good actress (can I still say that? ;-) As for Hayden Christensen: what else has he done? Any good? Why did Lucas feel so actor-acted to him, so to speak?

Phil: "Clearly none of these people have ever seen Lily Tomlin and John Travolta in Moment by Moment."

Oh. My. God. I had completely forgotten that particular waste of good celluloid.

I'm embarrassed to note that I took my then-girlfriend on a date to see that turkey -- an outdated but still terribly appropriate term for that awful film -- back in the days when teens could freely see R-rated films with no questions asked. That relationship was all downhill from there.

Lucas - once a great director and story teller, always a terribe writer. The king of stilted dialogue.

Natalie Portman is to me, and considered by most, a reasonably good actress (can I still say that? ;-) As for Hayden Christensen: what else has he done? Any good? Why did Lucas feel so actor-acted to him, so to speak?

Posted by: Neil B. on August 19, 2007 at 6:04 PM | PERMALINK

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I'm in the "I don't get Hayden Christensen" club, but I've heard him praised to the moon by industry people. I saw an interview with Kevin Kline, who certainly can act, where he said he demanded Christensen in the film My Life As a House after one audition. According to him, all the people watching the audition turned to each other and said "Who is this guy"? he was supposed to be so good. I thought he sucked in everything I've seen him in; in particular, he was bland and uncharismatic in Factory Girl, which is otherwise an excellent, and well acted, film. I really don't get the appeal. I haven't seen Shattered Glass yet, where he's supposed to be really good, but I suspect the only reason he's good in it is because it's one of those roles where the character the actor is playing doesn't display emotions, which means Christensen got to be Christensen -- he wasn't really acting.

Portman, on the other hand, is quite good and, contrary to some of the sentiments I've seen here, actually pretty sexy when she wants to be (see the film Closer, where she plays a stripper, in particular the final scene of the movie, which defines sophisticated sexiness). I think she's deliberately steered clear of really sexy roles, both because of the kind of person she is and because she wants to take her career down a different path. I'm not saying she's Jacqueline Bisset or anything, but she's not a damp washrag, either.

What, you don't like sand?

The Paul Reubens Pinocchio? With Carl Reiner as Geppetto?
"I wish I had a little-a son. I know, it's usual to get married first, but..."
Lainie Kazan as a 160-lb. Blue Fairy? Both with Mr. Bachagalupe Eyetalian accents?

And when Pinocchio comes to life, he looks at Geppetto and cries out "Mother!"?

Awful?

Not on your life.

...the courtship scenes in that movie rank as among the most embarrassing pieces of dialog and acting I've ever witnessed...

Ouch! That criticism is as rough as the sands of Tatooine!

Not having seen ANY of the SW "prequels", I'll refrain from making any blanket statements here, but it's still hard for me to believe that there's a more implausible/awkward cinematic coupling than Jodie Foster and Matthew McConaughey in Contact.

I don't think I'd call Portman and Christensen in "Clones" the least plausible couple EVER (there's been much worse in film history), but yeah, they're up there. The whole "sand" scene was maybe the worst scene in ANY "Star Wars" movie (only redeemed by how spectacular Portman looked in that backless dress). At least they improved considerably for "Sith."

And it's not their fault, as both are good actors (you doubt Christensen, check out "Shattered Glass," he's brilliant as Stephen Glass and makes you believe the New Republic staff would fall for this con-man masquerading as hurt puppy dog)and Portman especially has excelled with other pairings (especially her and Zach Braff in "Garden State"). The fault is with George Lucas, who, for all his talents, can't write a romantic scene to save his life.

Can I get a good realistic modern example of proper young-adult/teen romance?

If you're willing to go to TV for this, I'll satisfy my werewolf obligations my mentioning Willow and Oz from late season 2 Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Spot on, Martin. Portman was outstanding in Closer, resting any doubt that she's a droid- in fact, she was quite adroit.

Natalie Portman seems to be the kind of person you'd want to be friends with. She doesn't project screen sexuality, though. She seems smart and funny. In Closer she seemed to be a young girl parodying a sex pot, much like she did as a 12 year old in The Professional. That's not much of a defect. In fact, it makes her seem more intact as a person with an ordinary sense of privacy. No actor can play everything.

This one goes back a bit, but the most ridiculous lack of chemistry I can remember was in "The Wild Angels", a 1966 motorcycle flick in which Peter Fonda and Nancy Sinatra were supposed to be an item. They obviously couldn't stand each other and their body language spoke volumes.

Okay, I'm sure nobody here wants to rewatch Attack of the Clones. But if madness seizes you, rewatch it with these three assumptions:

1. Padme has a secret crush on Obi-Wan Kenobi.

2. Both Anakin and Padme are utterly inexperienced with romantic relationships.

3. Anakin is subconsciously using the Force to manipulate Padme's emotions throughout the film.

While these things may not have been Lucas' intent, I think you'll find that the performances and the story are vastly improved by them.

What Women Want. Mel Gibson and Helen Hunt. It's terrible bad.

The whole Padme character was stupidly written. She was supposed to be Queen of a farkin Planet, Senator of the Galactic farkin Republic, right in the middle of the fall of said farkin Republic, and all she can do is hang around her apartment, mope, and fiddle with her makeup.

I don't think that's a problem due to having to act out the backstory, where you get into problems with characters having to do things that they "wouldn't" do because that's the plot and we can't change it. It's simply going through the plot machinery so we can get to the next major CGI gee-whizzery.

.In a striking example of good judgment, film fans voting for "least plausible on-screen chemistry" have chosen Natalie Portman and Hayden Christensen's romance in Star Wars Episode II as the worst ever.

That's probably worse than the film deserves, but those scenes are probably the worst in a film so widely watched, and the contrast is very clear to those who saw both the original and IMAX versions, since the latter cut a lot of those scenes and was more watchable.

As well as bad script and bad acting/directing, I think timid editing was a problem.

At the risk of sexual stereotyping, in that movie Annakin sounds like the woman in the realtionship....
Posted by: Laslo Pratt on August 19, 2007 at 5:25 PM | PERMALINK

Yes - that's the whole point.

This big, menacing guy in the black mask, with the light sabre, and mental powers? He's the Emperor's bitch. And before that, he was Padme's bitch. And before that? He was a slave. He never had a daddy. The closest thing he ever had to a daddy was, well, how macho was C3P0? All that time he spent in his "meditation chamber"? The reason he got so pissed whenever he was interrupted by an anxious fleet ensign? He was wanking to gay robot space-porn. (he was into the mechanical thing, see?)

So, his little fling with Padme wasn't so much an attraction as it was a replacement for his mommy.

Agree with the utter lameness of the romance scenes, which has to be put down to a formula of young, overawed actors plus bluescreen sets plus classically appalling Lucasian dialogue plus classically Lucasian bad direction of actors. Worst ever is a stretch, but it was bad.

In terms of storylining, Lucas was not so bad, except that he wasn't willing to go far enough - by part II Anakin should already have been quite scary - rejoicing in fighting and slaughter - but the only real glimpse of this is in the scenes surrounding the abduction of his mother and the reulting attack on the Sand People, which I thought were genuinely strong scenes.

As a result, and as a result of similar hesitancy in the opening acts of Episode 3, Lucas then later has to make Anakin's character's moral/ethical development twist to the Dark Side implausibly fast (from true hero to multiple child murderer in a about 15 minutes!)

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