An “exhilarating” new Star Wars spin-off

An exhilarating new instalment in the Star Wars saga Dir: Gareth Edwards 2hrs 14mins (12A)

After paying a thumping $4bn for the rights to the Star Wars franchise, it’s no surprise to find that Disney is “determined to get its money’s worth”, said Nick Levine in NME. Hence its decision, hard on the heels of last year’s big-budget reboot The Force Awakens, to release this stand-alone spin-off film. Rogue One lacks most of the best-known Star Wars characters, but that actually proves liberating, said Brian Viner in the Daily Mail. This “pleasingly oldfashioned action movie” is “even more exhilarating” than The Force Awakens. Set just before the events of George Lucas’s original 1977 film, this latest movie plunges us into the war between the intergalactic dictatorship known as the Empire and the brave rebels. The latter recruit Jyn Erso (Felicity Jones), a plucky loner whose father (Mads Mikkelsen) created the Death Star, the Empire’s destructive mother ship. If she can track him down, he may reveal the flaw he installed at the heart of the ship, leaving it vulnerable to attack. The success of this exercise in cinematic money-spinning rests on “two damn fine performances”, said Kate Muir in The Times. The first is that of Jones herself, who lends the story its emotional heft. The second, in the tradition of Star Wars films, comes from a droll, patrician-sounding robot named K-2SO (voiced by Alan Tudyk). The sidekick of a rebel captain with a soft spot for Jyn, the droid “provides most of the laughs” amid the sci-fi capers.

The odd amusing one-liner aside, Rogue One is actually pretty “grey and gritty” – which is what makes it so compelling, said Levine. Having encouraged the viewer to identify with each of Jyn’s doughty comrades, director Gareth Edwards shows no compunction in killing some of them off. Add to that the return of the black-clad villain Darth Vader (still voiced by James Earl Jones, now 85) and it makes for nail-biting stuff. Yet I could not shake off a feeling of déjà vu, said Geoffrey Macnab in The Independent. Feisty youngsters? Portentous dialogue? An all-out assault on the Death Star? Isn’t this the plot of every Star Wars film? The familiarity is quite deliberate, said Stefan Kyriazis in the Daily Express. Even the special effects are designed to recreate the look of the 1977 original. The result is a “remarkable homage that never feels kitsch or contrived”. To complain about repetitive elements in Star Wars films is “as beside the point as recognising familiar chord progressions in the blues”, said Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian. Like a romantic comedy, or a western, the franchise has established its “generic components”. This is “fan-fiction”. Yet even for nonaficionados, Rogue One proves a highly entertaining adventure.