‘LAST JEDI’ IS MORE OF THE SAME FOR ‘STAR WARS’ FANS.
There’s an ultra-cool light-saber fight scene in “The Last Jedi,” the latest edition in the Disney marketing colossus known as “Star Wars,” that might make even the more ambivalent moviegoers sit up and take notice.
Set amid the minimalist expanse of the evil Supreme Leader Snoke’s red lair, the kinetic choreography comes close to fulfilling the promise of “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” which briefly featured martialarts stars Iko Uwais and Cecep Arif Rahman but did absolutely nothing with them.
Score one for director/writer Rian Johnson (“Looper,” “The Brothers Bloom”) who is making his first of what may end up being several “Star Wars” films.
That’s not to say the rest of “The Last Jedi” isn’t without its many pleasures, even if it sticks to the formula. In fact, it’s a worthy follow-up to “The Force Awakens” in 2015 — last year’s “Rogue One” was more of a stand-alone story set in the same universe — and, if you’re a fan, there’s a lot to chew on. (If you’re not a fan, well, “The Last Jedi” at least gives you a 152-minute break from Christmas shopping.)
There’s the return of Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) and the answer to the question of just what has he been doing alone on that island all this time. There’s tug-ofwar between earnest Skywalker protégé Rey (Daisy Ridley) and tormented First Order bad boy Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), both learning to come to grips with their use of The Force. Sensing a man who deep down knows he needs a moral makeover, she wants to lure him to the light. Sensing a young soul who can be manipulated and molded, he wants to drag her down deep into the dark.
Or does he? Their tortured dynamic is one of the film’s high points.
And there’s the last appearance by the late Carrie Fisher as Leia as well as the return of Yoda there is.
“The Last Jedi” starts where “The Force Awakens” left off, with the rebels of the resistance once again on the run and the First Order — the heirs of the Empire — in hot pursuit. Our scrappy and gallant heroes — Finn (John Boyega) and Poe (Oscar Isaac) — are bringing their best run-and-gun Agame while Rey has been sent to find Luke, who really is the last Jedi in the universe, to get his light-saber out of mothballs and ride to the rescue. But he’s not having it.
Meanwhile, Kylo — who more than met his match against Rey last time around — is determined to squash the rebels once and for all as he wants to get back in the good graces of Snoke (Andy Serkis, unrecognizable, as always). That’s going to take some work, though. “You’re no Vader,” Snoke says derisively at one point to Kylo. “You’re just a child in a mask.” Ouch, that’s gotta hurt.
Along the way, there are some notable guest appearances, such as Benicio del Toro as a stuttering intergalactic thief, Laura Dern as resistance vice admiral Amilyn Holdo and Justin Theroux in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it role as a gambler and code-breaker in this movie’s riff on the famous cantina scene. (There must be a lot more of him on the electronic cuttingroom floor.)
The soldiers of the First Order, like those of the Empire before them, still can’t hit the side of a barn if it were 500 feet tall and lit up like a Christmas tree. Plus, they’ve built a dreadnaught ship with no adequate means to fully defend it. These guys continue to be the most incompetent empire that ever empired. So, of course, you don’t need a weatherman to know which way this particular wind is blowing.
But that doesn’t mean “The Last Jedi” isn’t a fun ride, from the opening gag that Poe pulls on the odious and militantly ineffective General Hux (Domnhall Gleeson) to the final First Order vs. Resistance faceoff. To his credit, Johnson doesn’t let the pace lag often and even introduces the cute, cuddly birdlike creatures called the porgs without bringing to mind previous “Star Wars” creature misfires, such as the wretched Jar Jar Binks.
As the third installment in the rebooted franchise and the second in this story arc, “The Last Jedi” may not possess its immediate predecessors’ pleasant shock of the new, nor is it a stylistic detour from what’s expected. But it makes up for this with wit, spirit and one wicked saber smackdown.
THE TORTURED DYNAMIC BETWEEN REY AND KYLO REN IS A HIGH POINT IN ‘STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI’