Ruislip & Eastcote & Northwood Gazette
SOLO: A STAR WARS STORY
(12A)
SCRIPTED by Jonathan Kasdan and father Lawrence, co-writer of The Empire Strikes Back and Return Of The Jedi, the second standalone anthology film after Rogue One sketches the formative years of the charismatic Han Solo (Alden Ehrenreich).
Ron Howard directs after director duo Phil Lord and Christopher Miller were tossed into a sarlacc pit over “creative differences”.
This gung-ho romp of double-crossing criminals is clinical, bookmarked by impressively staged set-pieces laden with pyrotechnics and special effects.
Solo’s name is in the title but he’s the least interesting element and Alden Ehrenreich’s performance falls short of the smouldering, rascally delights of Harrison Ford. Instead, London-born actress Phoebe Waller-Bridge shines brightest as a rebellious droid, who is hard-wired to demand equal rights for her mechanised kin. punishment of female characters including one scene of a mother being bludgeoned with a walking stick for daring to leave her house without a male guardian.
Violence is meted out off-screen but we hear and feel every sickening blow and share the victims’ sense of injustice that silently rages behind their swollen and bruised lips.
Expressive and vibrant hand-drawn visuals alternate between an earthy palette for battlescarred reality and an explosion of retina-searing colour for the fantastical fables that family members share to temporarily salve their pain.