efore watching Star Wars: Episode II—Attack of the Clones on DVD, shed your expectations for a masterful work of cinema that will rival the benchmark for excellence set forth by fellow "middle child" The Empire Strikes Back. Then, sit back with some popcorn: That's the best way to enjoy Clones, Star Wars' uber-creator-writer-director George Lucas' second installment in the prequel trilogy. Clones has its dramatic weaknesses, no doubt, but this serious tale of political intrigue, romance and Anakin Skywalker's gradual descent to the Dark Side is still leaps and bounds better than the first prequel, The Phantom Menace.
We pick up the saga 10 years after the events seen in Phantom Menace. Old political issues are coming to the fore in the senate, and an assassination attempt on Naboo senator Padmé Amidala's (Portman) life forces the Jedi to get involved in the investigation. Jedi-in-training Anakin (Christensen) is assigned to protect Padmé, while his Jedi master and tutor, Obi-Wan Kenobi (McGregor), investigates what might be behind the assassination plot—and discovers a greater evil is brewing.
Clones proves a satisfactory bridge to lead into the final episode of Lucas' initial story arc. But for all its visual finesse, Clones lacks the emotional and dramatic depth necessary for it to surpass Episodes IV and V, which still rank as the best films of the saga thus far. When the story is on, it flows well enough; but too often the acting is flat, and the script alternates from tight, non-stop action to plodding melodrama.
The advantage of the DVD release, of course, is that it's laden with extras that take you on a journey through the filmmaking process. Packed with everything from the obligatory audio commentary to 12 behind-the-scenes featurettes from the Web site and a host of original documentaries and short featurettes, the two-disc DVD release of Clones has a lot to offer.
Missing scenes restore missing character
Clones on DVD has eye-catching image quality: Whether this is due to the digital encoding of the film or the fact that Clones is the first film to be shot entirely using a digital camera, the vibrant, well-saturated colors and sharp images make the film seem vivacious in a way neither the digital nor analog versions did in the theater. There's nary a pop or scratch in sight—to be expected given the film's all-digital heritage; however, oddly, there were a few scenes—particularly on Tatooine—where we saw a faint bluish cast at the very top of the screen.
The Clones DVD is generally well presented, although the themed menu animations can seem tiring and sluggish with repetition. The 50 separate chapter marks are a nice touch for a film of this length; this makes it easy to jump right to specific parts of the film.
Disc one contains an audio commentary montage packed with the random, and not-so-random, musings of writer/director George Lucas, producer Rick McCallum, editor and sound designer Ben Burtt, animation director Rob Coleman and effects supervisors Pablo Helman, John Knoll and Ben Snow. While it's nice to have such a wide and varied perspective on the making of the film (and the content is, overall, a nicely orated mix of trivia and filmmaking fact), there isn't enough of Lucas' own ruminations. Frequently, we found ourselves wanting to hear Lucas' thoughts on a scene, not Burtt's or Coleman's; and although many of those questions are addressed in later interview clips in documentaries or featurettes, they would have been better told in the context of the film commentary itself.
The first disc also has a THX sound optimizer to help you get your home theater set up properly, and animated menus that are randomly cycled among three visual themes.
The majority of the extras are self-contained on disc two, a haphazardly organized collection of trailers, preproduction images, deleted scenes and various short features and documentaries. The documentaries include a nearly one-hour tour behind the scenes of the digital characters in Episode II and a 23-minute piece on conceptualizing Episode II—but none of them encapsulate the role and significance of Episode II as did the documentary material on the Episode I DVD. In spite of the amateurish production style (for instance, the boom mic was visible on several occasions!), both of these documentaries do a good job, from a historical perspective, of taking viewers inside the animation and filmmaking process on Episode II, and putting them in the moment during the time these scenes were being created. The shorter of these two actually shows footage that didn't make the final cut of the definitive battle scene at the end of the film&&151;making it intriguing viewing from that perspective alone.
The third documentary runs less than 30 minutes and looks at the making of the film's unique sound effects; however, it's hidden under a different menu option where users would never think to find it. Also there, in Dex's Kitchen, are 75 production stills, a short bit about "R2-D2: Beneath the Dome" and an "easter egg" link to a college campus promotional campaign.
Arguably the most enticing aspect of this DVD is its eight fully polished deleted scenes, many of them which extend on for longer than just a minute. The scenes are the best organized content on the disc, playable individually, all together, and with or without an introductory segment with Lucas and/or McCallum on why, exactly, the scene was filmed, and why it was cut. Of the eight sequences, three in particular stand out as having had some true value to add to the film; had those sequences ("Padmé Addresses the Senate," "An Extended Arrival on Naboo" and "Padmé's Parents' House") been included in the film, perhaps these two main characters would have assumed greater depth than they did.
Elsewhere on the disc are 12 under-10-minute bits culled from material first seen on the official Web site; three short, EPK-style featurettes with cast and crew comments on the story, action and romance in Episode II; the assorted trailers and TV spots; and an ILM montage of visual effects.
