Don’t count The New Yorker movie reviewer Anthony Lane as one of the admirers of the latest and (hopefully) last installment of George Lucas’ lucrative sci-fi bonanza, Star Wars: Episode III?Revenge of the Sith. The following are a few gems from his review of the movie that appears in the latest issue of the magazine:

“The general opinion of ?Revenge of the Sith? seems to be that it marks a distinct improvement on the last two episodes, The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones. True, but only in the same way that dying from natural causes is preferable to crucifixion.”
“So much here is guaranteed to cause either offense or pain, starting with the nineteen-twenties leather football helmet that Natalie Portman suddenly dons for no reason, and rising to the continual horror of Ewan McGregor?s accent.”
“[T]he one who gets me is Yoda. May I take the opportunity to enter a brief plea in favor of his extermination? Any educated moviegoer would know what to do, having watched that helpful sequence in Gremlins when a small, sage-colored beastie is fed into an electric blender. A fittingly frantic end, I feel, for the faux-pensive stillness on which the Yoda legend has hung. At one point in the new film, he assumes the role of cosmic shrink?squatting opposite Anakin in a noirish room, where the light bleeds sideways through slatted blinds. Anakin keeps having problems with his dark side, in the way that you or I might suffer from tennis elbow, . .”
“The prize for the least speakable burst of dialogue has, over half a dozen helpings of ?Star Wars,? grown into a fiercely contested tradition, but for once the winning entry is clear, shared between Anakin and PadmÈ for their exchange of endearments at home:

You?re so beautiful.?
?That?s only because I?m so in love.?
?No, it?s because I?m so in love with you.?

For a moment, it looks as if they might bat this one back and forth forever, like a baseline rally on a clay court.”

Ole’! Enjoy the entire review.