I wanted to love this - partly because it's Star Wars, but also because I like that the producer sided with the director and I love Lawrence Kasdan, and have a soft spot for Ron Howard.
But it doesn't work. All the way though watching this I kept saying to myself, "this just doesn't work".
It should have. I mean, there's a lot of good material to play with - Chewbacca, the wookies, the growth of the Empire, Jabba, Greedo, the bounty hunters, Lando, the Kessel run, becoming a smuggler.
And bits of this were good. The special effects. Donald Glover was terrific. Woody Harrelson was good, despite a distracting cow lick on his wig. I loved the way Han met Chewbacca. I laughed at Lando recording his memoirs and the robot insisting Lando wanted her. I enjoyed the odd nod to the prequels.
But the handling was sloppy. The action scenes lack excitement and verve (Howard's never been a great action director). The cinematography was murky.
The story and script was poor. I was often confused about what was going on. There was a lot of constant exposition
I kept going "you could cut that bit... and that bit". You didn't need to see that opening scene on Corellia. Or really the stuff in the Imperial army (I wonder if there was meant to be more of this, but it was removed after The Force Awakens). Or the whole train hijack sequence - they introduce two characters (one of whom, a wise cracking pilot creature, seems like is a rip off of the raccoon in Guardians of the Galaxy). The film doesn't really start until Han and his gang go looking for fuel.
There's no real villain until Dryden Vos gets nasty at the end. (They set up a baddy at the beginning and never use her again. Imperial troops pop up every now and then and leave.)
There's no real stakes after the half way point - the first half is all about getting Emilia Clarke, but then Han meets her so the stakes are over. Then it's about paying off a debt...?
Alden Ehrenreich was okay in an impossible role - he's good looks and presence, even if he doesn't have that thing Harrison Ford did, the combination of stress and cockiness.
Emilia Clarke is alright. She doesn't have much of a role to play - she's done Bad Things but that's about it. She and Ehrenreich don't have much chemistry. Why no resolution with her character's story? Why not kill her? We don't want to see her again. Why bring in Darth Maul at the eleventh hour? What was that supposed to do?
This simply wasn't very good.
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