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Rian Johnson’s The Last Jedi is the most artful film in the whole series. Working with his usual (but new to the franchise) cinematographer Steve Yedlin, and Series Legend sound designer Ben Burtt, he creates images, moments and sequences that have more visual flair and sonic innovation than the other films. In doing so, he creates a slightly more grown-up feel (even, once or twice, bordering on the arthouse), all to the film’s credit. It’s not only wonderful, it’s fresh.
Perhaps the biggest and boldest cinematic innovation Johnson and Yedlin apply here is a simple one: colour, or to be much more specific, red. This could well become known, of the Star Wars movies, as ‘The Red One’ (or perhaps ‘The Crimson One’); the colour’s use is so blatant, so dramatically present, that it cannot go unnoticed, even by the youngest viewer (or the most under-informed cineaste). It informs the entire experience of the film. Johnson and Yedlin deploy it as a stand-in for blood on a salt planet (with a truly chilling, and seemingly very violent, effect, such that you feel they’re ‘getting away’ with something); as the colour of the armour of a squad of elite imperial guards; and, most theatrically, as the colour of the lair of Big Baddie Snoke, where red simply replaces actual walls and the film veers from fantasy movie ‘reality’ into actual abstraction.
Rian also advances the cinematic language we’ve come to expect from the film’s action sequences. Here, at climactic moments, he will offer us an absence of sound and spectacle, using silence in lieu of an explosion, destruction seen from a distance. Again, it feels more mature, more cerebral; you’ve seen plenty of big bangs, he seems to be saying, but how often have you taken a moment to contemplate their impact? He also makes far more of small individual moments of tension than is common for the franchise; the film’s first big action sequence comes down to the simple pressing of a finger on a button, and it is nail-biting.
All of this makes the film thrilling experientially, and the character stuff works tremendously as well. In particular, Daisy Ridley and Adam Driver get to play off each other (whether or not they’re on the same planet) with wit and emotional resonance. Oscar Isaac also makes a strong impression. The actor not making a big impact this time around is John Boyega, whose Finn definitely takes a narrative backseat to Isaac’s Poe. Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher offer substantial appearances, though their actual performances are a little odd.
The story is convoluted and at times confusing, but that felt, to me, by-the-by. I had a great time at this Star Wars; I felt, as an adult, that I was being catered to on a more substantial level than usual, and that was gratifying. I even liked the little fluffy penguins. I just might go see this one again.
