Take that Lucas! Liam Neeson disses new Star Wars movies

[John Corn]

Is it bad when one of your former leading actors in your new franchise of movies call them "silly"?

LONDON, England -- The Star Wars franchise can no longer be taken seriously, according to one former Jedi master.

"Ummm, well, they've kind of got silly now, haven't they?" actor Liam Neeson told The Toronto Sun yesterday while doing interviews for his latest film, the forthcoming ensemble romantic comedy Love Actually.

"That last (Star Wars movie) was just pyrotechnics, you know," Neeson said of Episode II -- Attack of The Clones, lamenting that the "computerized stuff" fails to connect with either the actors or audiences.

Neeson said he expects nothing different when Episode III, in which he is not involved, is released in 2005 to complete the prequel trilogy.

Yet Neeson has no regrets about his own participation in Star Wars lore, despite feeling that he did less than stellar work in 1999 in Star Wars: Episode I -- The Phantom Menace.

"The one I did, I loved working on it," he said, "and I loved working with George Lucas."

Neeson played Qui-Gon Jinn, a Jedi master knight who counsels Obi-Wan Kenobi and the young Anakin Skywalker.

"Admittedly," Neeson said with a wane smile, "we all come across as pretty wooden. But a lot of that was interacting with blue screen, which was difficult and was also a great challenge, you know, to try to make it seem as an everyday thing that (you're with) a winged beast that talks."

Blue screen is an in-studio process in which actors literally perform in front of a giant blue screen, replaced later with computerized special effects. "But listen," Neeson said, "I'm glad I did it."

 

[fv3]

Is it bad when one of your former leading actors in your new franchise of movies call them "silly"?

Once upon a time, the "acting" profession was considered lowly and disreputable.

There is no reason that should have changed, as is proven by the myriad absolutely stupid comments emerging from the mouths of so many "stars".

Except when these people are performing, no one should EVER take them seriously.

 

[jrjcd]

...this is nothing new-it's well known that marlon brando thinks the whole thing is quite silly and spencer tracy was basically so mortified about what he felt was essentially an unmanly profession that he pretty much drank himself to death.

Liam neeson is being pretty gracious, because i can remember when he finished star wars(following his filming of the haunting), he almost retired from screen acting, being so disgusted with how lucas was manipulating his performance digitally, to the point of combining different aspects of his face from different takes and such.

but ultimately, when someone in the industry achieves a certain amount of acclaim, it's hard to go back to the nine and five world when you're knocking down hundreds of thousands of dollars a year....

 

[Unthinkable]

Neeson is old school. I'm not surprised he said this at all. Technology isn't embraced the same way from generation to generation.

 

[jrjcd]

i guess i am old school also, because i find lucas digitally altering an actor's performance this drastically disturbing also-blue screen and CGI work is one thing, but let the actors you hire go about their business-that's why they were hired...