Would James Franco have made a better Anakin?

[Dooku's Disciple]

Based on his performances in the two Spiderman films, I think he'd do a fine job as the tormented type who's not quite sure what side he's on.

Granted, he might not scrub up so well if he were lumbered with some of the SW prequels' dialogue. Hayden Christiansen is probably a better actor than I give him credit for, but with that shambles of a script even Lord Olivier would look lost.

Your thoughts please?

DD

[Stravo]

I think Hayden is a fine actor. I've seen him in movies outside of SW and he's actually quite good but GL writes dialogue in the prequels that is just painful to the ear. Plus he has instituted ZERO character development for Anakin in the prequels. In TPM Anakin was the annoying kid sidekick who was relegated to lines like "Yippee!" "Master Qui Gon what are Midichlorians" and "Now this is podracing."

In AOTC he is introduced as a whiney, impetuous, arrogant hothead and by the end of AOTC he is...a whiney, impetuous, arrogant hothead. UGH.

[Vympel]

James Franco? Harry from Spiderman? Ugh. Just doens't sit well with me.

Hayden Christensen is a good actor. Just check RT.com for Shattered Glass, see what the reviews say. I also didn't think he was complete shit in that complete shit movie, Life as House.

George Lucas' scripts and *direction* for the PT have been wanting, that's all.

[Ghost Rider]

Problem with basing performances...is really Christasen is a good actor.

It's the script made from a man who think dialogue of amore is "Sand is so rough..."

Really there are parts I don't mind of the PT, but two of the focuses...Anakin and Amidala have been disappointing.

[THEHOOLIGANJEDI]

NO. I don't think he would have done better. How would he have handled some of the cheesy dialog he had to say. As the others say, can you really judge Hayden Based on SW? Nope

[Stofsk]

Based on his performances in the two Spiderman films, I think he'd do a fine job as the tormented type who's not quite sure what side he's on.

I don't. The writing in the Spiderman movies was not significantly greater than TPM or AOTC, and James Franco did not really perform significantly greater at saying cheesey lines and acting like a little bitch than Hayden Christensen. I actually thought Hayden was pretty cool, and like other's have said it was simply the writing and directing that has been at fault with the PT.

I know Hayden can do good things, because he's proven capable of it. Hell, he actually wasn't THAT bad in AOTC for fuck's sake. By that same token, I know Natalie Portman and Ewan MacGregor can do better as well. So blaming the actors doesn't seem fair in this context, and advocating a replacement for them doesn't follow. What was really needed was someone to write the damn scripts with good dialogue and story, not in the way GL ended up doing. Having a producer who doesn't suck his balls may have helped as well. Having someone like Kurtz challenge Lucas' stupid ideas would have been good.

[Kurgan]

Based on his performances in the two Spiderman films, I think he'd do a fine job as the tormented type who's not quite sure what side he's on.

Granted, he might not scrub up so well if he were lumbered with some of the SW prequels' dialogue. Hayden Christiansen is probably a better actor than I give him credit for, but with that shambles of a script even Lord Olivier would look lost.

Your thoughts please?

DD

You know, after seeing Spidey 2 at the imax a couple of weeks ago< I thought along similar lines. I mean, here we have a "tormented pretty-boy type" character, much like Lucas's Anakin in AOTC. But, with bad dialouge (and poor direction of certain scenes) he too may not have been that great.

Who knows...

The Anakin/Padme romance strikes me as how Shakespear's R&J is handled. Take two good looking but clueless people and put them together. We're supposed to assume things will turn out well because they are teh hotness but they don't, so we feel sadder. That's my theory anyway...

I wonder if we'll see Hayden's "throbbing vein" in ROTS?

[Spanky The Dolphin]

If you're refering to Christianson's penis, I'm going to have to track you down, pluck out your eyes with a fork, and eat them.

[Imperial Overlord]

The proof of Ewen McGregor's greatness as an actor is that he managed to go through AOTC, say the dialogue, and still seem cool. That's a huge accomplishment. That Portman and Christianson couldn't do it merely shows how difficult that particular task was (although the Lucas romance scenes made their burden particularily difficult).

[Kurgan]

If you're refering to Christianson's penis, I'm going to have to track you down, pluck out your eyes with a fork, and eat them.

GET YOUR MIND OUT OF THE GUTTER SPANKY! (see, you made me use caps!)


For a good view of Hayden's throbbing vein, check out "Life as a House" (and no, I didn't particularly like the film, but what can I say).

[Bob the Gunslinger]

I think Franco would be a better Anakin. I've been saying so for years (well, since Spiderman and AOTC). He brought more passion and character to his lifeless dialogue and gave an interesting performance to boot. I'm not sure that he'd be great in AOTC, but I think he would be better than Darth Whiney.

[Jalinth]

You know, after seeing Spidey 2 at the imax a couple of weeks ago< I thought along similar lines. I mean, here we have a "tormented pretty-boy type" character, much like Lucas's Anakin in AOTC. But, with bad dialouge (and poor direction of certain scenes) he too may not have been that great.

Who knows...

The Anakin/Padme romance strikes me as how Shakespear's R&J is handled. Take two good looking but clueless people and put them together. We're supposed to assume things will turn out well because they are teh hotness but they don't, so we feel sadder. That's my theory anyway...

All I wanted to do with Anakin/Padme is throw up. Shooting them would also have helped. Also, Shakespear was a much better scriptwriter than Lucas (but so would my moldy bread )

I know that Portman can be decent or better - Ewan M. can be damn good. But not with Lucas.

The only people who really were good were the Chancellor and the Count, and I think its was more they could pull off the gravitas needed to avoid their lines being completely corny. I always had an impression that McDiarmid had this hidden smile/snicker going on during his scenes (Palpatine chuckling at the inepitude of his opponents and how he was playing them like puppets), which ties into the character.

[The Silence and I]

I don't suppose McDiarmid was just amused by his silly dialog and laughing silently at Lucas

[Kurgan]

You know, after seeing Spidey 2 at the imax a couple of weeks ago< I thought along similar lines. I mean, here we have a "tormented pretty-boy type" character, much like Lucas's Anakin in AOTC. But, with bad dialouge (and poor direction of certain scenes) he too may not have been that great.

Who knows...

The Anakin/Padme romance strikes me as how Shakespear's R&J is handled. Take two good looking but clueless people and put them together. We're supposed to assume things will turn out well because they are teh hotness but they don't, so we feel sadder. That's my theory anyway...

All I wanted to do with Anakin/Padme is throw up. Shooting them would also have helped. Also, Shakespear was a much better scriptwriter than Lucas (but so would my moldy bread )

I know that Portman can be decent or better - Ewan M. can be damn good. But not with Lucas.

The only people who really were good were the Chancellor and the Count, and I think its was more they could pull off the gravitas needed to avoid their lines being completely corny. I always had an impression that McDiarmid had this hidden smile/snicker going on during his scenes (Palpatine chuckling at the inepitude of his opponents and how he was playing them like puppets), which ties into the character.

Oh I'm not saying that Lucas is even close to Shakespear in terms of writing dialouge in the prequels (and yes I have read enough Shakespear that I'm not just following some bandwagon thing, but feel free to disagree). McDiarmid was a totally ham-based actor in ROTJ. Other than than Star Wars I haven't watched him in anything else except when he played a Butler in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. His performances in the Prequels were just fine though. Christopher Lee can make the silliest roles good, and he's got a nice penchant for making villians scary (despite his grandfatherly looks).

I haven't watched Portman in much else really (except when she played the suicidal daught in... "Heat" was it?). Hayden was okay in Life as a House, a movie I disliked btw, when he played a bratty misguided kid there too (but with a little more personality).

The "romance" is really ackward, to be sure. I think I can see what Lucas was going for, even if he didn't quite suceed at it.

[Joe]

The thing about the acting is the prequels is that the three leads - Christensen, Portman, and McGregor - are good in practically everything else they've done except for the prequels. It's kind of funny - the OT had generally a much-less talented cast of actors than the prequels, but it still has better acting. Meanwhile, the prequels have Oscar winners and future Oscar winners and the acting rarely rises above average. Even Liam Neeson's performance in TPM was lackluster, considering what he's capable of. He looked like he was just going through the motions in that part.

[Mange]

No, Hayden Christensen is a very good actor. There has always been corny dialogue in SW, as Harrison Ford told George Lucas: "You can type this shit, but you can't say it", so AOTC is no different. I like the dialogue in AOTC, if Anakin had come across as a casanova, that had been really messed up.

[Stofsk]

Which lines was Harrison referring to btw?

[Slartibartfast]

Everything, probably, since most of his dialogue was ad libbed

Leia: "I love you!"
Han: "Yeah whatever"

[Mange]

Which lines was Harrison referring to btw?

As I recall, this was the line Harrison referred to:

HAN: It'll take a few moments to get the coordinates from the
navi-computer.

[Durandal]

There's no reason to think that the casting was done poorly in the prequels. They actually have a pretty damn strong cast line-up. Come on, Ewan McGreggor, Natalie Portman, Hayden Christensen, Samuel L. Jackson, Christopher Lee ... these people were established as very good actors well before TPM.

The problem, by and large, has been Lucas' directing and writing. It takes true talent to deliver crappy dialogue well, and the only one in AoTC who pulled it off was Christopher Lee. But that's because he's fucking Christopher Lee. Others' inability to duplicate that feat isn't indicative of some sort of shortcoming on their part as actors; they simply had unreasonable expectations placed on them, like Lucas handing Christensen and Portman their lines and saying, "Read these without vomiting."

[Durandal]

Everything, probably, since most of his dialogue was ad libbed

Leia: "I love you!"
Han: "Yeah whatever"

LOIS: Oh Peter, I love you.
PETER [Looks at his watch]: Yeah about half past five.

[THEHOOLIGANJEDI]

No, Hayden Christensen is a very good actor. There has always been corny dialogue in SW, as Harrison Ford told George Lucas: "You can type this shit, but you can't say it", so AOTC is no different. I like the dialogue in AOTC, if Anakin had come across as a casanova, that had been really messed up.

My point to a T. Thanks for saving me the time. Persoanally i always thought that the complaints about the prequels have been way overstated an blown out of proportion. The acting really isn't all that bad.

[Bob the Gunslinger]

I agree that the dialog mister Christianson had to work with sucked--that's why I think Franco would have been better. Better actor or worse, he still delivered the crappy Spiderman dialog in a more interesting way. Think of what he could have done in AOTC.

"This sand is rough." *Psychotic stare*

[Mange]

No, Hayden Christensen is a very good actor. There has always been corny dialogue in SW, as Harrison Ford told George Lucas: "You can type this shit, but you can't say it", so AOTC is no different. I like the dialogue in AOTC, if Anakin had come across as a casanova, that had been really messed up.

My point to a T. Thanks for saving me the time. Persoanally i always thought that the complaints about the prequels have been way overstated an blown out of proportion. The acting really isn't all that bad.

Thanks, it almost felt as if I was in a enourmous minority having this opinion. I have much hope for his performance in ROTS.

[THEHOOLIGANJEDI]

I think Franco would be a better Anakin. I've been saying so for years (well, since Spiderman and AOTC). He brought more passion and character to his lifeless dialogue and gave an interesting performance to boot. I'm not sure that he'd be great in AOTC, but I think he would be better than Darth Whiney.

Maybe in Spidey 2, but in The first one he (was fine) but was dull and flat, he really wasn't a standout in Spidey 1.