Ooh, ooh, ooh!!!
I quote her in my forthcoming AOTC rebuttal-essay.
I love so much about her take on Lucas and the prequels (or, more exactingly, ROTS and its final confrontation/conclusion).
That said, she isn't a fan of Jar Jar -- or, at least, isn't prepared to go out on a limb defending *every* aspect of the prequels:
Time Link:
10:05
Of course, it's still a great comment, full of praise for Lucas, and that's what counts. I just find it a bit ironic for someone championing Lucas as a formidable artist, storyteller, and innovator in his own right. Lucas, of course, famously says in "The Beginning" that "Jar Jar is the key to all this". It's doubly strange, in a way, because Paglia has a great admiration for religious art (and she bashes the secular humanities, including secular strains of thought, like postmodernism, for traducing the spiritual power of religious art, in the same video).
She might otherwise recognise that the prequels are telling a story with religious scope, and resonate quite strongly with this famous triptych by the painter Hieronymus Bosch:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Garden_of_Earthly_DelightsAdditionally, TPM powerfully resonates with the composer Stravinsky's famous composition, "The Rite Of Spring". See, for example, the titles:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rite_of_SpringChosen Ones, mystic circles of young girls, rival tribes, dance of the Earth (Gungans dancing/cheering on the garden paradise of Naboo), the ritual of abduction, augurs of spring, the Chosen One being entrusted to elders -- hopefully, you can immediately see the connections.
A third and final resonance, of sorts (I'm going for a triptych of my own -- especially as everything in TPM comes down to the mystical property of threes), is with Shakespeare's abstract "meta" play, "The Tempest":
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_TempestJar Jar is basically Caliban, Amidala is Miranda, and Palpatine is Prospero.
I just don't think most people, Paglia included, have too great a feel for how ritualised and sacramental the opening chapter of the saga actually is. They all desire it to be more "normal", somehow -- less coronal, less generous, less Byzantine, less jolly and elusive. With Jar Jar, Lucas exposes an awesome and formidable hole in the heart of all humanity.
But never mind. This isn't meant to be a Jar Jar thread, or a place to discuss TPM and its myriad bounties, per se. Still, hey, hey... During production, all the way through to ROTS, Naboo was actually described as a "garden planet", aptly imbuing it with a ton of mythic/religious overtones, and contrasting powerfully with the lava hellscape of Mustafar. From Eden to a Lake Of Fire. I'm just a bit curious here: Jar Jar, and TPM as a whole, I would have thought, amplify the significance of where the PT ends up. And Paglia seems very adoring of its final destination. But in order to see its true depth and dark majesty, you need TPM -- and Jar Jar.
I suppose I just blanch any time I see someone championing the prequels, only to talk out of the corner of their mouth when Jar Jar comes up, as he always seems to. Which proves Lucas' epigram all the truer: Jar Jar really is the key to all this. Even today, many people still don't get the importance of Episode I. Even Paglia venerates Episode III (the "safe one") above the others. However, her positivity is deep and real, and I respect her for that. She doesn't give praise lightly. This thing that Lucas did really seems to mean something to her; as it does all of us. Great to have at least one prominent academic/intellectual on our side -- and more importantly: giving Lucas his due.
I also love this tribute to Lucas at the close of her "Chronicle" essay (the first link you provided, AD):
There's no one perfect way to sum Lucas up, let alone in a single sentence, but she certainly gave it one hell of a shot.
As I said on TFN in 2015:
boards.theforce.net/threads/is-revenge-of-the-sith-the-greatest-work-of-art-in-the-past-30-years.50030948/page-3#post-52470223(This is basically a straight copy-and-paste job with only cosmetic alterations)
She seems slightly amazed at Lucas' timorous personality, contrasted against the vast ambition, passion, and achievement of the Star Wars enterprise. If that can't elicit a joyful smile and make the heart perk up, what can?
All of the saga may be essential, and all of it may be needed for its cumulative, synergistic, "total artwork" effect, but there is salience in picking out the final part of ROTS, the final part of Lucas' grand opera.
The climax of ROTS is obviously where everything comes to completion (well, from a certain point-of-view), where the combined force (pun intended) of six episodes of epic artistic experimentation, and classic literary themes, from murder and betrayal, to the dysfunctionality of peer bonds and environmental devastation, is extruded on the screen with fantastic co-ordination and verve. The series is like a huge cake and this is that cake deliberately exploding: the huge, wrenching, apocalyptic climax that has been teased from inception.
How could that not be a little exciting, a little bit worthy of notice and acclaim? It's putting it very strongly and clearly, and in a very attention-grabbing way, to deem the climax of ROTS the "greatest work of art in the past thirty years", but the sheer operatic intensity of it urges me to agree. I am not sure it is entirely appropriate, however, to deem one thing the best thing ever (more or less), but there is a complexity to the way the climax of ROTS was fashioned, and it's immeasurably satisfying (each and every time) to see it played out, in my view; so I certainly don't see Paglia's choice as absurd or anything like that.
I love how unequivocal she is. This confidence -- a positive confidence -- is something the Star Wars prequel trilogy fan-base is sometimes found wanting for. Finally, here is someone saying (I know this goes back to 2012, already) that there is a brilliance to the PT, a brilliance to Star Wars, a brilliance to Lucas, that more people should take note of, or go away and think about. That art is broad, art is fluid, and one particular genre or realm doesn't have a monopoly on audacity or quality of expression. And that having a dissenting opinion is completely fine, even cool. It is, in fact, the life-blood of a healthy democratic society, and something we need more of.
