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86
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30
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45
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96
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88
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71
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67
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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
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72
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89
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52
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64
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81
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63
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73
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xx
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94
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29
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16
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75
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83
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61
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42
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70
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46
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19
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66
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80
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83
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59
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67
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34
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62
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73
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xx
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54
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Peter and Vandy
35
Play the Game
77
Precious: Based on the Novel by Sapphire
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76
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69
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79
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40
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xx
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89
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66
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67
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69
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64
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64
Where is Where?
xx
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74
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69
World's Greatest Dad
70
Yes Men Fix the World
69
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xx
You, the Living
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones
EMAILPRINT20th Century Fox Film Corporation

Mixed or average reviews
Based on 39 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 225 votes
Read user comments
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Movie Info
Genre(s): Sci-fi
Written by:
George Lucas
Jonathan Hales
Directed by: George Lucas
Release Date:
Theatrical: May 16, 2002
DVD: November 12, 2002
Running Time: 132 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: PG for sustained sequences of sci-fi action/violence
Starring Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman, Hayden Christensen, Ian McDiarmid, Samuel L. Jackson, Pernilla August, Jack Thompson, and Christopher Lee
Ten years after the events in "The Phantom Menace," Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi (McGregor) and Anakin Sywalker (Christensen) are summoned to protect Padme Amidala (Portman) after an assassination attempt is made on her life. Anakin's love of Amidala grows when the pair returns to Naboo, and Obi-Wan's investigation of the death plot reveals sinister designs that threaten to bring the Galactic Republic to the brink of war.
Also On Metacritic
FILM: Return of the Jedi Star Wars Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith The Empire Strikes Back
GAMES: GameBoy Advance: Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington
Attack of the Clones celebrates a certain youthful spirit in both moviemaking and movie watching; because it's as much phenomenon as movie, audiences will either ride with or reject it. I was happy to take the ride.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy
Don't go if "Star Wars" isn't your bag: You'll only resist and resent it. But if you're a fan, it's hard to see how you'd be disappointed. Me? I can't wait for May 2005. "Episode III": Hot diggity!
Read Full Review >Variety Todd McCarthy
George Lucas has reached deep into the trove of his self-generated mythological world to produce a grand entertainment that offers a satisfying balance among the series' epic, narrative, technological and emotional qualities.
Read Full Review >Time Richard Corliss
An exhilarating two hours of serious fun.
USA Today Mike Clark
As for the breathless 45-minute climax, no screen fantasy adventure in memory can match the showmanship.
Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
The saga regains its grandeur with a complicated but easy-to-follow story. The characters are as satisfying as the effects.
Read Full Review >ReelViews James Berardinelli
In a time when, more often than not, sequels disappoint, it's refreshing to uncover something this high-profile that fulfils the promise of its name and adds another title to a storied legacy.
Read Full Review >Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
As the sequence builds, it accretes so many heroic and nightmarish associations it plays like a prelude to apocalypse, which of course will come in Episode III. Attack of the Clones is part soda pop, part witches' brew - and all visual ambrosia.
Read Full Review >New York Post Lou Lumenick
A technological landmark that couldn't look or sound better.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
Mostly very good. It's exactly the big fix of Saturday-matinee adventure, blazing special effects, inside humor and sly self-references for which its fans have been lusting.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Chris Gore
Clones is not a good movie -- but it is an incredibly awesome Star Wars movie! This is far from a perfect film, but the problems are almost dismissable based on the final result.
Read Full Review >New York Magazine Peter Rainer
Still, in its own Saturday-morning-serial kind of way, Attack of the Clones is a commendable example of the sort of movie we once loved and then outgrew. Of course, if it was even better, we wouldn't feel as if we'd outgrown it.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
A triumph of technology over humanity, and if it falls short of a completely fulfilling experience, it also achieves the kind of primal emotion movies were invented for: wonder.
Read Full Review >Rolling Stone Peter Travers
The dark fantasist in Lucas makes a comeback after years of once-over-lightly.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
Clones makes the Frodo-speak of "Lord of the Rings" sound like Noel Coward.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Renee Graham
One roots for Lucas to get the next film sorted out, and to resurrect the humanity and soul that first made so many fall in love a long time ago with that galaxy far, far away.
Read Full Review >The New Yorker David Denby
Lucas shifts back and forth between this kind of original invention and a dependence on pompous dead-level dreck, a grade-B cheapness that he's obviously addicted to. [20 May 2002, p. 114]
Film Threat Ron Wells
You know, each and every person reading this right now will shell out their six bucks ($9-$14 in L.A./New York) to see this film no matter what I say. Hell, I feel ambivalent about it and I'm still going to pay to see it again.
Read Full Review >New Times (L.A.) Luke Y. Thompson
Sometimes it bounces along, other times it feels forced. Kids and hardcore fans will love it regardless, and those who don't will nonetheless be talking about it for the next three years.
Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
Here we are again: not entertained, not nearly enough, by an installment of the ''Star Wars'' epic that, for the first time, exhibits symptoms of...nerves. And a chill, conservative grimness of purpose, rather than an excited thrill at the possibilities of cinematic storytelling.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
It is not what's there on the screen that disappoints me, but what's not there.
Read Full Review >Newsweek David Ansen
A decidedly mixed bag.
TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
And while it was always clear that Lucas cared more about special effects than acting, here his lack of interest has produced phenomenally wooden performances from newcomers and veterans alike: Only the imperious Christopher Lee, as baleful Count Dooku, emerges unscathed.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
The movie has a broader range of emotions and visual effects than any "Star Wars" installment since "The Empire Strikes Back," but the writing and acting are as stiff as R2-D2's metal torso.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
Lucas knows his fans are un-boreable, un-annoyable and inexhaustible. For an artist, that's more a curse than a blessing.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Hazel-Dawn Dumpert
Attack of the Clones' high-definition surfaces are certainly impressive, but they offer no lifelight, nothing to put your arms around.
Read Full Review >Slate David Edelstein
The scale of the enterprise is thrilling; it's too bad the movie is so muddled on so many different levels.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jack Mathews
The overall effect of Lucas' digital mania has been detrimental to the saga. Where the first trilogy was mythological fantasy, the second is pure cartoon. The sad truth is, the more three-dimensional they look, the more two-dimensional they are.
Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan
Only a teenage boy could find this kind of stuff continually diverting, and only a teenage boy would not notice flimsy emotions and underdeveloped acting. It seems George Lucas, like Peter Pan, has never really grown up.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias
Without the mythical power or giddy adventurousness of the first two Star Wars movies, the impact is strangely numbing, like watching a two-and-a-half-hour ILM show reel in search of moneyed investors.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Dana Stevens
It is not really much of a movie at all, if by movie you mean a work of visual storytelling about the dramatic actions of a group of interesting characters.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum
Though the look aspires as usual to be both otherworldly and familiar, there's nothing that doesn't reek of southern California (as opposed to Hollywood) plastic, and this is as true of the characters as the decor.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov
Attack of the Clones' final 35 minutes very nearly makes up for the preceding 105, featuring as it does the jaw-dropping spectacle of the entire Jedi Council battling it out with not only clones, but also lumbering monsters, space ships of all sorts, and each other.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Desson Thomson
There's nothing to stir us, no scene to savor for life -- such as the father-son battle between Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader in "The Empire Strikes Back." Back then, we were watching a classic, still the best film in the series. This time, we're watching just another "Star Wars" flick.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen
Watching Attack of the Clones is like getting rapped on the head with a rubber mallet -- no lasting damage (I pray and hope), but bad enough to bring on an acute bout of dizziness and disorientation. Definitely do not operate heavy machinery after viewing -- this behemoth is brutal.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Michael Atkinson
There is an odd cognitive dissonance at work between the obvious ingenuity dedicated to the film's visual details -- alien anatomies, industrial machinery, technological minutiae -- and the retarded intelligence quotient evident in its content.
Read Full Review >Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
For all its video-game bedazzlements, Attack of the Clones suffers from severe digital glut, periodically relieved, if you can call it that, by amateur theatrics.
Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek
I can't remember ever feeling so glad that a movie was finally over. Lucas may have held my imagination hostage for two hours, but reclaiming it afterward wasn't hard at all.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 6.1 (out of 10) based on 225 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Chris gave it a9:
It was awesome! The effects were great, the action scenes were well choreographed, and the acting was decent. Jango Fett is way better than Boba.
bill gave it a3:
For me this was the worst of the six star wars movies. As a matter of fact I wouldn't call it a movie until the last 20 minutes. The begining and middle of this film was boring and predictable. Only the dule between Dooku and Yoda saved this movie from being a big fat 0. But even then it was to little to late.
mike k gave it a7:
this movie which is the least exciting and good of th saga was only ruined for a few reasons..one big one being hayden as anakin george really can't cast for that role look at the kid from episode 1..but other than that the only problem was count dooku ..played by the great christopher lee but even his acting could save such a terrible character...they should of gone with a female sith it would of been differen't now on the good side the clone war battle in the beginning was amazing..the factory scene is funn and the dinner scene with obi wann and dexter is one of my favorites of the whole saga.
ghomas m gave it a0:
I am sorry this has to be the worst movie i have seen and this includes house of the dead. The love scene in the meadow made be blush with embarasement that human made it.
Mark K gave it an8:
A lot better than Phantom Menace but still not up to the standards of Empire Strikes Back.
Eddie D. gave it a2:
This is definitely one of the worst movies I have ever seen.The first 30 minutes is completely unnecessary, and boring. And they wasted another useless 40 minutes fooling around with Anakin and Pad Me. The plotline- FAIL! The action- FAIL! The romance- three thumbs down. I want my money, and my time back.
[Anonymous] gave it a7:
This is one of those movies where you think, "What the heck was George Lucas thinking?" But I gotta tell ya, I have weaknesses for these films. Sure the acting is off. Sure the only real good actors are Ewan McGregor, Christopher Lee, and even Hayden Christensen. Sure you have to wait a while for some of the Best on screen action/ battle. I had fun with this movie. Yes it's a love story. Yes, it does remind you of Pearl Harbor and Spider-Man 3. But it is fun.
