Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith
The dialogue, for the most part, is still atrocious, and the acting from anyone without a British accent remains stiff, uninspired or just plain bad. What works in Revenge of the Sith's favor, however, is the way it's more connected to Episodes IV, V & VI (unlike its two predecessors, which essentially amounted to almost five hours of exposition). Episode III is wall-to-wall action; everything that occurs in the film drives straight to a point and that makes for one hell of a ride. Unfortunately, the aforementioned exposition of Episodes I & II, only some of which is crucial to Anakin Skywalker's character arc, almost derails Episode III, and it made me wonder why Lucas didn't just make one three-and-a-half hour epic prequel. (Oh, right—the money.)
The problem is this: In order to turn Anakin to the Dark Side, Palpatine preys on his fears of losing Padme, the love of his life. But because their relationship was so poorly constructed, written and acted in the first two films, Anakin's transformation into Darth Vader becomes more of an intellectual exercise, rather than an emotional one. We understand the motivations, but we don't feel them. If it weren't for Ewan McGregor's powerful performance in the film's climatic scene (one of the few well-written ones), I might not have "felt" anything at all.
Revenge of the Sith barely works, but that's enough, and its success can be measured by what I'm going to do next: I think I'll go watch A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi.