I completely understand your point about not having wanted to know anything about this film, but it was been discussed fairly widely in the press that this film is intended to be much darker, and the fact that it's the first time a Star Wars film has been given a higher rating than PG-13. If you know the story, though, you have to know that it has to go there. This is the pivotal film, this is the one that has to show you how a sweet little kid like Anakin can become someone like Darth Vader. And yeah, it's pretty brutal. But I think it has to be that way. It would have been too trite and totally against Anakin's character for him to just go to the dark side for a trivial reason. And the film definitely shows the transition that Anakin goes through. I don't have kids, so I don't know what I would do in this case. I have a co-worker who has gotten his 6 year old into Star Wars, and I was a bit taken aback when he mentioned that his son really wants to see this movie. He's going to end up waiting for the DVD since his son would have too many questions (he's not seen episodes 1 and 2 yet). Someone on another board was concerned about her 9 year old son, but after some discussion, her son seems to be ok with this kind of stuff, so she's going to let him see it. It really depends on your kid - not that you need me to say that. I do know a number of parents who won't let their children see *any* film until they've pre-screened it first because in any film, they may find something that they don't think their child is ready for yet.

I liked the film, better then the episode I and II movies. In retrospect on my trip home, it occured to me that none of the movies were really necessary to the plot, no real mysteries were solved, at least nothing in my opinion that made the movies necessary for anything other then to ease the fans desire for more. So, as a movie, ep III was good, enjoyable, and well done(at least better then the previous episodes). The acting was enjoyable, at least on first viewing seemed better to me then the previous episodes. But I don't think there really is anything that surprising in the movie, spoiler-wise, we already know that palpatine becomes emporer(sp), we know that vader was luke and leia's father, etc etc etc..... but for the purposes of providing the fans with the visuals to go with the backstory that was discussed in the original trilogy, it was good. If you are going for some epiphamy style surprises, I don't think you will really find those, but if you just want to have a good time, and complete the story as it is thus far, then in my opinion it is worth the ride.... just my $8.00.