I think I agree largely with everyone on here. Was lucky enough to see the only IMAX 15/70 print in Europe at the Science Museum London on thurs with a selection of fans and non fans. Mostly we all laughed and cried and whooped in the same places. It’s a pretty joyous return to a very familiar galaxy that Phantom Menace didn’t quite pull off and that the next two prequels totally ignored. It was fun, fluffy and very innocently emotional. The two brit leads did great- hooray!
There’s a bit of sag in pacing in the middle, but the beginning was terrific and the end was a kinda messy triumph. The overt references got me by the heartstrings but I understand others who found them annoying. It’s a total rip of of SW 1977 but with enough innovation to allow you to forgive it almost anything. Snook or Snoke was crap, Starkiller base was a cop out, but it never lingers on its flaws long enough for you to get annoyed. the moment Rei picked up Luke’s lightsaber I was in bits. As has been said, Carrie wasn’t great, not quite convinced by Lupita Nyong’o’s orange lady-Yoda. Harrison was incredible and Peter Mayhew very nearly stole the show as a wonderful, if rather unconvincingly youthful Chewie.

I wish Disney had asked Christopher Nolan how he processed and printed his Interstellar IMAX prints. This version seemed to have been digitised rather than blown up from 35mm negative, it didn’t look as good as that format can look, which is a shame. Still better than 3D though! The escape from Jakku IMAX scene was only impressive enough to make you miss the IMAX 70mm in the rest of the film, and probably wasn’t really necessary at all.

I don’t think a new SW film will be this special again, simply because the schedule of spin-offs looks like it’s going to oversaturate and normalise the whole thing. Enjoy it while it lasts!

Merry Xmas from London!