stranger has no name, though he soon acquires one. Finn (John Boyega) turns out to be an Imperial Stormtrooper with a conscience. I must admit, I never realized that such tender beings existed. It’s as though a member of the Hitler Youth had volunteered for Meals on Wheels. Anyway, off comes his helmet, and Boyega gives a fine demonstration of moral relief, as the sweaty burden of malice is lifted from his soul. Such, at least, is one reading of the scene; the expression on his face could equally be that of a grown man who no longer has to jog around in one of those white plastic codpieces, which never look quite as shatterproof as the wearer would like them to be. Not for a second, as a teen-ager, was I spooked by the Stormtroopers, and Abrams, I suspect, feels the same, which is why he dedicates one of the earliest shots in his movie to refurbishing their image—showing them all in a row, under lighting that flickers like a strobe. Just for once, they seem to be something other than outsize toys, although even Abrams can’t do much about the Millennium Falcon, which struck me, decades ago, as little more than a Lego kit waiting to happen.
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And what of its proud owner? In contrast to Luke, Han Solo, still armed with his lopsided sigh of a smile, resumes his spot on center stage in “The Force Awakens,” and rightly so, for the franchise owes so much to Harrison Ford. Without him and Alec Guinness, after all, the first “Star Wars” would have been largely unwatchable; viewed again earlier this week, it came across as startlingly inept—barely written, often badly acted, and always poorly paced, with some sequences tumbling past in an embarrassed rush and others lingering like unwanted guests. Granted, the result made hundreds of millions of dollars, and acquired the patina of legend, but, still, “Star Wars” was emotionally as null as the interstellar void through which its vessels leaped. That gratuitous round of applause at the end, for the returning saviors, and thus, by implication, for the movie’s own bravado? I blocked my ears. And the comedy? Don’t make me laugh. Ford alone took the measure of the nonsense around him, and saw instinctively how it might flourish; his lazy sprawl, and his grumbling asides, encouraged the audience to step back and inspect the striving of other life forms, and other civilizations, from a laconic angle. He understood, as Bogart did before him, that a half-reluctant hero, with a fondness for cash payments, is sexier and more plausible than any pink-cheeked enthusiast who gets turned on by the dream of doing good. Ford became the ironist of junk.