George Lucas’ approach to cinema is rather documentary, which became all the more obvious through the recent trailer for Episode VII, that leads to a pretty observational and spacious but calm way of moving the camera. His shots are precisely constructed compositions, with clear aesthetics and basic motion.
This is a good example of a basic but clever and interesting way to make us witness Obi-Wan observing and investigating the room until his target reveals himself and the confrontation is there. There is nothing fancy about it. It’s the camera used as a tool to capture what’s happening within the frame rather than a more toy-like interpretation of a camera that’s supposed to attract attention to itself. This is rather consistent trough all six previous Star Wars films since Lucas was carefully selecting directors that shared his ideals (Irvin Kershner had just shot a documentary before Episode V) for the two films he didn’t direct himself. In JJ Abrams’ films, the cameras are supposed to attract attention to themselves as they are never calm. Abrams uses the camera’s movement to create tension and atmosphere. Lucas uses precise compositions and the juxtaposition of those compositions to create tension and atmosphere, as seen by the fact that many of the best scenes from his Star Wars films are heavily reliant on juxtaposition (e.g. the final space battle in A New Hope, Anakin’s Search in Attack Of The Clones, the death of Padmé / rebirth of Darth Vader in Revenge Of The Sith etc.).
