..
..wait for it..
...PEOPLE HATING!
Ha haaaaaa. Unintentional irony at its finest. but wait, theres more:
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some of people slating had not even seen them.
Just learn to ignore them.
Immediately followed by
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Though I have not seen his edit, I must say that these people are too harsh.
Whoa HOO. Wait a minute. Where's the post upon post of scornful derision after that last quote? Where's someone saying "just learn to ignore that guy?" It sort of points to the idea that actual QUALITY of the edits sorta takes a backseat to the mental picture of some lowly guy "sticking it to the man" and "making a stand," and that the leeway some people wouldn't give to the movies themselves, they'll give to the edit because it's validating something a little extra important to them. Just like George and Rick probably got a "kick" out of the edits less for the quality of the edits and more because of the effort that went into them.
People there are overreacting with the "call LFL" thing, but then again, no one there is SELLING their shit, either. Which, if you take the time to read critically, is the major difference in their arguments. Yes, it's shades of grey in an endeavour that is sorta shady to begin with, but that's where the heart of the argument lies. And I can see a long and useless sidetrack into the ethics of downloading versus bootlegging and so on and so forth so save that, because it's pretty well assumed if you're coming here, and you own bittorrent, the morality leg is pretty shaky to stand on anyway, especially if you're going to argue that sharing torrent links to a blockbuster movie is worse than selling copies of a homebrewed edit for about 10 bucks profit . It's just going to be a morass of pointless nitpicking.
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If it isn't your thing, if you don't agree with it, why post or peruse or whatever.
Or why spend months upon months re-editing EVERY single Star Wars movie to fit "Your vision" and then spread it all around the internet, like the guy spending all this time, energy and promotional effort trimming and cutting a finished piece of work getting to hang out with Lucas and McCallum. I wonder how strongly he voiced his opinion directly to them, or if he just emailed them a couple links to the threads where he derides and belittles their filmmaking and storytelling qualities in great detail. Now if he came back here and said he HAD done so, THEN I'd be like "oooh" and "aaaah." that's something I'd respect the hell out of. but hell, that Empire magazine quote is so generic, to say it's MagnoliaFan's edit he's talking about is iffy.
I know he hung out at the premiere and talked to them there, but that's all I know. Hell, if some nutbag fan told ME he was at home diligently re-editing movies to distribute to the 1/1000th of the fanbase geeky enough to seek out fanmade alternate edits of finished films, I'm sure I'd smile and nod and send them an appreciative word before I moved onto the next drink and next handshake, too. I mean, how close ARE his ties? Really? I don't think they're THAT close that Rick and George would just be like "ha hahaha so cute" and pat him on the head and then give him another check or something. Sure, I could be wrong, and I probably am, looking at how confidently he speaks on the matter, but I've been hosed on the internet before
But even looking at the statements, they're just vague and wishy washy enough that it's left open to interpretation. speaking of which:
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As far as I know, they've seen "Balance of the Force" and "The Phantom Edit".
I think they liked it
or they could have been paying you lip service because you were nice to them when you met them. who knows.
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Remember, a good chunk of the original Star Wars was born through George's re-editing of old war films to use as an animatic. He was doing re-edits before it was trendy
Let's not spin it too harshly. Lucas didn't distribute his early student editing exercises, either. and his re-editing of war films as an animatic isn't "a re-edit" because he then went in and CREATED SOMETHING NEW out of those early guide tracks. There's a shared similarity, but it's not even close enough to claim its the same thing. I mean, honestly, can anyone here REALLY argue with this statement over at the MF thread we're all so busy burning in effigy?
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As do so many of the "I could do it better" crowd, you completely miss the point.
It doesn't matter whether you say these are the only versions, the better versions, the more satisfying versions, blah blah blah. These aren't your films. You didn't write them, didn't cast them, didn't direct them, didn't produce them. Because YOU'RE happy with your fanboy edit doesn't mean that I'm any more interested in seeing them re-edited than I am in seeing a new fanboy edit of 2001, Jaws, Psycho, Godfather II or ANY other movie, for that matter.
It's nice to have hobbies. But if you're looking for a pat on the head for having them, you'll have to produce something original first.
Where's the argument there? What in that statement is out of place? For that statement is one of the issues at the heart of why people at that, and many other messageboards, dont' give MagFan any slack: He'd get a hell of a lot more respect if he did something CREATIVE and ORIGINAL with those talents an energies, instead of doing something DESTRUCTIVE and REPETITIVE.
Plus, a lot of people still have problems with the creative choices he made as far as storytelling goes, because most of it feels just as empty and hollow as people who didn't like the prequels thought the theatrical releases were. It's just empty and hollow in a different direction. It has the stink of poorly thought out "Fanboy cool" all over em.
But like McCallum said, you gotta give him a hand for being as dedicated as he is. But that's about all I'm giving him a hand for. I'm not saying that to be extra-snide or anything. I really do appreciate that he put that much effort into it. I'm just certain I'd appreciate it more if it was its own thing.