Continuing on with the changes I’ve made (small though they may be), we head to the next scene. A.K.A. Palpatine’s office.
When I worked on v1, I cut out the last two shots of this scene. They are of Mace Windu telling Padme that he’ll contact Obi-Wan Kenobi at once. In the last shot, Padme thanks Mace Windu as Palpatine looks at Padme. When I first removed it, I was applying the “enter late, cut out early” rule used by the Phantom Editor a little too much. At the time, I thought these last two shots were pointless and didn’t advance anything. So I didn’t think about things like pacing or giving the scene some time to breathe. The scene would end with Palpatine saying, “The thought of losing you… is unbearable.” And then the scene would end abruptly.
And I mean abruptly, because any way I sliced it, the transition to the next scene was awkward. The more I’ve looked at these two shots, the more natural the scene feels with those two shots reinstated back in the film rather than on the cutting room floor. They’re not my favorite shots from the movie, but they weren’t as pointless as I originally thought.
Moving to the next scene, I’ve decided to add two more shots to Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Padme’s reunion scene. Now from the start, this scene was bad. Really bad. For me, this was the scene that spelled out what the rest of the movie was gonna be like. I cut out a lot of stuff from that scene, and with good reason. However, I might’ve cut out a little too much.
In my version, Padme tells Anakin and Obi-Wan she wants to know who’s trying to kill her. Obi-Wan responds with “We’re here to protect you, Senator. Not to start an investigation.” Then, I skipped ahead to Padme saying, “Perhaps with merely your presence, the mystery surrounding this threat will be revealed.”
End scene.
Once again, as in the previous scene, I feel I applied the “enter late, cut out early” rule a little too much. I’ve decided to add in two more shots to this scene. The first shot is a reaction shot of Panaka:
In the theatrical version, there was a shot of Panaka reacting negatively to Anakin and Obi-Wan’s little spat. I deleted that little spat, and consequently removed this shot as well. For v2, however, I added this shot in after Obi-Wan says that they’re here to protect Padme. The implication being that Panaka really wants the jedi to find the assassin, and is disappointed that they’re not. It isn’t an extremely important detail, but it gives Padme some time before she says her line.
The next shot I’ve reinserted is this one:
Just to be clear, this shot is still much shorter than it was originally. All I’ve added back in is Padme’s line, “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I will retire.” Everyone gets up, and then we cut to the next scene. I think these changes coincide with Walter Murch’s advice from “In the Blink of an Eye” in that they’re being re-inserted to enhance the emotion of the scenes. Episode II was the hardest movie to edit, and for that reason, I had way more going on in my mind than pacing, so it took a back seat for v1. Fortunately, for v2, I’m able to go back and fix some of these tinier issues that can affect the overall experience.