Community Focus Thread 1: The Phantom Menace — Page 7

EddieDean said:
4) The structure of the ending. It has to deliver the lowest lows followed by the highest highs, which is mainly an issue of ordering. (And personally I’d treat the Gungans as the least important plot there, so maybe cutting that down would be my second major trim.)

I personally like l8wrtr’s approach to the ending, although I think a few things needed better timing (Such as the way Padme’s failure is handled, which I feel should’ve been moved closer to the finish). Naturally, I tweaked it for v3 of my edit and divided it into its own three-act structure, complete with a lowest point followed by a highest point. Here’s my arrangement for those who want the rundown:

Setup
Gungan army intro
Palace siege intro
Space battle intro
Gungan battle begins
Darth Maul intro
Destroyer droid obstacle
Lightsaber battle begins
Anakin enters the ship

Conflict part I
Gungan battle continues
Lightsaber fight continues
“We don’t have time for this, captain.”
Anakin enters the battle
Jedi get separated

Conflict part II
Gungans retreat
Padme gets captured
Qui-Gon dies
Gungans surrender
Anakin gets hit
Obi-Wan fights Darth Maul
Padme meets Nute Gunray (With Padme’s comeback deleted)

Ending
Darth Maul dies
Anakin destroys the control ship
Gungans celebrate

EddieDean said:

Omni said:

• If you, like me, wish to remove both the moment that the fake Queen orders Padmé to go clean R2 and the scene where she actually is cleaning him and meets Jar Jar, you only miss two things:

1. The first part of a small subplot where Panaka gets impatient/distrustful with the Jedi
2. Padmé’s name.

The first one doesn’t matter very much, is arguably even good since there’s no payoff anyway, but the second one can be a big problem. We’d only learn her name when Anakin seeks her out in Coruscant before he’s rejected by the Jedi, which is a bit too late for us to gain a degree of intimacy we should already have with her character.

Here’s a thought - what if we just cut the first scene, but preserve the second? What if Padmé’s cleaning R2 just because she feels like it, rather than being ordered? She’s Queen, so she can do as she pleases, and she’s not exactly busy with official business. This way, one of the first things she’d do when given a bit of liberty is choose to clean up a little robot - hinting at both her humility and compassion (similar to Rey with BB8) and her interest in droids (and perhaps mechanics).

One of the weaker plot points in the prequels is Padmé and Anakin’s romance, and one of the weaker plot points in TPM is the connection that Padmé and Anakin seem to develop that isn’t exactly well explored on screen. But if she has a natural interest in droids (and mechanics), that could help show why she’s drawn to Anakin when she sees he’s built (or repaired) his own, C-3PO. It’s arguably one of the better scenes relating to their character development together in this film (as much as people tend to skip it because it’s world-shrinking). And showing her compassion (plus highlighting it in the crawl, if you like) also shows why she’s drawn to a boy who acts so selflessly.

That works really well. You don’t even need to lose the other scene - just trim Padme being ordered to clean R2.

Man, I was just writing almost the exact same post on my phone while at the vet’s, but didn’t finish it in time. But suffice to say, I completely agree.

I think it would have to be both or neither for the two options on the red and blue dice. At least part of the explanation could be dubbed in Huttese and subtitled, but the central line needs to be in English otherwise it would stick out a bit.

I don’t think huttese is an option for this scene. Qui-Gon doesn’t speak huttese, Watto is only talking in huttese when he is talking to Anakin.

Damn, you’re right.

There is the really dirty option to just trim the reaction shot of maul. Its the only shot the blood is in, you could easily shorten it by a second and skip the blood. You would only need to fix the audio afterwards to get rid of mauls grunt when the saber hits him. That could be a little tricky, but not really time consuming. At worst you would have to redo the saber-slashing sound effect and find a clean recording of the score.

Peter Pan said:

There is the really dirty option to just trim the reaction shot of maul. Its the only shot the blood is in, you could easily shorten it by a second and skip the blood. You would only need to fix the audio afterwards to get rid of mauls grunt when the saber hits him. That could be a little tricky, but not really time consuming. At worst you would have to redo the saber-slashing sound effect and find a clean recording of the score.

I’d just move the audio forwards so that it starts at what is now the beginning of the trimmed shot, then shave the difference off the end of the audio sometime before whatever the next SFX is (Obi-Wan deactivating the saber, I think).

CaptainFaraday said:

Peter Pan said:

There is the really dirty option to just trim the reaction shot of maul. Its the only shot the blood is in, you could easily shorten it by a second and skip the blood. You would only need to fix the audio afterwards to get rid of mauls grunt when the saber hits him. That could be a little tricky, but not really time consuming. At worst you would have to redo the saber-slashing sound effect and find a clean recording of the score.

I’d just move the audio forwards so that it starts at what is now the beginning of the trimmed shot, then shave the difference off the end of the audio sometime before whatever the next SFX is (Obi-Wan deactivating the saber, I think).

I’d do it the same way if it wasn’t for Maul’s grunt after he is hit, sadly it overlaps with the SFX of the saber.

I’d add more blood, trailing as he falls. And getting on the floor, maybe dripping down the pit while Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon talk. Lightsabers might be able to cauterize a hand being cut off, but not someone being totally bisected like that. Maybe some organs come out.

Hal 9000 said:

I’d add more blood, trailing as he falls. And getting on the floor, maybe dripping down the pit while Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon talk. Lightsabers might be able to cauterize a hand being cut off, but not someone being totally bisected like that. Maybe some organs come out.

I think that would make it R

[/sarcasm]

RogueLeader said:

Also, a thought regarding the ending. I know the four different plot lines in the climax was a problem discussed even during the editing of the actual film. To help solve this, I wonder if you could “resolve” the Gungan battle before our heroes split up in the hangar. It could play out like this:

• When the Gungan battle starts, maybe have it play out up until the droids breach their shields. This would play out as sort of extended opening for the “climax” of the movie.
• Then we cut to our heroes sneaking into the city. This way our heroes are making their move when the droid army is already stuck in battle.
• Have the Gungans begin their retreat before our heroes split up in the hangar. This would be enough to consider this plot line “concluded” in the audiences’ minds I think.
• Cut Jar Jar’s extended antics while he is trying to escape the army.
• We could briefly cut back to the aftermath of the battle and show Jar Jar surrounded when we need to show our heroes at their lowest point.

Following from this, I wonder if there’re any lines we could use to have the people in the hangar hear that the Gungans have been overwhelmed, especially so that Anakin learns it. He’d already know that the plan was to send Naboo pilots up to the droid control ship, but it’d be good for his character if learning that the Gungans are in jeopardy is also a factor in his decision to try and help.

Edit: Or even Padmé, actually. What if the Gungans get captured, Padmé gets captured, and even the pilots in space start failing, and Anakin hears it all from his cockpit (presumably over the comms, with a bit of radio-like audio?), and THEN he gets on up there to help out?

Hal 9000 said:

I’d add more blood, trailing as he falls. And getting on the floor, maybe dripping down the pit while Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon talk. Lightsabers might be able to cauterize a hand being cut off, but not someone being totally bisected like that. Maybe some organs come out.

I appreciate that some here want full gore while others want minimal/no gore, but maybe there’s a middle ground that can satisfy everyone: We could have blood and organs spilling from only one half of the cut, whilst the other half of the cut looks fine.

sade1212 said:

Does anyone have any inkling as to how I might be able to get my hands on Secior’s edit or the original Phantom Edit? I’ve had no luck with the .info site or other searches and these editors are not active online anywhere as far as I can see.

You can find the Phantom Edit on Pirate Bay, as a DVD ISO file. The Phantom Editor’s accompanying AOTC edit is also included with that file.

I’m pretty sure Secior’s edit is still available on fanedit.info, but you need to use JDownloader to unpack the files there. Details are on the site.

darth-gary said:

Years ago I attempted an edit of TPM. I never finished it, but I remember doing a very simple edit in the beginning that seemed to work quite well. It was the scene following the ship blowing up in the hangar and the Jedi reacting to it. Gas is pumped into the room and the Jedi hold their breath. Cut to “Sir… they’ve gone up the ventilation shaft.” This would omit the inane line “They must be dead by now, destroy what’s left of them”, chopping through droids like butter, Qui-Gon trying to burn a hole through the blast doors, and the lightning fast down the hall move when evading the destroyer droids which is never used again. They emerge in the main hangar bay and Qui-Gon says “Battle droids.”, as if confirming a suspicion out loud rather than seeming surprised at seeing lots of battle droids even though they just fought a dozen or so of them a minute earlier with the scene intact. The Jedi kicking ass is then saved for a later scene when they’re trying to free the Queen from the droid escort on Naboo.

This is brilliant, great short cut. Though I don’t know how well this would play into the amidala=Death Star plans angle.
But regardless of that I really like this idea.

Peter Pan said:

darth-gary said:

Years ago I attempted an edit of TPM. I never finished it, but I remember doing a very simple edit in the beginning that seemed to work quite well. It was the scene following the ship blowing up in the hangar and the Jedi reacting to it. Gas is pumped into the room and the Jedi hold their breath. Cut to “Sir… they’ve gone up the ventilation shaft.” This would omit the inane line “They must be dead by now, destroy what’s left of them”, chopping through droids like butter, Qui-Gon trying to burn a hole through the blast doors, and the lightning fast down the hall move when evading the destroyer droids which is never used again. They emerge in the main hangar bay and Qui-Gon says “Battle droids.”, as if confirming a suspicion out loud rather than seeming surprised at seeing lots of battle droids even though they just fought a dozen or so of them a minute earlier with the scene intact. The Jedi kicking ass is then saved for a later scene when they’re trying to free the Queen from the droid escort on Naboo.

This is brilliant, great short cut. Though I don’t know how well this would play into the amidala=Death Star plans angle.
But regardless of that I really like this idea.

Yeah, Darth Gary, I think that’s really clean. Segues nicely from a threat to an opportunity that the Jedi exploit, to trim what feels extraneous when all that needs to happen for the Jedi on the separatist ship is for them to realise it won’t be a negotiation because the Trade Federation are fully hostile.

And Peter Pan, there’s no specific output we’re aiming to achieve here, so my Padmé-as-Death-Star-plans idea is only one idea amongst many! My ideas don’t hold any extra weight just because I made the thread! ☺️ We should explore as much as possible.

I’m generally a bit eh on fan films, but I will say, that one has absolutely incredible fight choreography.