The next scenes in the movie involve discussions at
The skywalker den
the skywalker dinner table
Anakin's room
Pod Race hangars
Wattos junkshop
Obiwan in the ship (a scene we have moved to earlier in the script)
and of course in the original cut there were scenes with neimodians, sidious and maul (all of which I think are being removed for this edit)
Then , Bam, the podrace.
I think it's easy to say that this began as the slowest part for the movie the first time that I saw it. I couldn't believe how long we were kept on tatooine hanging out with anakin's friends, watchig quigon mack on shmi, and the wonderful antics of jar jar binks. As trooperman stated, the use of SLOW MOTION scenes is not necessary, however, my idea is to take certain scenes or movements from the actors and "slow" the movement of the action down a bit. So instead of a quick head turn from a character, it would be a smooth head turn, just has a more dramatic visual......you'll see what I mean. Hopefully it can be accomplished to the point where it won't even be noticed that the shot is slowed down.....just so that the shot looks "better" somehow. We will really need it in the edit so that we can make performances from scenes that weren't there originally. For instance I would love to try and craft a scene of anakin staring a darth maul for a few seconds as he begins to fight the jedi in the hangar.
Therefore, there is ALOT to fix with the next 30-40 minutes of the movie. I'm going to discuss a few scenes and some ideas I have for trimming them up or making them better.
Last time that we let off in the script Anakin was leading his friends through the sandstorm into their hut.
-Show the clip of them entering the house, anakin shaking the dust off and cut the clip right before "mom, mom i'm home". Add in an audio clip of shmi saying "anakin?" (from the "anakin its your bedtime" scene).
-Cut to shot of her turning around the corner with anakins audio of "These are my friends, mom".
-Cut to shot of quigon introducing himself (for the first time)
"I'm qui-gon gin"
-Then cut to a full screen shot of Qui-Gon "your son was kind enough to offer us shelter"
-NOW, cut to scene of the sandstorm outside and a quick cut to the dinner scene right after.
I feel that this connects the moment more smoothly. I'd like to save the scene with anakin, padme, and 3p0 for AFTER dinner sometime. It would feel more interesting if they got to the plot of what to do a lot faster than the original cut portrayed. Who feels like bobbing along with anakin to the next room? We want to see what Qui-Gon is going to do, is he going to hang out? What plan does he have? That is what the dinner scene will reveal.
-For the dinner scene, I think it would be beneficial to borrow several cuts that Magfan made with his edit. He created a VERY smooth cut for the scene, however, there is one thing that I thought could be elaborated on.
When it gets to the point where anakin looks at qui-gon and says " your a jedi knight arn't you?" (add in a little bit of that "magical" sounding Star wars music)
-Take the shot of qui-gon looking up at him and use the "slow down" method so it appears that he's a little more shocked by the statement.
-Cut back to anakin looking seriously at Qui-Gon
-Cut back to shot of quigon continuing "what makes you think that?"
-Cut to shot of anakin "I saw your lazer sword" , cut out "only jedi carry that kind of weapon".
-Shot of qui "perhaps I killed a jedi and took it from him".
-Cut to a quick response from anakin " No one can kill a jedi". Cut out, "i don't think so".
-Cut to the shot of Shmi sighing and looking down
-Cut back to Qui-gon "I wish that were so"
Then I would play the rest of the scene out as MagFan has editted. I will post the details of that a little later in script form so that it can be read smoothly. But those are a couple of quicky's I had to spice up the moment a bit.
After dinner, I would try throwing in the 3PO scene.
-Cut to shot of artoo rolling into the room
-Remove all dialouge from the beginning of the scene, it looks better with the visual of anakin removing the cloak off of 3po with music playing through it. Since the characters heads are turned away, you can't even see them talking. Therefore you can remove all of the banter between anakin and padme for the beginning.
-Start the dialouge off with "he's a protocal droid to help mom"
-Cut out "watch"
-Show anakin pushing the button, 3po clicks awake. I think that most, if not all, of 3po's dialouge should be changed for this scene. There is plent of material to go through in the radio dramas (which I need to look into) and should create 3po to be a little more "bitchy" about not having an eye, not being able to walk properly, and of course meeting the rust bucket R2 for the first time. Their meeting should have been funnier, why was it not funny at all?
-As 3po sits up , show the shot of anakin reching for the other eye socket , cut out the "whoops" and clip the scene before he goes "yeah".
-After 3po gets up, show the scene of anakin mentioned "when the storm is over, i'll show you my racer". Cut out " i'm building a pod race".
-And of course an attempt at new dialouge between r2 and 3po would be a nice change. Considering there is no visual reaction between either one of them, this could be accomplished.
Now, there are scenes involving the nemoidians and the sith. I have been told that since sidious is not a part of this movie, the nemoidians will have to be the "break away" from the tatooine scenes. Hence, here is the dilemma for this part of the script. We HAVE to get off of tattoine for a moment. We have been on the desert planet one scene after the next. Since we can't use the scene of Darth maul talking with sidious, or the hologram scene with the sith and nemoidians............we're kind of at a loss for other story to expand upon at this moment. However, nothing is set in stone, scenes can be arranged whereever they can be. Maybe we could show the scene of Nute Gunray with sio bibble (old grey haired guy) on Naboo. Either way, I feel we need a transition very soon in the script to get elsewhere in the story.
Now we have the scene with Qui-Gon making the "deal" with watto.
-I think that watto should have a theme to play with his presence. Perhaps something a little demanding, like Jabba's music....just to add a bit of intimidation to the character.
-There are plenty of weird reaction shots from anakin that should be removed. The boy just makes the weirdest looks in this scene. Kinda frumpy, I don't know how to explain it. I would also use the music as a tool in the scene. For instance, when quigon shoots out his proposal, have the music shift so that it grabs attention of the dialouge.
-There seems to be plenty of steam blowing around in the background......but not enough sound effects for it. Perhaps we should add some more "noise" to the room to flesh out the environment more.
-I would also cut out any shots that make Watto look like a cartoon character. There are plent of "over exagerrated" performances from the animators that could be tamed....for this scene and plenty others.
Then there is the introduction of Darth Maul. Since Mathasslet and CC have fleshed out this character more. I'll probably wait for CC to comment on how they wanted to execute any scenes with darth maul. I know that they are trying to meld Maul and Grevious together........but I'm not sure how they are going to accomplish that, therefore, I will wait for their comments before exploring that aspect.
The scene with Qui-Gon talking to Shmi out on the "porch".
-I would use the Magfan format on this as well, which involves cutting out discussion of his "father". Talk about a subplot that was NEVER resolved in the trilogy. As qui-gon is ending his transmission with obi wan , it is halted after qui-gon says "a ship without a power supply isn't going to get us anywhere". End transmission. I feel that has a better flow than mentioning "theres something about this boy".......then hanging up in obiwans face right as he was onto a revelation. Keep their situation the same, they have to try this crazy pod race idea because it is the ONLY one that they have. However, I would take that line from qui gon "theres something about this boy" and saving it for later in the film. Perhaps in the jedi council scene? Or perhaps like this:
Ext. Naboo ship. Naboo troops are hauling the generator and equipment into the ship
Quigon- "and now i'm going back , I have some unfinished business"
Cut to shot of obiwan with audio from quigon "theres something about this boy"
Obi wan- "yes master"
Cut to quigon- "get this hyperdrive installed"
Obiwan- "it shouldn't take long"
That is a possible way to trim THAT scene into a more fitting Master/Apprentice dialouge. I always hated the idea that obiwan would refer to poor slave child who won them their ticket out of their as a "another pathetic life form". It's just pointless. ObiWan is one of the best padawans in the jedi order, he does NOT have a "pathetic lifeforms category".
Back to earlier in the script with Anakin turning on the podracer. First I would cut the whole sequence with the ugly children running up to tell anakin he's going to be "bug squat". Do you think we should cut the scene of Jar Jar fumbling with the wrench and getting shocked? It is a little funny and the movie could use SOME comic relief (considering we're cutting out all of the 4 year old humor from the film). I would take out "ITS WORKING, ITS WORKING!". But it wouldn't hurt to leave it in, its not THAT bad. I havn't worked out all of the details for this scene or the "waking up" scene. I don't think I want the "waking up" scene anyway, just bad performance from Jake and Natalie. I know there was an idea of anakin having a "foreshadow" dream at this point........however I didn't really get into that idea. I didn't like the idea of looking at images from the next 2 movies while your watching the first one, WAY too confusing for a first time viewer. It also makes it feel like a fan edit as in "real time" the footage for the other movies would not have been filmed yet.
The Pod Race- lets get to that a little later.
-After the podrace we have the scene with watto and quigon, which is pretty good all the way through. I don't really have any problems. Adding some music to the scene will put some character into it. I'll look at it again and see if there is any dialouge that can be trimmed down.
-When quigon is going back with anakin to their house I would cut out the dialouge they have "these are yours"...."YES!". Just music and the image of him handing the boy his prize.
-I think that the "goodbye" sequence could be altered. I'll save some detail for my next post, however there is too much "back and forth" emotion going on. Anakin is just bouncing all around the place.... "look at the money i won"...."I'm free? Did you hear that?" ....."Yipee"......"I want to do it mom, its what i've always dreamed of"......."what about mom, can't she come"......."i don't want to leave".......back and forth. The intention of the scene is to show, not a 9 year old boy, but a very wise young "jedi-to-be" deciding at a critical point in his life if he should stay with his mom, or follow the adventure. I'm going to work on this scene this weekend using dialouge from anakin and shmi's Tone Poem and see what I can pull together. I would also like to trim the official "good bye scene outside". I'm thinking of cutting right to the point where anakin is hugging his mom before he leaves and the silent looks that they give each other........then "don't look back"........."don't look back"..........then anakin walks off with quigon. We need to cut the scene of him walking off, then running back to her saying he can't leave AGAIN. Back and forth.
-how about cutting the entire "good bye 3po" scene? Is this really necessary? What can we salvage from it?
-Then we need to add in the probe droid deleted scene.
-Darth Maul vs. Qui-gon
-"Anakin skywalker, this is obiwan kenobi"......cut to "pleasure to meet you"..... cut out the "your a jedi TOO?"
-Then they fly off of tattoine and the story moves on.
Now I know that there is alot of detail to work out for all of these scenes. But I thought it would be a good idea to recap all of the ideas and see what other comments you guys can come up with. Let the brain storming begin and I will get to working on a Script version of the scenes. Let's not be afraid to swap dialouge, add/subtract music, add sound effects, decolorization..........these are the tools we have. I'll be back after a little more brainstorming.
darthpreston