I've seen and done edits that are clean and as carefully done as possible, but are working from sources which aren't as good (or are indeed horrible). If that material is what you're working with, that's what you've got. Then again, if you're working from DVD quality sources and your cut still looks like crap, I can see a demerit on that. =)
I'm not as big a fan of edits that take a bad movie or a good movie and just screw with it to get their own ideas in. Although yeah, I did a Phantom Edit too, once upon a time. My favorite fan edits are edits that have their own new ideas and bring something new to the table. I love the fan documentary format which you don't see a lot of - Building Empire being a great example ...
I also like the "Director's Cut" sort of DVD ... or a cut that shows what the movie was intended to be during shooting ... That either creates the movie the way the director really intended originally, or exposes and gives a greater understanding to the released cut. I can see why the Willard Ratman Cut didn't get high marks, but I give that edit points because it's a director's cut which wouldn't otherwise exist on DVD. I think that the Ratman cut needed to be done, because Willard had been hacked a bit to get a PG-13, and this restored the true version that should have been on DVD anyway. Director's cuts rule.
A great fan edit should make you think, in a perfect world this would be the DVD. Movies get compromised by the Hollywood system, filmmakers lose their power or get too much power and aren't able or willing to put out the films the way they should be. I'm interested in the Star Wars fan edit as a corrective to the power trip of George Lucas, how he hasn't given the original trilogy the love it deserves, etc., imagining how a DVD would have been done right THEN. I'm also interested in the fan edit that gives the power back to a filmmaker whose vision was compromised by studio politics. He doesn't have the power, and his version ought to be on DVD but isn't. So you make that version. That interests me more than reediting Return of the Jedi to make Luke's saber blue and cut out Yoda for some reason. (A joke, but the equivalent of this seems to be done with the prequels on a roughly daily basis.)
As a filmmaker, I think that every edit should respect the director's intention on some level ... I kind of cringe a little when I see people editing films in ways that aren't what the director EVER intended. I mean, you could be doing an edit that the director would hate you for doing NOW, but which he'd have loved back THEN, and that's cool with me .... but yeah, even the lamest directors kind of deserve to be treated with some respect. When you say, oh, I've taken Wedding Crashers and taken out Will Ferrell's character and it WORKS SO MUCH BETTER NOW ... I just say what? I'm making that example up, of course, but there are lots of edits where I just say, well, that's not what they ever intended. Anyone, at any stage of the production. What truth is there in that edit? There's no truth in that, you've just cut a character out. You haven't exposed any reality about the making of the film or polished it to a more perfect state.
Or if you tackle a movie that no one cares about, and make an edit no one cares about. Yeah, great, you edited Jeepers Creepers. Good job. (Apologies if anyone's actually edited Jeepers Creepers.)
I do like the idea of Batman & Robin Deassified, though I didn't see it. Because that's, well, that movie isn't a Batman movie, and if not for Hollywood bullshit, they might have gotten a real director and made a real Batman movie, so you try to make a real Batman movie out of it.
But y'know, The Phantom Batman Reloaded & Robin ain't never gonna be good. I mean, these are bad movies. They're never gonna REALLY be good.
Anyway.
About the covers.
I didn't enter this, but to me it looked like the cost and time to get proper copies of ALL my recent edits to all those judges would have been a little tough anyway. Having to send that many copies of that many edits with printed cover art too? Jeez, I never send out my edits with printed cover art. And I've gotten good at sending out a lot of copies. I can't imagine how starting-out editors would feel.
Why not judge the cover art on the damn JPEGS, as they are? Posted on the web? This is a WEBsite, isn't it?