I wonder if you downloaded the early version that was once on FE rather than the "finished" version? It's certainly a lot less rough now.
About the centre channel: unfortunately there is no way (as far as I know) of removing the music. I just spent lots of hours trying to get it sounding the best I could. It's not perfect but I think it's mostly OK.
Overview of Edit:
None of the Phantom Menace fan edits I’ve seen have gone far enough. Jar Jar is either still really annoying or so side-lined that he serves no purpose at all. The Federation remain bumbling and ineffective villains, and there is a lack of tension and excitement. This isn't the fault of the fan editors, of course, but to fix a movie this terrible something more radical is required.
So when I watched Trooperman’s Episode 2 edit “Shroud of the Dark Side”, which radically altered the tone of the movie through new music and re-dubbing of certain characters, I was inspired to try something similar with Episode 1. Using these techniques I wanted to evoke that “classic Star Wars feel” so glaringly absent from the Lucas version.
The first major change was to re-score most of the movie. Adding pieces from the Original Trilogy goes a long way to making TPM feel more like a Star Wars movie.
I also wanted to make Jar Jar an effective humorous foil for the humor-deficient Jedi, so I dubbed him into an alien language and added subtitles. He is now more cynical, world-weary and tagging along with the Jed to save his own neck.
The Trade Federation have also been redubbed. Instead of bumbling and ridiculous, with their Asian accents, they now sound and act like menacing alien threats. Much more worthy antagonists.
In addition, removing the other Gungans deDisneyfies the movie, and makes it feel less like a dated CGI cartoon.
Key Changes:
- Tons of musical changes throughout, largely from the OT
- Jar Jar is the only Gungan
- The Trade Federation and Jar Jar are both subbed and dubbed
- The space battle happens when the Queen leaves Naboo
Quick note: an early version of this edit was released on FE under the subtitle "Lone Gungan Edition". It was way rough and in hindsight not ready for release.
This version is significantly tightened up and slicker. So my advice for any editors out there: don't release your edit until you're 100% sure it's as good as it can be!
Hopefully this edit will be up on MySpleen sometime today.
Or you can PM me for the links.
DuracellEnergizer said:
I don't think I'm at all interested in seeing this movie anymore.
It's worth watching. Just don't expect coherent plotting. Or coherent characters. Or coherent themes. Or coherent science.
Or you could skip it.
Yeah I would recommend to the kind souls doing the cleanup job that they not change anything, and leave it to the fan editors to play around with.
Part 1 is fun, but part 2 is a lot better.
This is an incredible piece of work. For me possibly the best fanedit I have ever seen. So inventive, so funny, at least 4 or 5 moments of pure genius.
I won't get into spoiler specifics, but seriously, you need to watch this!
/hyperbole
Great work! The ANH deleted scene in particular looks so much better. Really impressed.
Yeah that cut to Leia was something I had to add - when I watched the edit without the cut to Leia's face it made me laugh out loud, kinda like how Anakin's wet dream in Ep2 made people laugh. A "bad laugh". Vader says "especially - " and then stops, and just doesn't say anything for a pregnant pause... and then Luke attacks him for no reason.
Cutting out the brother-sister plot is great, IMO, except that one moment. It's not that I hate the brother-sister plot, but I thought in an edit about the father and son it's better to cut out the brother sister stuff.
Cool that you liked the father-son stuff - some of the new scenes were based on an incredibly limited amount of usable footage, and some of the composite work is horrible and needs to be redone, but I like the edit overall despite the flaws.
Thanks for the review, and I'm glad you enjoyed it.
A couple of quick points: your idea of making the sandstorm scene look like probe droid footage is interesting, although I'm still holding out hope that all the Jedi deleted scenes will be cleaned up (this edit won't be released until that happens). Re: the different source types - that's something that needs ironing out. It's the same source but there are a couple of shots of Vader which have been zoomed in too far to cut out stuff that shouldn't be in frame, so it ends up making it look wacky like that. It was done in a hurry, and is the kind of stuff I'd fix up before this edit was properly released.
The thing with Harmy's edition is that it's in NTSC so I'd need to convert it to PAL to match up with the rest of the edit - and whenever I try and do NTSC-PAL conversions they always end up "jittery" for some reason.
Did you think the increased emphasis on the father/son conflict worked?
Cool - thanks a lot!
I'll answer the points one at a time:
"I like the new crawl, but I’m not sure how I feel about the movie opening on a shot of empty space. The lack of a ship is very evident, but is really unavoidable when the next scene takes place on Dagobah. I like the idea of Luke completing his training before going to recue Han, but visually, it feels very much like a fan edit."
I'm on the fence about starting the film on Dagobah, but this edit is all about the father-son conflict, so starting with Luke asking Yoda about his parentage, then cutting to Vader, and then back to Luke was a way to get the main theme into the first scene (scriptwriting 101). Highlighting the father-son conflict was also why the lightsaber scene HAD to be in this edit, although I'm sure it would work better as Luke's introduction in the film.
"The sandstorm scene is very interesting. I had no idea that some of the audio in the final cut was lifted from this scene. I think the briefing room scene is edited well, with the sandstorm scene in mind (the heroes have already had their kiss and cuddle on Tattooine, so no need to have another in front of the other rebels). I really hope this deleted scene can be cleaned up somehow"
The original audio in the sandstorm scene is totally unusable - I took the audio from the space scene that replaced it in the film. I much prefer the sandstorm scene though, and I think the way I changed the order of the scenes "fixes" the pacing problem that made Lucas scrap it in the first place.
"I love the new shot of the Tydirium entering Endor. It really adds to the feeling of the rebels sneaking into the lion’s den (so to speak)."
Totally agree. It adds a cinematic moment that really helps the film.
"I’m in two minds over Vader’s force-choke of Jerjerrod. It is a nice little reminder of Vader’s intolerance of his underlings (after his killing spree in ESB, we could certainly use a few more scenes like this in RotJ!) But, on the other hand, I am a little unsure of Jerjerrod’s motivations. Does he get some kind of pleasure out of butting heads with Vader? Together with Jerjerrod’s reluctance to fire on Endor, you can almost see a sub-plot involving his ‘good guy’ personality – but this maybe doesn’t came across as well as it should do. As such, it may be better simply to leave these scenes on the cutting room floor for the sake of pacing."
Yeah I agree that Jerjerrod's motivations are a little unclear, but it seems like he's trying to compete with Vader for the Emperor's attention. I like the idea of trying to add to Vader's internal conflict about Luke, but it doesn't come across as well as I'd like. Still, him choking a minion is pure Star Wars, so it'll probably stay in.
"The new shots of the Endor battle between the rebel Commandos and Stormies give a very chaotic feel, akin to the final shots of the Droid vs Clones battle on Geonosis in AotC. They are well done, but I’m not too sure if they really fit into the visual style of RotJ. I’m probably being a little biased here, as I have never liked action shots done entirely in close-ups."
I hadn't thought of the Geonosis comparison for that scene, but yeah, it definitely feels like that. I agree with both your criticisms, but I wanted to show the stormtroopers being all hardcore, and that's the only footage I could find that fit at all. I'm not sure how well mixing the forest battle works with Jerjerrod telling the TIE bombers to napalm the forest, but I'm keeping it. Beats Ewok traps anyway.
Again, thanks for the comments.
Hey Bester,
Glad to read you enjoyed the edit. I agree that it's fairly conservative - it was supposed to cut the stuff I didn't like rather than change the tone, or do anything more ambitious.
After you watch the experimental cut, if you could let me know what you think of it I'll be really grateful. Personally that's my current 'go to cut', but I doubt many people would agree.
In another OT thread 'silverwheel' explained perfectly why it should be Sebastian Shaw, better than I ever could:
"It ruined one of the most powerful lessons of the series. The ghost of Old Anakin symbolized that while he could not undo the many terrible things he had done, he could still make amends and seek forgiveness. Old Anakin symbolized a wasted lifetime. Hayden's ghost basically gives the character a free pass. Plus, Old Anakin fits with what we had just seen in the movie - a tired old man trapped in an iron lung, desperately wanting to get out. Now, in death, he has his release. The notion that his ghost can just "go back" makes no sense, literally or metaphorically."
I had to google Half Dome to get what you meant, but yeah I think you're right, it's probably better without that shot.
Random thoughts while watching the rough cut:
I like the idea of the opening scene but as the main characters aren't included I think it needs to be a lot shorter, something more reminiscent of the first scene of Empire
I like Yoda handing Luke the green crystal for his lightsaber
I'd cut the exposition scene of the droids walking to the palace, cut from deleted scene to them getting to the big door
I fear you're biting off more than you can chew with this edit; some seriously ambitious stuff in the first few minutes that will take uber cgi and compositing skills
Jabba's 'What is it' should end with a ?
Less Salacious frikkin' Crumb would be better
I like the idea of Palps' new first scene
I'd make lots of cuts to the Jabba sequence to make it seem less kiddy, Han less lame and the whole thing a bit pacier
Interesting use of the sandstorm scene, works well
Surprised to see the Wicket/Leia scene - it's usually about the first thing editors cut
Just thinking out loud here: I wonder if there's some way to make Threepio's story to the Ewoks more cinematic, maybe with flashbacks or something
Not sure about the ROTS flashback - if one of the themes of the film is Vader wrestling with how he's been dehumanised etc, the theme should be established in act one
I don't think the Skywalkers' shuttle landing in the DS hangar bay is necessary - it reminds me of Lucas' bad changes to Empire
I like the shot of the Falcon's turret window looking out on star destroyers during the battle, although it's unclear who's in there using the gun
If you're gonna cut out ghost Anakin you should probably crop the shot so Yoda and Obi Wan are centre frame
I don't think the ending works, it doesn't really go anywhere; probably better to end on Endor
Interesting edit, gonna be a lot of work to get some of these concepts fleshed out. I'd personally choose to cut a lot more childish Jabba and Ewok stuff - but since it's well beyond two hours now I think that's possible and it'll still clock in around a couple of hours.
I also think the Fett storyline doesn't make much sense - he's in the opening scene working for the Empire, then goes to Jabba's palace, then gets his head chopped off. I still think it's best that he's not in the film, as he doesn't really do anything, and has no arc at all.
An idea off the top of my head: there are a couple of fan films with decent footage of Mandalorians attacking stormtroopers in a forest, so what if somehow the rebels paid the Mandalorians to fight for them as mercenaries (think: the ghosts fighting for Aragorn in ROTK) and during the battle Fett died as a kind of anti-hero, then he would have an arc that could work. But I imagine that would be better in a non-Ewok cut.
Anyway, good luck!
Exactly what I was going for. ;)
To me it's supposed to indicate to the audience that stormtroopers are all over Endor, hence the rebels are walking into a really dangerous place - which increases the drama, (as does the fact the stormtrooper watches the shuttle land somewhere clearly off the beaten track and not where Imperial troops would have landed). It also hints at the idea that the Empire know that all about the rebel mission - something later confirmed by the Emperor.
It also works because it has a cinematic quality and scale to it which ROTJ largely lacked... and is mostly why I like it.
Ronster, I'm glad you enjoyed the edit. I agree that it's a little short, but I think the pacing is pretty good throughout, and at the time (it was about a year ago I was originally working on it) there weren't any deleted scenes and I didn't realise that there were fan films that had usable footage.
Re: your edit. Sure, it sounds interesting, I'd like to take a look at it.
Darth_Ender: yeah, I really like that moment. It's from a trailer for a fan film called Holo Xperience, and it looks like it's a current project - unlike Tydirium which seems to have been abandoned. I reckon there may have been enough footage, if Tydirium had been released, to completely ditch the Ewoks from the film.
Here's the rebels landing on Endor with some footage from a fan film added, just to see how it would look:
I found a couple of interesting fan films with potential Endor footage:
Ben, here's the sandstorm scene without the score:
http://www.mediafire.com/?o1u7qkvj13kevzv
It highlights that the score also acts to hide the dodgy dialogue editing.
Sure, I'll render and upload the sandstorm scene minus the music later today.
On the subject of how the musical tone needs to match the preceding scene, here is version two of the sandstorm edit with new music, and with the scenes around it as context:
Check your PMs.
I hope you enjoy it. If you'd like to watch the experimental edit of Jedi I'm working on now I can get that to you as well.
Cool. If he could get that scene to a decent quality it would be incredibly impressive.
Bingowings, you might be right that no music is best, but because of the horrendous image quality I'm tempted to add music, if for no other reason than to take our attention away from the images.
Sluggo, yeah that's why it was cut, and it makes total sense from a pacing sense, but the scene does contain some decent cinematic imagery - something that Jedi lacks as a whole. It also has a nice little moment between Han and Luke which the film badly needed, and definitely could be better than the scene in space that replaced it. What I may do is add the Emperor at the Death Star scene after the sail barge, then cut back to this and see how that works.
Bottom line is the picture quality's so pathetic that unless some good samaritan comes along and manages to restore the scene it's not usable in a serious Jedi edit.