Elysium: The Bone Saw Cut

Overall I thought the flow was smoother, I didn't really miss much of what you cut, and I think you did the absolute best you could with what you had. You took the movie from a "6/10 with some sick weapons and a boring story" to a "7.5/10 with some sick weapons and pretty interesting story."

I honestly wonder if more can be cut, but I'm just not sure what.

Also I saw other reviews talk about framerate. I watched it on VLC on my phone so maybe that affected things but I honestly didn't notice anything.

The few things I wanted to call out:
- The fact that pulling the data will kill him was only mentioned once in the movie but when informed Max still says "I know." Maybe include one extra line about the program killing him?

- Minimizing Josie Foster's presence was a great move. I didn't care for her accent throughout, and the "corruption" thing? Who cares? Wouldn't Elysium just think "oh yeah, ok, she sent a team to retrieve the information that could destroy my entire life? That's cool, good job."

Overall I appreciate the edit and give it a solid 8.5/10

The narrative flow is fine, the story is much more direct and focused now.
Also, the visual and audio editing are ok, never noticed any cut whatsoever.

However, just as it has been said by the previous reviewers, the framerate has definite issues. Some of the faster action scenes are blurred, but that’s not the main problem.
In many sections of the film, a phenomenon repeating approximately every 2 secs happens when the framerate seems to increase for a few frames (lasting 0.1-0.2 sec) and then slow down immediately after. So the video feels like it’s skipping or jumping (the audio seemed unaffected). I checked and this is not present in the original film. Once I noticed this, it became really hard to watch, the effect is really strong.

The trims on social commentary do make the film a bit less bleak, but there's little remaining to emphatize.

Also, Kruger and Delacourt are introduced completely out of the blue. It just doesn't justify the amount of screen time dedicated an obnoxious and over-the-top villain and turns Jodie Foster into an in-and-out cameo.

Editing is flawless and makes up for a decent effort among others. I just feel like Elysium is a tough one to salvage - a shame since it looks so glorious.

The video quality is impressive for the 720p MKV, but as mentioned below, there's something really wrong with the frames from start to finish - rendering it almost unwatchable at times. Can't speak for the BD.

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Watched the fanedit and it is definitely the superior version.

The framerate seemed off, don't know if that is from shaky cam but movement and camera pans didn't feel smooth; walking scene at 38 minutes is one example.

Didn't explain code to reboot Elysium or the betrayal plot, but then again leaving it in would make it worse.

Other than that it brings it closer to what it should have been, Battle Angel Alita.

A parasitic space city, annoying droids, crazy cyborg bounty hunters that want to pull out katanas. Sound familiar? The film works better as a weird wasteland with black comedy moments, "I've always wanted a wife".

Quote from the Manga:
"The public security system is nothing more than a debugging routine to ensure the smooth operation of the factories.

The factories operate entirely for the sake of Tiphares and are not concerned with the daily lives of the residents of the scrapyard."

The problem is Alita fleshes out a lot more backstory and history. It is more a case of programmed auto pilot from previous wars that have become legend, the space citizens are kept just as drugged and pacified. Instead of evil rich people hoarding technology that wouldn't cost them anything to share.

This edit brings it more inline with such a more coherent setting. Other recommended ideas:

1. Take out the cause of overpopulation and disease. It would still be a lot easier to build gated communities on Earth than a space station, and basic technology solves both of these things in the real world. They were added to try to boost the heavy handed political message that doesn't work.
Instead have an unknown past war reduce the population to a handful of mega cities in the few habitable zones, and no one even knows what year it is.

2. State that all unauthorized technology is illegal, especially spacecraft. The original film had it so once all the rich people leave no one can solve any problems on Earth. The criminals in the film acted more like underground resistance than criminals, crimelords don't normally want to reboot the system to help everyone.

3. It would be cool to throw in scenes from Rollerball as part of the bread and circus to keep people entertained. Or even wasteland scenes from the Road Warrior, Fury Road, The Postman etc.. into the opening to set the tone as over the top weird wasteland. Or even go full retro and open with 199X. Kruger acts more like a wasteland barbarian from Mad Max then real military, maybe add back more of his scenes except the missile launcher one.