Review Detail
8.3 4 10
(Updated: September 04, 2012)
Overall rating
8.0
Audio/Video Quality
9.0
Narrative
7.0
Enjoyment
8.0
captain khajiit
The faneditor's approach of leaving the core of the film more or less as it is but tweaking it where necessary is not without merit. After all, the film is great to begin with, and most of the alterations work. I liked the recutting of the Black Riders attack at the Prancing Pony, and the re-editing of the scene at Weathertop is a notable success: I'm not sure anything will ever satisfactorily solve the trilogies problem of the Nine being too powerful formidable when it suits Jackson and not formidable enough when it doesn't, but the faneditor deserves credit for trying.
Like others, I was not convinced by the jump to Rivendell. Some cuts, such as the Black Rider moving off when Frodo resists the ring, almost worked, but felt a little unnatural. Nonetheless, the faneditor succeeds more often than he fails.
The faneditor obviously likes much of the extra material from the extended cuts, which I have always felt tends to drag the films down. This is ultimately preference — and with films that I like I often just take out what I don't like and keep what I do — but the edit might come into its own more with some of the extra material removed, if only to improve the pacing.
Video
There were a few scenes in which the quality dipped a bit, but taken as a whole the quality was high for a fanedit. The English subtitles for the Elvish were not good. They appear to have been designed for televisions with exact scan modes and are *slightly* cut off in 16:9 mode, which is how most DVDs are designed to be displayed. This could be fixed.
8 out of 10
Audio
The 5.1 audio is one of the edit's strengths. Given that music is playing almost constantly in this film, the absence of hard cuts is impressive. It is obvious that a great deal of work went into the audio editing. I didn't notice any real problems and — again — the Weathertop sequence stands out as being particularly well done.
10 out of 10
Presentation and Extras
This aspect of fanediting doesn't really do much for me, but I have to confess that I really didn't like the menu. It didn't look very well laid out and played in 4:3 in my player. Having a video sequence at the start was a good idea with potential for improvement, but I actually thought that the feature had started and found it a little confusing.
I am sure that the faneditor could have a go at cover art, if only to encourage people to have a look at his edits on the main page. The scene selection looks fine though.
I actually enjoyed the extra. :-) Was it silly? Yes, but it was also fun, and I found that it provided welcome light relief after the serious tone of the film.
5 out of 10
Entertainment
This is tricky. I would prefer a more streamlined edit closer to the theatrical cut in both pacing and content, but I did enjoy this, and feel that the faneditor implements his vision for the edit consistently. I will have to dock a mark for the subtitles and the poor presentation because they did irritate me.
7 out of 10
Overall score: 8 out of 10
This is an enjoyable edit that deserves to be watched more — judging by the ratings — than it has been . The faneditor has good ideas, and I sincerely hope that he will produce a second version at some stage.
The faneditor's approach of leaving the core of the film more or less as it is but tweaking it where necessary is not without merit. After all, the film is great to begin with, and most of the alterations work. I liked the recutting of the Black Riders attack at the Prancing Pony, and the re-editing of the scene at Weathertop is a notable success: I'm not sure anything will ever satisfactorily solve the trilogies problem of the Nine being too powerful formidable when it suits Jackson and not formidable enough when it doesn't, but the faneditor deserves credit for trying.
Like others, I was not convinced by the jump to Rivendell. Some cuts, such as the Black Rider moving off when Frodo resists the ring, almost worked, but felt a little unnatural. Nonetheless, the faneditor succeeds more often than he fails.
The faneditor obviously likes much of the extra material from the extended cuts, which I have always felt tends to drag the films down. This is ultimately preference — and with films that I like I often just take out what I don't like and keep what I do — but the edit might come into its own more with some of the extra material removed, if only to improve the pacing.
Video
There were a few scenes in which the quality dipped a bit, but taken as a whole the quality was high for a fanedit. The English subtitles for the Elvish were not good. They appear to have been designed for televisions with exact scan modes and are *slightly* cut off in 16:9 mode, which is how most DVDs are designed to be displayed. This could be fixed.
8 out of 10
Audio
The 5.1 audio is one of the edit's strengths. Given that music is playing almost constantly in this film, the absence of hard cuts is impressive. It is obvious that a great deal of work went into the audio editing. I didn't notice any real problems and — again — the Weathertop sequence stands out as being particularly well done.
10 out of 10
Presentation and Extras
This aspect of fanediting doesn't really do much for me, but I have to confess that I really didn't like the menu. It didn't look very well laid out and played in 4:3 in my player. Having a video sequence at the start was a good idea with potential for improvement, but I actually thought that the feature had started and found it a little confusing.
I am sure that the faneditor could have a go at cover art, if only to encourage people to have a look at his edits on the main page. The scene selection looks fine though.
I actually enjoyed the extra. :-) Was it silly? Yes, but it was also fun, and I found that it provided welcome light relief after the serious tone of the film.
5 out of 10
Entertainment
This is tricky. I would prefer a more streamlined edit closer to the theatrical cut in both pacing and content, but I did enjoy this, and feel that the faneditor implements his vision for the edit consistently. I will have to dock a mark for the subtitles and the poor presentation because they did irritate me.
7 out of 10
Overall score: 8 out of 10
This is an enjoyable edit that deserves to be watched more — judging by the ratings — than it has been . The faneditor has good ideas, and I sincerely hope that he will produce a second version at some stage.
C