House Of Abrasax, The

Cutting the family part works fine, nothing important is lost.

I’m of the opinion that the stupidity about “bees genetically designed to recognize royalty” should have been cut. A few minutes later the bees sacrifice themselves to save Jupiter, that is enough context to get that -- okay, bees really love her. No exposition is required. And that should also help with the length of Stinger’s exposition, because most of it (apart from the bees) is required for the story.
The dialogue “I love dogs, I’ve always loved dogs” should’ve been cut, it’s so weird and cringe in the context it happens. The “acting” qualities of Mila Kunis don’t help, but that scene is just wrong.
Actually, I think the film might actually improve if all the (very forced and terribly acted) romance scenes were cut, or at least reduced. Even the last kiss scene in Act 3 could be cut, and the film would still end with the two of them flying over Chicago.

Also, the dialogue line “my mother never cleaned a toilet in her life” makes no sense with the family section cut at the beginning; this line should also be cut.
The scene with Stinger explaining to Caine that he has to save Jupiter makes no sense, he has saved her 3-4 times before in the film, he should need no additional convincing.

Sidenote 1: as a suggestion for the future (not a criticism for this edit), if anyone is able to redub the voice of Eddie Redmayne, his villain (Balem) might actually be adequate; in this way, it’s unbearable and painful to hear him speak.
Sidenote 2: it’s actually funny that the best part of the film, the Act 2 “bureaucrats” section clearly inspired by Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, may actually be so good because both Mila Kunis and Channing Tatum don’t have any lines.

The color regrade works, the visuals are already the best part of the original and they are reinforced here.

The title card at 3m04 has a lot of aliasing at the edges, lots of pixels are visible.
At 1h02m15 and 1h23m26, there are noticeable audio volume drop lasting a few seconds.
There is visible posterization with some of the darker backgrounds.

I don't think this movie is fixable, such a shame. It's been ages since I watched the original so I don't remember what really happened but I thought the edit started out great. I agree with previous reviewers where the family part could have been cut off but not sure if this would make narrative sense on why Jupiter visits Balem.

Maybe I wasn't paying enough attention but I thought there were a few cuts that made little narrative sense. The one that comes to mind is when Caine suddenly shows up on the ship with Jupiter's family. Other than that, great job on the edit. It made the movie a little better but still not enjoyable overall.

So, I have to say that I thoroughly hated the original cut of this movie. It was, in almost every way, terrible. This, on the other hand, was quite good. Honestly, I think her family could have been completely taken out of it, as we never met them and they had minimal impact on the film. she mentions them way more than they actually appear, and considering her actions are ultimately not predicated on their survival, I think they could be completely taken out. Over all, another amazing edit, and I am glad that I got a chance to experience it.

My first Malthus edit. Cant really say how nice it was. The OG release of this film made a completely negative impact at the time and this edit basically turned that into something fun to be revisited!

Just two points:
- Since english is not my native language i had to volume up when actors are talking cause the audio gets so low compared to the action sequences.

- Narrative speaking i think besides only 18 min being cut from the og edit you get a much more dynamic cut, but its a double edge sword cause you feel everything happens much faster, its like there's no time to breathe between acts

Malthus once again delivers a fantastic edit that takes the the slow boring paced theatrical version to something that feels more engaging and exciting to watch. The opening of the House of the Abraxas is vastly better and feels more like how the Matrix opened- establishing the unique world, the target their after, and some key characters we'll meet later on before we meet our main character. Another thing I liked was getting rid of the redundant family stuff in the beginning and though the first time we see them in this edit is them being kidnapped I thought it worked well as her reaction to their plight makes it clear how much they mean to her.

Another thing to mention that was done well was the tweak to the colour grading it felt more vibrant and colourful and really enhanced those sweet visuals in the movie. Though its not critical to the story perhaps the montage of Jupiter cleaning could houses could've been kept before the clinic scene to sort of give some sort of an explanation to why she's there and show the audience her life better. Regardless House of the Abraxas overall is much more engaging from the start, edited seamlessly and an improvement over the theatrical version,