Star Wars: Episode I - Cloak Of Deception

This isn't the first edit of The Phantom Menace I've seen, and it probably won't be the last. Unfortunately there's only so much you can do with the film, and it still will never match the greatness of the original trilogy. A lot of Episode I edits take out the same stuff, I don't think there are any that retain all of Jar Jar hijinks or Anakin's oops's. But, of course, there are little ways edits can be different. I don't know if HAL9000 had any original ideas, so to speak, for his edit, but I do know that he has made a concoction that is, nonetheless, unlike another.

The obvious question is whether that is the best concoction. I'm inclined to say no, but I'm not sure. It might be the best there is so far, though. One of HAL's goals was to make the edit feel like it could be a real movie. Much of the issues that plague other edits are the pacings of scenes: they go by so fast that they have no room to breath. The next best EpI edit is L8wrtr's. His edit moves at a breakneck speed, and it's a lot of fun, while still keeping a good sense of the essence of the movie. But it almost moves too fast. Other edits are even worse on this front. HAL mostly avoids this, save for the first fifth. I do like what he's done with the first act - in the original film it takes what seems like forever for the story to finally get moving, which happens when they get to Tatooine. HAL gets them there in under twenty minutes. It's a double edged sword, really. It's great that the film no longer has a slow start, but now it almost has too fast a start. Once the action starts, the audience doesn't get a chance to breath for a long while. But there wasn't much HAL could do about this, and, honestly, I prefer how he's done it to how other editors have.

The rest of the edit is solid. I noticed most of the cuts, but this was mainly because of my familiarity with both the film and the soundtrack. For a new viewer, I'm sure most, if not all, would be invisible. There were some things I wished HAL had left out, and some things I wished he kept in, but this is his edit after all. I quite enjoy the pod race as is in the original, but I can't fault him for trimming it, and I will admit it is wonderfully paced here. I'm not a fan of the inclusion of the Shadows of the Empire soundtrack, as I just don't think it sounds like anything else in the film, but again, his choice. I do appreciate the instances where deleted scenes were added back in, in the pod race and elsewhere. I like that HAL tried to keep this close to two hours. Edits that are an hour and a half or even shorter just don't feel like Star Wars to me.

Well, maybe I should wrap this up now, I've said quite a bit. Honestly, there's not much special here. I feel kind mean saying that, but I think it's okay, I explain. I do recommend this edit. It's not radically different from others. But it does fit with HAL's Episode II and III edits. I've viewed the work prints for both (as I did this one), and they might be my favorite edits of their respective movies. Episode II I know I particularly enjoyed (weird sentence, right?). Anyway, I hope to see the completed versions of those soon. Then I'll have a prequel trilogy that I can almost feel happy about.

This is a stellar edit. Not enough to save the movie, but it's the best it can be without radically changing huge swaths of material.
The phantom menace is my least favorite star wars movie, and there's one big reason: it bores me to tears. Whatever about the unrealistic love plot of episode 2 or Anakin's unnatural character arc in episode 3, you could at least follow their stories and the characters had identifiable traits and relationships with each other. The characters here are 1-dimensional, some even round down to having 0 dimensions. The story is filled to the brim with unnecessary political drama that is too complex and dull to follow, yet too loosely tied with the jedi's actions to make it easy to follow either plotline. The jedi's part of the plot is devoid of energy and filled with unnecessary sidequests (Otah Gunga and Podracing), so it's hard to care about the "good" part of the movie either. No matter how you edit it, you can't make these characters endearing and you can't make the story engaging, all you can do is get it over with faster.

And that's exactly what Hal9000 has done, with benefits. Along with masterfully refining the structure and pacing, he has carefully extracted all character and story beats that one could find irritating. While there exists edits which make more dramatic overhauls to the movie, this is more like the definitive version of the movie that could still be identified as the same movie. It fits in with all the extended star wars content perfectly, and keeps the spirit of the original movie. Like I said, this doesn't make it into a movie that I'd revisit often, but it's pretty much an objective improvement over the original edit, and probably the best edit that doesn't mess with the original canon.

The star of the show here is the pacing. Perhaps contrary to what I said above, this doesn't cut every single unnecessary frame of the movie. Rather, it makes smart removals, carefully choosing what to trim, cut and retain. It doesn't seek to blaze through the movie as fast as possible, or else it would still be an unsatisfying experience. Instead, this edit keeps a brisk but steady pace, similar to the original trilogy. Otah Gunga is entirely cut (seamlessly, I might add), and political dialogue is cut up to the utmost essentials. As a result, the story is 1000x times more easy to follow, and nothing outstays it's welcome nor end too soon. Nowhere are the cuts noticeable. Instead of being the quickest way to experience the movie, it's the most satisfying way to experience the movie.

Cuts made to story and character moments are similarly well executed. The above mentioned cut of Otah Gunga means that the first act of the movie exclusively consists of the rescue of queen amidala and the running of the blockade. You know... events that actually set up the plot, and are at least mildly exciting? Unlike the huge distraction that waterworld was? Needless to say it's a great change. The update to Anakin's contribution to the ending makes it a massively more satisfying conclusion than what we got in theatrical. Child Anakin and Jar-Jar's cringworthy acting has been trimmed, but just like the overall pacing, it isn't completely gutted to the point of damaging the plot. That means that some cheese remains, and many viewers will dismay, but it really does help scenes flow in a natural way.

On the topic of the technical aspects, the only time I noticed a drop in quality was during the scene where Qui-Gon's gang encounters Darth Maul's droid and runs back to the ship and takes off after a brief duel. Many reviews mention certain deleted scenes looking quite bad in comparison. I personally did not notice, though the version I watched was newer and had a previously included deleted scene removed, so there could have been further updates to iron out those flaws. Besides, the scene i mentioned above was included in the theatrical cut (at least I'm pretty sure it is). Either way, I can't give the visuals a perfect score because of this, but it isn't anything to worry about.

To summarize, I can't give this a full enjoyment score because it remains that; a flawed, boring movie with flat characters and story. Don't go in thinking that this will fix the movie. But do go in thinking that this is a vast, vast improvement. Hal9000 has made a straight-up replacement to the original film. But if you seek a more radical approach with massive changes in service of making the movie actually enjoyable, you will have to search elsewhere (I suggest "The Phantom Menace: The Ancient Lore" as a starting point).

Pros: This edit takes a moderate approach, leaving the TPM story basically intact. The editing quality is overall pretty good, though a couple of the added SD scenes are glaring reminders that this is a fan edit.

Cons: In general, the cuts made it harder for me to care about the story. Cuts to the opening chapter in particular make it hard to get attached to the Jedi so that I found myself indifferent to the outcome of the lightsaber fight at the end. I've always felt the pod race is long and boring, but because the build-up to this shorter pod race was so quick, it was hard to get emotionally invested. The added music felt a bit manipulative to me because the story didn't move me.

I'm in the camp that pretty much believes the only way to ever make the prequels anywhere near as good as the originals, is to completely redo them. That being said, I still find some things about the films to be pretty enjoyable. I was a kid when the Phantom Menace came out, but believe me when I say, I was a huge fan of the originals at that time. I watched Empire like once a week back then. Sorry to drag on....

I've not been much of one to give the prequel edits a good chance. I usually dismiss them as something damaged beyond repair, but something made me decide to watch it again. I thought the best way to watch it after at least 5 or so years was to try out a fan edit. The decision was between this newest version and other highly rated ones. The inclusion of the SOTE soundtrack and visual tweaks made me opt for this.

I don't care how much work you do to the film, if it's the pink tinted HDTV or DVD releases as your source, you've already lost my interest.

What can I say about the editing that somebody will most likely say better? I liked it. I found myself actually enjoying the film. Sure, there are things I would've still changed, but I don't think you'd have much of a film left if you cut every single little problem out. Hal 9000 cuts out huge chunks of what I consider, boring filler. Sure, I do think the underwater segment has some cool visuals, but cool visuals do not always make a great movie. Avatar anyone?

I didn't watch this on a 50 inch flatscreen, but opted for a 32 inch CRT. I just love that TV. So, I'm not your best judge on how the grain looked or all that jazz, but Hal's got a fan over here. It played beautifully on my television and not once did I encounter any problems in picture.

His cuts to the story were well justified, even though I still cringe at some of the things left in. Most notably the "are you an angel" scene. You can't fix a bad script with editing. I also felt Anakin appearing pissed at the jedi meeting was something that also needed fixing. I see a touch of evil early on.

Now, Anakin being the space hero, instead of accidentally going to battle was my absolute favorite bit. It's a taste of "The best star pilot in the galaxy". Hey George, why didn't you do that in the first place?

Forgive my review if it's not informative, but I really enjoyed this edit, and recommend it!