Star Wars: Episode I - Cloak Of Deception

I have never been a big fan of the Phantom Menace. I always found it boring and obnoxious. Hal9000 manages to make it a decent movie for me. With Jar Jar toned down, the character of Anakin improved and political confusion removed, this now makes for a fun and fast paced flick. I really appreciate Hal's approach here. Most people would just cut out literally everything that displeases them but every edit/cut that Hal made was to make for a better film. An example of this is with Jar Jar. Most faneditors wish to remove basically everything that comes out of his mouth. This results in an issue, which is that Jar Jar becomes some random character who for some reason is following everyone around. Hal masterfully refines his character to be an actually likable character who ends up wanting to truly help the cause. All in all, this is a wonderful piece of work which never feels like a fan edit and improves immensely upon it's source material.

First of all I wanna say thank you to Hal9000 for making this edit. I watched version 4.1 of this edit. The visual/audio editing is seamless and perfect throughout the movie, I have nothing to criticize on that front for sure! Great job, you work really well :)

I have to say, after watching this edit, I think this movie really is unsalvageable. It's riddled with exposition, plot contrivances, and cheesy scenes no matter what you do with it. This is a brilliant effort though, and renders at least 50% of the movie somewhat decent.

I disagree wholeheartedly with any changes to the podrace. I think the way the podrace is presented in the original cut, bar the annoying "yippees!" being thrown around, is perfect as it is and shouldn't be changed. In this cut, the lack of build-up/anticipation at the beginning of the podrace kinda makes it start too soon (much is riding on this race), and end too soon as well. We are brought to the arena, boom the podrace starts, and then it's over too quickly as well since some of the victory shots have been cut too. Overall, I think the podrace should be brought back to its default state bar the "yippees!"

A lot is cut in favor of making this a better movie, but it creates a movie that's just too fast-paced as a result. We're being thrown around from place to place without any time to breath, at least most of the time. Generally, it works, but it's still too fast.

Qui-Gon's character really feels like he's dumb in this. Not sure if it was the same way in the original movie but he comes out as very selfish in this one, and kind of being the cause of some of their problems because of his stubbornness. Much of his "warm father-figure" dialogue to Anakin has been removed (some for very good reasons :P), but that leaves him a bit cold and short-sighted. Don't know if that was intended.

The deleted scenes were overall inserted well enough, although the one with Padme and the Speeder really stood out like a sore thumb to me. It feels pointless.

Anakin as a character feels MUCH better in this movie than the original, I really felt like his arc and motivations worked. His mother came out as pretty stupid though, since most of her scenes in the house have been cut. She kinda just "goes with it", and it doesn't really work in my opinion.

Anyway, I have to say that hal9000 did a good job, all things considered, his editing skills are top-notch, it's just the movie I think that doesn't really work on a very basic level!

Still, recommended because it's shorter than the original :)

Very well done edit. You forget you are actually watching an edit except when the deleted scenes are added because they're so low res but that's it.
I don't necessarily agree with all the cuts but they work very well. The ending battles / climax are particularly improved. Can't wait to see v4.

Other than the original Phantom Edit, this is the first TPM edit I've watched...and I dug it!

Started strong and finished strong. The middle was hit/miss for me. There were certainly parts cut that I would've liked to remain and parts that remained that I would've liked to go...but I imagine that's how it is with any fan edit of a movie you're a fan of. I definitely missed the trip to Otoh Gunga though it was interesting to see an attempt at making the Jedi appear to know where they were going.

My favorite edit (decision and execution) was Anakin intentionally taking a ship to join the fight. I don't know if that concept originated with this edit (as there are so many) but it was just brilliant!

On to watch your versions of Episodes II & III...

This is a masterful edit and in my humble opinion the definitive TPM edit. I used to believe seciors Revisited edit was the best, but after showing it to my wife, who hadn't seen the movie in years, she remarked that it seemed too rushed, like a mere summary of events rather than the actual movie. I think seciors TPM suffers from feeling too much like an edit, and in the end, 85 minutes is just too short for a Star Wars movie, which are usually closer to the two hour mark. Either you embrace the PT or you don't, and so I think a philosophy more like HAL9000's is in order. The point isn't to race through the movie in order to get it over with, but to make it as enjoyable of an experience as possible. In this regard I think HAL9000 succeeds. I think the most important task for a faneditor working on TPM is to cut out the excessively annoying and childish elements while also removing much of the tedious political dialogue. Not only do these not fit well together in the same movie, but neither are interesting to your average movie goer. Other than that, tighten up the pacing a little bit without leaving too much on the cutting-room floor, and you've actually got a decent movie (yes, I like this movie now and think it deserves its rightful place in the Star Wars canon). I like that we get a fair amount of Jar Jar, but that he has been toned down a great deal. If this had been the Jar Jar we got in the theater, I don't think anybody would have complained.

My only gripe is the removal of Jabba the Hut from the pod race. I support the removal of most of the cameos, but Jabba's appearance here actually makes enough sense to merit it. After all, the pod races seem to be a pretty big deal on Tattooine.