Star Wars: Episode I - Cloak Of Deception

Ok, where to begin. I like many other children of the seventies i grew up on star wars. Then we waited years for a continuation and got prequels. Then we had to watch in horror as all was lost from our childhoods with Lucas intent on drafting terrible scripts, with dreadful direction coupled with actors - Lloyd & Christensen, who couldn't act!!

**Rant over**

Hal9000 has done what i considered impossible - make me like and enjoy ep 1. I read the prior reviews, considered other versions but liked the points made that the pacing was about spot on. The thought of a rushed edit was not for me, so i watched with an open mind and about half way through realised i hadn't made my tea. Oh my god i actually felt connected and sympathetic towards Anakin and thought Hals version nailed it. Jar Jar? Unobtrusive yet he almost ground the film in his 'everyman' role - being swept up in some grand adventure.

I'm blown away and frankly chuffed that i can actually watch TPM without forwarding to certain scenes or watching the clock - amazing work.

Criticisms - none. The pod race was awesome and i loved the new mix of music which i felt fitted and linked it soooo nicely to the original trilogy. The AV was perfect, the cuts were seamless and and i really liked the insertions of alternate scenes - very clever and illuminating.

10/10 for the lot - i owe Hal9000 a pint :)

After watching some of the other Prequel edits around (with L8Wrtr's being among my favorites), I decided to give this edit a chance. I wanted to see what else could be done to make TPM a better film. The pacing for this edit is really well balanced. Like others have said some of these edits are pretty seamless (even to the point where I had to check the checklist to see what had been edited). Solid job.

I'd recommend this edit for sure.

While I admire the ambition to rework TPM so significantly, sadly I don't think this works very well.

Quite a lot of times, the rhythm and pacing of the editing is off with scenes feeling rushed or jumpy.
Some edits make little narrative sense (Jar Jar tagging along for no reason and Gungans appearing out of nowhere via jarring (pun intended) voice over, which must be the only use of it in SW outside of Force voices, being the worst offenders I think). Others, while trying to get at something interesting, just feel chaotic (the final battle).
Music editing also needed more work between the newly created transitions as cues often sound just faded at random points with no regards to phrasing.

That said, I counted ca. 20 smaller trims that work very well and would certainly find their place in a perfect edit.
I just don't think it's technically possible to fulfill the ambitions of this edit with materials available commercially to fans and not throw the whole rhythm of the edit off.

It's a Hal 9000 edit, so you know the editing is going to be top-notch! I would absolutely recommend his edits to any Star Wars fan out there.
That being said:
9/10 for audio/visual quality since the integrated deleted scene stands out like a sore thumb despite benefitting the narrative overall.
10s for visual and audio editing. These edits have been nitpicked to death in the forums, so at this point, I assume any "editing" issues are part of the theatrical cut.
The Narrative gets a 9/10 despite the many ways in which it improves on the original. It loses a point for Jar Jar's presence being even less justified now that Gungan City is cut. Like any reasonable human, I despise the Jar Jar moments in TPM, but now viewers have less emotional investment with the Gungans when they inevitably join the story in act 3.
Finally, Enjoyment. The reality is that there is no saving this movie. I give it a 6/10 because I could barely get through it. When I told my wife that 23 minutes of the film's worst content was already cut from this edit, she was shocked. Qui-Gon, podracing, and Darth Maul are the only reasons I ever return to this movie.

All of the prequel edits by HAL9000 are brilliantly done and my favorite of those that I've seen. This honestly beats out every other cut of these movies by far.

That said, this is my least favorite edit by HAL9000, but I don't think that's really his fault. This movie had major issues that needed to be fixed, mostly with Jar Jar and Anakin. Jar Jar is reworked to be an every-man character thrown into situations he never dreamed of and doesn't understand. This does wonders to cut down on his obnoxious character, but he is still overly silly in places. The deleted scenes added in help tie parts of the movie together better, but they are still visually jarring from the finished cut, not HAL9000's fault and I think they are necessary, but it is still unfortunate that these are the best versions of these scenes. In later edits, the added scenes feel a bit more cohesive to me. The Gungan aid at the end feels less natural than in the original, but I think this is worth it to remove some of the worst scenes in the original cut. Overall, I still recommend this edit and will be watching and showing it to others for a long time, but I feel it's the weakest of the bunch.