Star Wars - Episode I: Return of the Sith: Revisited Edition

Finally...A version of TPM that I actually enjoyed and I mean, I actually really enjoyed this.

I noted the kinda quick runtime of just under 85 mins and I was a bit dubious as to whether this would feel rushed. It doesn't.

Perhaps because the editing is spot on, there's nothing boring and ultimately is was (boringly)directed by George Lucas - this feels like a totally fresh film to me. When compared to the likes of Transformers or Man of Steel or even Avengers...this feels engaging, but never OTT.

I think the removal of Sidious in this edit is genius. I was also very impressed with the removal of Gungan City and going through..the planet core. Even Jar Jar didn't annoy me. He said what he needed to say and it felt like what he was saying was important to understand the later plot.

Relegating the Trade Federation to simply a separatist Federation works spectacularly well. The pod race felt like such great fun now - not too short or too long.

I was really keen to see the end battle and once again, this really impressed. All that stupidity is gone.

Technically, it was utterly seemless and I noticed not one single thing out of place. So I've given this 10/10 in all aspects. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

Talk about taking a turd and turning it into a diamond....wow.

The Phantom Menace is without a doubt the biggest disappointment in film history and probably always will be. It's unsurprising that it inspires so many to try to correct it's myriad of flaws by re-editing the dross in to some kind of coherent film.

So it's a delight to watch this reconstruction by seciors, a real treat from the magnificent opening crawl. You can't immediately help feeling a bit sad too at the thought of what could have been.

Rather than just shorten the film, seciors has made some brave but excellent, common-sense decisions about the plot that massively improve it. Dropping the 'Trade' from 'Trade Federation' is a stroke of genius, simplifying things by depicting them as a group of rebellious planets (which will no doubt fit in nicely with subsequent edits of the remaining two prequels).

Other narrative decisions shine through as well. Retaining the mystery of the Force by ejecting the bizarre 'Medichlorian' and 'Chosen One' sub-plots works brilliantly. There are other changes to characters story arcs, such as Palpatine's (Ian McDiarmid) which I won't talk about for fear of spoilers (see 'criticisms / spoilers' below) - but every decision is pretty much spot-on.

The film is finally brought in to some kind of focus and characters get the screen time they deserve according to their role in the story. The idiotic Jar Jar Binks is relegated to a minor character, whose presence while still not making any sense no longer gets in the way of the film's progression. Long and drawn out chats about treaties and trade disputes are dumped in the bin where they belong.

All of this means that the story Lucas must have had originally, about a central wise Jedi trying to stop the Republic from falling apart, starts to tantalizingly come through. There is now a central character - Qui Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson) is now without doubt the films main protagonist, something comically missing from the original. Whether he's a memorable protagonist or even an effective one is still debatable, although that's something even a Fan Edit as good as this will struggle to remedy.

In summary, Return of the Sith is the first time I've watched The Phantom Menace and actually enjoyed it. Sure, some of the enjoyment no doubt came from the wide-eyed appreciation of it all actually making some sort of sense and not ever getting boring (and incredible feat), but there's no doubt as well that seciors has somehow managed to put together a coherent film that can actually be watched in it's own right, and for that I'm very grateful.

CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM / SPOILERS

* The title 'Return of the Sith' is an excellent one and is completely believable in the Star Wars canon. How excited would we all have been if that was the original title? There's one problem - the Sith played a small role (in the case of Darth Maul an unforgivably small one) in the original. With 'Darth Sideous' removed completely this title only actually refers to one character (however excellent) that suddenly appears fleetingly midway in the film and then at the end.

There's two possible solutions - include the conversation between Sideous and Darth Maul at the beginning ("at last we will have revenge") and maybe some of Sideous talking to the Federation through the film (even if it's just the part where Sideous says he's sending Maul - "Now there are two of them!" is actually one of the better lines in the film).

Otherwise we never actually know who Darth Maul is (even his name), why he's tracking the Jedi and why he confronts them in a fight to the death. In Star Wars films, characters have light sabre fights for massively important reasons in the plot. He's clearly on a mission that presents a lot of danger to his life and at the end he obviously hates the Jedi and they're his priority (he doesn't try and kill the Queen on sight for example). Why?

Otherwise, call the movie what it is, especially now in this re-edit; 'The Battle for Naboo' or something. We all wish the film was about the return of the Sith, but it isn't unfortunately. The title and excellent cover-art refer to a film that we wish we'd had, not the one we were presented with no matter how it's re-edited.

* The pod race is much more enjoyable now. Anakin's crossing the line in victory all feels a bit rushed though; it's a very important emotional part of the film whether we like it or not, and maybe the pacing could be looked at to emphasize that moment more.

* The re-cutting of the ending, going between the Naboo fighters attacking the Control Ship and the light-sabre fight on the planet, feels a bit jagged at times. Obi Wan now has to wait too long for the force field to go at one stage and the ships jumping from leaving the hangar to approaching the control ship is jarring. Finally, I can understand drastically cutting down the Naboo battle scenes to eliminate the hideous slapstick elements, but this again feels a little rushed.

* The running time of the film at 1hr 25min makes everything go by very, very quickly. In the case of this film, that's probably no bad thing. But maybe there's times to pause for breath, or elongate certain scenes as I've suggested above, to produce a running time maybe ten minutes longer that will feel even more natural and better paced.

I must emphasize though - this edit is fantastic.

Wow. Just wow. Episode 1 is still ridiculously over-complicated with no clear baddies and goodies (my kids kept asking me) and the Padme/Queen thing (my kids kept asking me) - BUT, it was an enjoyable story with enough flash-bangs and pace to ensure we weren't bored.
The film rollicks along at a great pace without feeling rushed, and never gets too bogged down in the frankly boring story.
Taking out Darth Sidious was a stroke of genius - he is completely unnecessary. Knowing that the Sith have arrived is enough.
And I LOVED the edit of the pod race. Not too long, not too short, and just enough of the announcers and stadium reactions to keep you up to date with what's going on.
The edit was seamless, the quality was excellent, audio without a hitch. Seriously impressive.
Flawless.

This is my favorite Episode I edit by far. Seciors has managed to achieve that delicate balance of improving the pacing greatly without making the movie feel rushed. Also, technically the editing is superb. Everything fits together seamlessly and it really does seem like an original movie, not an edit!

Plot points that were improved: Hiding Palpatine's identity which helps put more of the focus on Darth Maul which is never a bad thing, also no midichlorians and no virgin birth.

In the end this movie achieves what the original missed, a fun fast paced adventure that hints at plot twists and dark turns up ahead without actually giving it away.

(I apologize for making so much of this review about myself, but I just didn't know how else to get my point across.)

I was huge Star Wars fan as a kid, but when The Phantom Menace came out, it was "just another movie". Maybe I was a little disappointed, but it was no big deal to me. I think I only saw it twice. Once when it was in theatres and again when it was on TV for the first time. All I ever saw of it since were the Red Letter Media reviews, which I think are brillant.

After watching SECIORS' fanedit, I thought I needed to see the original again though, so I'd be able to actually judge what he did. In doing so I realized, that I loved all of SECIORS' editing choices and that he did an impressive and flawless job in reducing the film to its core. I also realized that most of the hate TPM is getting nowadays is totally justified. What a godawful movie the original is.

Although I always considered myself a movie geek, it was only over the past ten years that I started focusing on things like storytelling, character arcs, character motivations, pacing, expositional dialogue, directorial choices, etc. I believe TPM fails on all accounts. (I also feel like even stating that I'm aware of the fact, that there is nothing that hasn't been said about TPM, is a cliché.) In my opinion the movie doesn't even work, if you look at it as a film purely aimed at kids, due to all the political crap, the pseudo-philosophical nonsense and the overlong action sequences.

Having said that, I think this is exactly why SECIORS' edit succeeds. Halfway through his version I stopped overanalyzing everything and just let my seven-year-old self take over, and looked at it on a scene by scene basis, enjoying the spectacle, just like I saw Return of the Jedi for the first time. (I loved the Ewoks, for chrissake!)

SECIORS turned a bloated mess into the entertaining and easily digestable kid's movie Lucas probably wanted it to be in the first place. My initial thoughts were, that this edit must be every parent's dream come true. Finally parents can watch TPM in less than 90 minutes and without having their ADD kids go bonkers before the third act starts. I actually suggested calling it "The Parent's Edit", but SECIORS decided against it. Whatever!

:-)

I don't know too much about the technical side of video editing, so I'll give it all 10's there, since I didn't see or hear any flaws. I also thought the narrative worked perfectly fine, despite the fact, that 50 minutes (!) were cut.

I'm torn when it comes to enjoyment though. I didn't really enjoy the movie, I enjoyed figuring out the amount of work and thought that was put into this edit. I think this is the best version possible, although I probably should check out some of the other TPM fanedits to properly comment on that. Unfortunately I can't do that right now. It's just not physically possible, at least within the next couple of months. I'm still recovering, you know?

:-)

On a sidenote: I think the obsession faneditors have with TPM is fascinating and I'd love to read you guys discuss this topic in the forums. This is going to sound brutal, I'm afraid, but I think even the best edit is just damage control. Like …, you can get Daft Punk or Moby or Four Tet or whoever to remix Rebecca Black's Friday, but it's still an embarrassingly bad song, and listening to the remixes is something you do out of curiousity, because you respect the DJs, but it's still rather unlikely, that you'll put it on your playlist, no matter how impressive their work is. Right?

Right?!

Again: I loved SECIORS work. If I had kids, THIS is the version I'd want them to see. I just think the original movie is beyond salvageable.

(EDITED: Now, that's what I call a great poster!)