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I've seen it four times in the theatres, in the last three weeks .... haven't been posting very regularly, cause I got a bit busy of late.

Good as the movie was, it was not a slam dunk ... and I feel a few scenes that ended up on the cutting room floor, should have been left in the movie, and that would have made it even better ...


( I've taken all the following from Tf.net )

1. Don't Talk Back
Anakin had more of a conflict with Obi-Wan, including a shot featuring the line, "I've heard this lesson before."

2. The Lost 20
Jocasta Nu (the Jedi archivist) tells Obi-Wan of the 20 Lost Jedi and about the "great" Count Dooku at length in the scene where he is looking for clues in his adventure. A bust of Dooku can be seen.

3. Explaining the Lost Jedi
Yoda and Mace discuss the lost Jedi who abandon the Order with Obi-Wan. Anakin's Warning Signs
Mace converses with Obi-wan on the platform before and after Obi-1 get's in his Starfighter. Obi-Wan tells Mace of his aprehensions of Anakin taking Padme back to Naboo and he feels a disturbance in Anakin's feelings. You might have seen this shot in the SW Insider magazine.

4. More Remorse for Tusken Slaughter
There was more to the extended "work shop" scene with Annie and Padme after he killed the Tuskens. Anakin cries (which we saw) - but continues on where he talks of his remorse for doing it and Padme tells him that he is only human.

5. Padme Wants Obi-Wan
After Padme's capture on Geonosis, she pleads with Dooku to free Obi-Wan.

6. Dooku Uses 2 Sabers
Dooku fights Yoda with TWO lightsabers.

7. Join me, Amidala
After Anakin and Amidala are captured, Dooku meets with them at the round table and tries to convince Amidala to join the separatists.

8. Bar Bouncer
Another deleted scene was before anakin and obi wan enter the bar, they are greeted with a bouncer who says jedi are not permitted to enter. The old rumor was that Anakin ignites his lightsaber to intimidate him but Obi-Wan uses a Jedi mind trick to enter.

9.Anakin Hits Dooku
The fightscene between Dooku and Anakin. There is a part when Anakin gets angry and finally manages to hurt Dooku is also cut.


10. Just Another Day at the Office
In the arena, just before Anakin asks Obi-Wan "What About Padme?" (which Obi responds "she seems to be on top of things". Obi-Wan tells Anakin "Take the one on the right. I'll take the one on the left."....I love that one-liner. It just demonstates how even the arena is just another day in the office for a jedi knight.

11. Mace and Yoda Chat
In the screenplay (art of AOTC book) it lists scene 014 and 015, which were missing from the film (015 was a select image) Mace and Yoda in the Jedi temple corridor at night. Mace asks Yoda why they could not detect the attack on Amidala. They talk about how the dark side is growing in power and the prophecy coming true.

12. The End for You
Durning the final battle between Yoda and Dooku, originally yoda was to knock his lightsaber out of his hands, to stand on his head, and to say:The end for you, Count, this is. He aims the lightsaber above his head, preparing to stab, when dooku knocks him aside, and then lets the crane fall on Obi Wan and Annie. Originally, yoda was set to get under the crane, pushing it up from underneath, but that was later changed.

VERY ESPECIALLY THIS SCENE ! IT WAS IMPORTANT TO CLEARLY ESTABLISH YODA AS THE ULTIMATE MASTER.

Now I realize thats a lot of scenes, and would mean a good 20 minutes more to the movie at least ... but I feel the movie would have been substantially better from the point of view of storyline and screenplay, had these scenes been left in. To save in added time, I feel some of the love story scenes could have been trimmed ... I agree with Queeq ... the movie does drag during some of the love story portions, and these could use some editing.

A couple of other places where I felt the movie fell short ...

Firstly, Anakin came across a precocious young brat of a jedi padawan ... not as an exceptionally skilled young jedi ... and I think somehow, the latter SHOULD have been focussed on because .....

Secondly, by the end of the movie, he's still a LONG way from the sinister Darth Vader ... in the third part, there won't be enough time to show him as being a " Powerful Jedi ", as Yoda would later describe him to his son, and his fall to the dark side as well ... because his fall cannot be a sudden overnight thing, but a gradual process from light to darkness.

Therefore his jedi prime should have been focussed on more ... the wild driving in the chase scene does not do enough to show him as the " best starpilot in the galaxy " ... etc.etc. So by the time of episode 3, the focus can be on his fall entirely.

1. Don't Talk Back
They should have let that one in! It had one of the best lines in AOTC!!!

2. The Lost 20
Would be good if they had let it in, explains Dooku a bit more

4. More Remorse for Tusken Slaughter
The "more human" thing is very important IMO; it shows the love between the two and Anakin only being human and no super god

8. Bar Bouncer
It shows the dark side of anakin

9.Anakin Hits Dooku
good because it shows Anakin is already a good fighter

Those are the most important ones I think, if they shortened the love scenes they would have made room for scenes like "Don't talk back"

I dunno... do you really think the Lost 20 bit is necessary?

well, #3 would be over the top, but #2 would explain why Dooku chose that path and help us understand him, also enlarger the role of the librarian and gives more info on the JC

It just struck me as a rather unnecessary concept. I mean, if it had gone in, fine, but as deleted scenes go it wouldn't be one I would be crying for re-inclusion.

Well it does add to his mystique ... to hear that he was at one time actually a " Great ", " Noble " Jedi ... actually one of the good guys. It makes the viewer wonder more why he went over to the darkside.

Also not 100% certain of the accuracy of all that stuff. Not sure how well TFN seperated fact from fiction. The two sabres, the Lost 20, the Padme negotiating, that is all very kosher, but we have little or no evidence to support the Anakin cutting Dooku or Yoda getting the better of Dooku

Well Anakin nicking Dooku before being overwhelmed would have been a nice touch I feel ...

But I definitely feel that Yoda's superiority over Dooku should have been more clearly established.

Hmm, really not sure about that myself, I prefer it the way it is, but never mind.

Actually, maybe Lucas had a definite reason for not showing Yoda as terribly superior to Dooku ... wonder what.

Oh yeah, and one more thing ... I think he could have dispensed with the 3PO comedy hour special, smack in the middle of the battle in the arena ... with things moving at a mile a minute, when I was trying to catch as much of the detail as possible, in the middle of all the mayhem ( the third and fourth time, I was consciously trying to keep my attention on the background ), C-3PO wasn't funny - he was just plain irritating ... keeping him as comic relief in the midst of that extremely fast paced battle sequence was a bad move I think, because, at that point, ( I speak subjectively here ), I really wasnt in a mood for those silly jokes - so the humour objective wasn't realized - and those silly jokes only served in distracting me, so it worked contrary to the punch that the battle sequence was supposed to deliver. It lost out both ways. He should have done the 3PO comedy routine elsewhere, if he HAD to have it.

Ush, we have a few pictures to proof these scenes... accept the Dooku gettin hit part... never heared of that one before

and harm... it's about the same like in RotJ were 3PO and R2 get in the middle of the battle and they casual walk to the bunker

Have to agree with Harmax on the last point. I was getting caught up in the emotion of the battle and 3po kept jumping in with those silly lines...it was frustrating.

Errr... do you mean 'scene' singular, Yerss? Because if you ay there is nothing about Dooku being hit then there was only one other thing I said was bad, which is the Yoda beating him bit, which I have never seen any evidence for.

The other bits I described as 'kosher', as in I knew they had been filmed.

3PO's lines were pretty bad in the arena.... I agree. Pretty much Cringe City.

"What a drag." *being dragged by R2*
"I am quite beside myself" *head next to body*

I mean, get a real writer next time to do the comedy.

I was talking about harmax (first) post, that there is proof that they are shot

Ah...

There's about four hours of filmstory filmed. McCallum confirmed that.

I wouldn't trust McCallum on EVERYTHING ...

I'm sure like TPM, some of those scenes will be added into the actual film when its released on DVD, and many others will be on the special features DVD.

I sure hope so. Especially Anakin's Tusken slaughter ... that has been really edited down in the film, and I can understand the rationale ... difficult to sell to many miniature figures of a guy shown to kill women and children ... and the censorship issues ... it wouldn't have got a PG-13 rating. But, for the DVD, I hope they include an uncut version of that scene. It's essential to the storyline.

Well, the by-some-untrusted-producer of SW also said most of the four hours will probably be on the DVD. So I'm looking forward to that.

I was wondering though... would there be so much additional footage of the OT?
Sometimes I get the feeling the OT was much better thought out in advance and they cut only minor storylines. With the PT I get the feeling GL wants to tell too much and is trying to find some balance in everything he wants to tell. I was watching ESB last night and it struck how well everything works and how well it is paced. I still find that missing in the PT so far.

Yes, I totally agree with queeq here, (even though skaters from his country are doped )

" Sometimes I get the feeling the OT was much better thought out in advance and they cut only minor storylines. With the PT I get the feeling GL wants to tell too much and is trying to find some balance in everything he wants to tell. I was watching ESB last night and it struck how well everything works and how well it is paced. I still find that missing in the PT so far. "

Couldn't agree more with you queeq. The flow of the storyline in all the OT movies was seamless. That's not happening as well with the PT. In fact, for me, this is more so for AOTC, than TPM ... inspite of all the criticism levelled on it, TPM, for me was a really good movie in that respect.

The problem with the PT movies is, Lucas is dealing on a much larger canvas, a much larger scale ... and 2 hours 20 minutes, just isn't enough time to get everything in ... the problem with trying to tell too much, in too little time is ... it just becomes cluttered and there is too much information for the audience to imbibe. At the scale that Lucas is now telling the story, the movies would have to be of truly epic length, like Lawrence of Arabia, or Dr.Zhivago etc.

It's still a really cool movie ... that's why I saw it 4 times. But it's these small things ( cluttered flow of the storyline, dragging the love story part, cutting some scenes that provide that different colour etc.etc. ) that make the difference between a really good fun movie, and a spectacular motion picture, that people will see over and over again with pleasure even 20 years after it was made ... or even 40 ... or the difference between 300 million dollars at the BO or 350 .....

For that matter by the end of my life I will have watched TPM many more times than AOTC ....

On the idea that we all broadly agree that the PT is a bit crammed, which of the major plotlines do you think would have been best removed?

I think more than removing plotlines, it's more about trying to integrate them more harmoniously, so they complement each other, and the storyline as a whole flows more seamlessly ... so that instead of a clutter of too many things happening too fast, and too much information to process being handed out in too short a time, it becomes like a logical progression from one thing to the next, and the different storylines getting told in such a process so naturally, that one doesnt even realize that 3/4 different story arcs have just taken place.

It would involve doing something more than just simplistically using wipes to flit between three different concurrent storylines.

He seemed to get away with having two seperate stories in ESB, though. Hmm.

Another director is needed.

Better editor

I think you're a little too late on that one.

It becomes a cliche in the very moment Vader say it for the first time.

Something cool that is said once and repeated several times by fans.

Speaking of fans, go to the official site and look at the new JC question. For one thing, it's my question and the last part is kind of funny in an offensive sort of way

I find it VERY funny and not offensive at all









At least he talk about me!!

Maybe it's not so much a problem of removing plotlines.... maybe it's just a matter of dosage HOW you tell it. I've argued before that I find ESB 'feels' much more romantic than AOTC, but it has a lot less romantic air time. It's just much more effecrtive and feels more genuine. I sometimes feel GL has difficulty finding balancing in stressing what bits of the story require more time and what bits can be done with less time.

I spoke with my brother briefly about it. We don't see each other often and he's not really a SW fan, but he's always liked it. And he found the first half of AOTC "too much talk". I was a bit surprised about that remark, but thinking about it a bit I do feel he has a point? Not that talking is bad, but there is the problem with both TPM and AOTC that hal;fway the movie you're still wondering what it's all about. Now THAT was never a problem in the OT, it was always very clear:
1. ANH: Princess captured, heroes go and save her and help rebellion that way
2. ESB: Empire retaliates big time on rebels as heroe Luke is becoming mighty foe of evil Empire
3. ROTJ: rebels and Luke win the day...

Now try doing that with the PT...

1) TPM: Queen captured, heroes go and save her and her planet, and help the Senate that way
2) AOTC: A Clone army is made without anyone knowing except the makers, they go to war, and people talk a lot.
3) Ep. III: We don't know yet because GL hasn't revealed anything except that we all know that Vader is the new Sith on the block.

I thought it would be cool if Dooku fought with two sabers. That would have been cool kept in.

McCallum says 4 hours?! He's prone to being a bit of a liar, but there is nothing "spoilerific" about deleted scenes. I think there might be around a few hours. They did have a lot of stuff not shown in the movie.

Actually Rex, that does NOT work. That is what the MOVIE turns out to be about, it's not always clear in the film that it is indeed about THAT. THose things develop in due course of the film and you know by the end.

Here's what we know from the beginning of the PT's so far:
1. Trade confllict, Jedi come in to solve it.
(But the movie is more also finding a boy of a Jedi prophecy, an evil Sith lord manipulating people, Queen fighting back, Palpy rises slowly to power)
2. Republic is in danger, a separatist movement is trying to take over with renegade Jedi Dooku, Jedi must protect Amidala
(But the movie is more about how Palpy uses a bounty hunter to create a clone army which is to be the republic army, at the same time he pulls the strings in the separatist movement to destroy all power structures in the republic and to rise to more power, and also about Anakin falling in love and slowly falling to the Dark Side)

This is a big difference.

and GL is going to direct EpIII too, so joy to the world you can say that about EPIII again...

Perhaps people hyped up AOTC too much? Like they did with TPM?

I dunno. People say that. But I hadn't watched ESB for a year or so. And TPM and AOTC a couple of times in between.... THere are certainly differences.

Maybe it has to do with the set=up of the OT. I feel the actors had much more input then. I know about ANH and ESB that there were numerous occasions were people like Ford changed lines and other little things. Just enough to add to the right touch. But the schedule is so hectic and most of it in front of blue screens, less in actual sets than in those days, that there's no time for that.

Still, AOTC is a huge improvement to TPM, so if EPIII relates in that way to AOTC we have a kick-@$$ film to look forward to.

I feel that this PT is full of polithical conflict, what makes the plot A LOT more difficult to unfold, and requires re-readings until the truth is clear.

The OT had 2 sides clearly profiled:
- The empire, bad guys, high technology, great dark powers. They are not pulling the chords from behind. They are RULING the galaxy.
- The rebels, a mixture of all society levels, scavengin technology from whatever sources to confront the darkness.

On the PT we don't have this confrontation clearly defined: The BADBADBOY is pulling the chords very slowly, and at the same time, is doing a role of a good guy side by side with the heros.

That's why i think that the plot is not easily shrinked as the ones of the OT.

And as a pollithical posture, I think that the PT is VERY GOOD. I don't think that Lucas wanted to tell a story that he already did. He is taking us to the "backstage" of the Old Republic", where we can see not just what is on the surface.

If only none of the scenes had been cut from the movie....

than it would be too long and too boring

I still feel some of those scenes would have a big difference in terms of the story.

I'm waiting for the DVD in November .....

well, pick your choice, four won't reach the DVD, perhaps they can't the Jocasta scenes as one?

Why won't four reach the DvD????????

nono, four SCENES

and I already said my opinion in another thread that they might consider a few as one big scene

I like the news that they are also going to give explanations for each cut scene, as to why the scene was cut.

that's what they did with EpI DVD too

I wouldn't have minded a 3 hour episode 2. Episode 3 would also make a great 3 hour film. However, it wouldn't fit the typical 2 hour length, and for years they've been referring to star wars as a 12 hour movie, not a 14 hour movie.

Pity though. The stories in Episode 2 and 3 deserve as much as 4 hours!

well, perhaps you can hope that because there is a lot to say, it will be well packed

I thought Episode 1 and 2 were great, and packed with a great story and great action etc. Not quite sure how ppl don't see the big picture when complaining about the political aspect of TPM. I think the political stuff is what gives the movie it's depth.

I'm worried about how they're going to tell all the story they need tot ell in one film.

It's true. The PT movies are much more complex in terms of storyline than the OT ... and there are too many details, plot, subplots ... to try and fit them into 2 hours 20 odd minutes, withouth the whole screen play becoming way to " busy " ...