Is that how these directors cuts happen? Because directors can't decide what they want in their film?
Also, from what I understand, it is not that uncommon to have more footage than you'll use, because scenes are often put together from many takes from different angles, and shooting more than you strictly need does give you some freedom with editing, though 6 hours for a 2 hour movie seems excessive.
Edited by Redmess on Oct 26th 2021 at 5:36:56 PM
Hope shines brightest in the darkest timesSometimes it's a studio hack job, like Blade Runner, but a lot of them are the theatres saying 'we won't show a movie that's longer that 2h45min,' the director handing in a three and a half hour assembly, and the editor having to make decisions. Good directors account for this when they're filming, so that the movie doesn't lose coherence or impact if they have to drop a few scenes.
Pre-blockbuster era films could have intermissions. It's way easier to watch a 4 hour movie in 2 chunks with a 15 minute break than it is to watch a three hour 15 minute movie all in one go.
Some of it is also economics. a theatre can fit 3 showings of a 2 hour movie in primetime, but only 2 showings of a 3 hour movie. More showings=more tickets sold=more people buying concessions, so they prefer shorter films, and most distributers are willing to accommodate them.
It's actually often the opposite, studio mandated shots and sequences often bloat the filming process with material the director does not want and the movie doesn't really need. When it comes to a director they often shoot more than they need but then pare it down to what works best.
One example is the opening sequence of Revenge of the Sith, the original cut up to the landing of the capital ship was 45 minutes. The entire sequence was built to show the chaos of battle with one problem after another and in the editing selected which pairing of events flowed the best. Deleted scenes include Grievous executing Shaak-Ti, with Obi-Wan and Anakin escaping by cutting through the floor.
Conversely, both Amazing Spider-Man movies had a lot of material filmed on indecisive studio demands, famously Mary Jane was supposed to be in 2.
When it comes to Dune, while I can see some more exposition on events the movie is so carefully paced if anything it feels like they could have trimmed 15 minutes of desert scenery and visions and still tell the story.
Comics are just words and pictures. You can do anything with words and pictures.A really good director will generally film for the time they have.
You also get stuff like how Alien and Wonder Woman don't have deleted scenes so much as alternate scenes. Alien has a few scenes that can replace existing bits, but no wholesale cuts, and Wonder Woman has an alternate take of the No Man's Land sequence and pretty much everything else is on screen.
If you're shooting enough material for a five hour movie and you know you have 2/2.5 to actually work with, you're not doing your job correctly.
And yeah, shooting studio mandated stuff is a different situation.
Edited by Zendervai on Oct 26th 2021 at 12:26:46 PM
It should be said though that early cuts are often 50-75 percent longer than the final movie simply because it leaves all the excess fat and air in the scenes. Editors will cut out the beginning and ending of scenes for the final cut so that they get to the core purpose of the scene faster and on to the next part quicker. What's more telling is deleted subplots and characters that have little to do with the main story.
Comics are just words and pictures. You can do anything with words and pictures.The Snyder Cut of Justice League is actually a really good example of why a lot of stuff is cut out. It's certainly better than the theatrical release because it's more consistent, but it's also really obvious that it's more or less an assembly cut with completed special effects. There's a lot of dead time in the movie with scenes lasting too long and awkward pauses in dialogue and a lot of stuff that would normally be trimmed quite a bit. Also way too much slow-motion. It's legitimately way too long because it would be absolutely trivial to cut it down by an hour by just trimming scenes of dead air and dialing back the slow motion.
That's the thing. Shooting more than you need (to a reasonable level) is fine. Shooting extra for studio mandates isn't really up to the director. But when a director is specifically filming for a down the road director's cut, that's an actual problem. Cases like the Abyss (where Cameron demanded the theatrical version be the way cut down one because FX not being to the level he wanted meant he preferred a compromised story over one that looked terrible) or Kingdom of Heaven (where the really long cut is vastly superior to the theatrical cut) are very rare and even some of the ones held up as classic director's cuts (Aliens) have problems. Aliens, specifically, has most of the added footage in one huge chunk near the beginning, which slows the pace way down. It explains a lot the theatrical version doesn't, but the theatrical version is way snappier and has a much more consistent rhythm.
Villeneuve has a combination of the clout to demand a lot of control over the final product, plus the knowledge that a director's cut isn't guaranteed so the best approach is to make the theatrical cut the cut he wants.
On a practical level, for this film. I personally would have swapped a couple minutes of turmeric-tinted visions/footage of dragonfly copter wings for a bit more focus on Yueh and Wanna (there is a set photo going around supposedly of the former's conversation with Jessica). But it's a minor quibble.
Edited by Synchronicity on Oct 26th 2021 at 11:53:37 AM
However flawed the Hobbit movies were, I kind of enjoyed the way they took their time in telling the story because it felt more immersive and committed to the setting. TLOTR movies had a similar distinction in that the extended editions were expansions of the story rather than pure bloat. The Snyder Cut was probably as long as it was because it wanted to give as much material to the audience so they could judge for themselves, and it's kind of refreshing to watch a movie that isn't concerned with constantly moving to the next plot point but letting you appreciate the artistry being put on screen.
Getting back to Dune, the pacing and structure definitely reminds me more of those movies rather than the more glitzy blockbusters. I liked too how a lot of the shots of giant spaceships are obscured by the dust clouds, which is how it would look from the ground level.
Comics are just words and pictures. You can do anything with words and pictures.https://twitter.com/Legendary/status/1453058884516466691
Sequel is officially greenlit. Long live the fighters, baby
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AWESOME.
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Awwww man, I also want both of those things (and, even more utopian, the Giant Banquet Scene), but I do love me them sweeping long shots...
Also, I'm a ginormous fan of the Extended Cuts of LOTR and the Hobbit Movies, those are the only versions that exist to me, so the fact that we won't get one for Dune crushes me quite a lot
Edited by FellDeedsAwake on Oct 26th 2021 at 8:57:07 PM
Well, we did have the scene of Reverend Mother Mohiam scheming with the Harkonnens, and they explicitly mention she's the Emperor's personal Truthsayer; so she works as an emissary of the Emperor there. I'd say that's good enough, and, as we discussed before, not showing the Emperor in this movie was effective in building up his power and influence.
LOTR was a filmmaking gamble that paid off massively, in that the studio was willing to put up hundreds of millions of dollars to film them all back-to-back over a year or so. (It's what Villenueve wanted to do for this one too but the price tag for a difficult property understandably made Legendary skittish.) There was no waiting on the success of Fellowship.
Anyway, hoo yeah the spice must flow.
Edited by Synchronicity on Oct 26th 2021 at 2:30:43 PM
Yeah, LOTR was a last-ditch gamble by New Line to show something profitable and boy howdy did it work.
Glad that the sequel got greenlit, though. Guess it was successful enough streaming-wise that Warner Bros thought it was worth it.
Also yeah, at the point of the book that the movie stops at the Emperor is still a distant figure so it makes sense that we deal with his emissaries instead of him, for now.
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Turned out to be for the best. Yes, the actors have noticeably aged since filming the first part but it gives Villeneuve and the crew some time to see the response to see what they could fix and what they should keep doing for the second part. Peter Jackson is a much better filmmaker than Villeneuve and hit the ball right out of the park with how consistent he made the trilogy but that is very rare in this industry.
Plus, I'd argue that LOTR was far more difficult to adapt than Dune.
Edited by HBarnill on Oct 26th 2021 at 1:27:39 AM

Yeah, I'd be happy with the cut scenes; I'll do the work of mentally inserting them into the movie.