Fan-Edit: Evolution

by Mollo

Not happy with the ending in Casablanca? Why not change it? Or maybe Ben Hur could lose in that chariot race? How about the Matrix sequels being turned into one cyber-punk epic with a new ending? What about a Spider-Man 3 without the embarrassing dance sequences? Hold on! That’s already been done.

What is happening on the Internet right now is that the public are re-editing every conceivable motion picture to better suit their desires. With the introduction of domestic editing suites like iMove, Premiere, Vegas and Final Cut Pro people are re-editing movies at a furious rate. Straight to the cutting room floor… sorry…. bedroom floor goes all that Hollywood schmaltz, the endless death scenes, irreverent comedy, propaganda and poor special effects. Re-envisioned or carefully restored these versions have become known as Fan-Edits and there popularity is growing rapidly. The Fan-Edit Website (FanEdit.org) has over 300 re-edits to choose from and most genres are covered.

Hollywood studios have done all they can to stop the duplication of their work. Penalties for owning an unauthorized copy of Batman for instance, can get you locked in jail for years and fined half a million dollars. In most cases Hollywood copyright infringement has stricter penalties than for violent or even sexual crime. File sharing on the Internet, the demon in the eye of the studios, allows media to be passed freely from person to person without restriction or regulation. So the result is that digital entertainment and information has become truly free. Movies, once released are ripe for conversion.

George Lucas’s revisionist tendencies have undoubtedly encouraged the Fan-Editor. A version of the Star Wars Special Edition has now appeared on the Internet that painstakingly corrects all the faulty special effects, adds some subtle new ones and loses most of the offending scenes. Even the sound and titles have been restored or improved. It took one fan, working alone, over two years to complete this mammoth task and he has created what amounts to an authoritative version of the film.

I asked this devoted Fan-Editor, who goes by the name Adywan, how he became aware of the Fan-Edit?

“About 2 years ago a friend of mine showed me a Star Wars Fan-Edit and I loved the imagination that had gone into creating it. I then found OriginalTrilogy.com and discovered that there was a whole fan-edit community out there.”

Why did you feel the need to re-visit Star Wars after Lucas had released his Special Editions?

“It seemed to me that it looked rushed and new shots were added just to show off what they could do with computer graphics. Then when the DVD versions finally came out in 2004 the new colouring to the film was horrible and the 1997 additions really stuck out like a sore thumb. I had so many ideas so I decided I would do own edit and it just grew from there.”

How have the studios reacted to your Fan-Edit?

“I don’t know. I’m not sure if anyone from the studios would have even seen it. I guess it would be nice if George Lucas had seen it and liked what I had done to his movie.”

Why do you think that Fan-Edits are growing in popularity?

“I think it is mainly because we live in the digital age. Most people have a PC at home and its to easy use some pretty good editing software. Before I started my Star Wars Revisited edit, I had never even attempted to do any sort of visual effects work. The Internet is a major player in the rise in popularity of the Fan-Edit. More people know about this community now and can freely discuss ideas and seeing other people edits gives them the incentive to create their own.”

How does it make you feel re-visioning somebody else’s work?

“Well to be honest I have always wanted to be a filmmaker and creating my edit is probably the closest I’m ever going to get to that dream, so a Fan-Edit is next best thing. I do feel a bit of a cheat though because all the hard work was already done for me.”

What is the Fan-Edit that has impressed you most?

“There are a couple that are in production, right now, that I am really looking forward to: “Shadows of the Dark Side” and “Star Wars Reborn”.

George Lucas has been credited with Star Treks jump to the big screen. He must also be credited for the cause of the Fan-Edit. His last three Star Wars sequels were so poorly received by fans, that they could not wait to get out of the cinema and onto their laptops to start savagely cutting.

The Matrix sequels were another great disappointment to the majority of fans of the original film. As a result there is a huge array of Matrix Fan-Edits available. There is Matrix Dezionized, Matrix Evolutions, Matrix Squared and Matrix Regenerated to name but a few and each tries desperately to invoke some of the originality and ethos of the original movie.

Star Trek and Star Wars are the most popular subjects for revisionism but there are a surprising variety of other films that have been subjected to the Fan-Edit treatment. The Big Sleep has been extended by 8 minutes with extra scenes from the 1945 pre-release version and the theatrical release of The Natural starring Robert Redford has been extended by 12 minutes, using extra scenes from the television version. Sergio Leone’s The Good The Bad and The Ugly and Once Upon A Time In The West have had scenes restored that were cut for different international markets and in doing so have created even longer versions than are officially available. Terrence Malick’s The Thin Red Line is now a war movie with 41 minutes of flashbacks, wildlife and soliloquies cut.

A few Fan-Edits are raw hack-jobs but others are professionally executed with new scores, special effects, titles and narrative. The Fan-Edit as a medium is in its infancy but there is no denying that it is a blossoming Art-Form. It is moving beyond restoration or self-appeasement to become a force in its own right, a new form of entertainment with an eager public. One day a Fan-Edit might well be more successful than the original studio release.

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