Petty's Purist LotR Edits

"Aragorn and Arwen
on the bridge,
Oh how romantic! -
unless you're a fridge!"

Errol Flynn: "Thoughts when zipped up, not down."

Wise Odo

I think Flynn's work was better when his thoughts were zipped down not up.

I find it quite reprehensible, Mr Tyrant, that you should twist and twirl Wisey's channelings in such a sordid and saucy manner! I know what you're getting at! Wisey clearly did not mean what you mean when he mentions Errol Flynn and zips up and zips down! Have you no sense of the metaphoric!!!!!

For the longest time I found a lot of the LOTR actors, and especially Ian McKellen, to have terribly poor enunciation and I just hold a lot of mumble-mumble-possibly-fake*-british-accent in many lines. I'm able to understand a lot more now though, possibly from watching the films so many times. Sub-titles would have been helpful, and as an anime fan I don't mind them, but I have the same problem with preemption, especially when the grammar is different so in the original there's a dramatic pause, whereas the reveal is at the beginning of the subtitled sentence. Sometimes they distract me from the visuals as well.

*In the case of Elijah Wood, at least.

Ringdrotten wrote:The beard had over 3000 posts on the original forum, hence the Wannabe Beard rank

And he always stayed 300 or 400 posts ahead of me, no matter how much I spammed!

((( FAUX GEORDIE ACCENT))) Its day 3 in the Big Edit House and Petty is going mad at not being able to use his pc. Petty has been rendering LotR for two days now and is entering the final 10 hour stretch, but will he make it? Or will his increasing crabbit attacks and the prospect of having to watch all 8hrs 20mins back to check for mistakes that could be as small as a single frame drive him finally insane? Stay tuned to find out in the Big Edit House.

You're Petty. of course it will drive yoou insane

Good point!

(its at the Grey Havens- roughly 40mins to go!!!!!)

im hungry
I WANT MY CHICKEN DIPPERS!!!
MUM!!!!

Squach wrote:im hungry
I WANT MY CHICKEN DIPPERS!!!
MUM!!!!

It's weird, when I was young and before I ever considered becoming vegetarian, I used to love chicken nuggets!! Much nicer than most veggie dishes!!!

What's going on here? Is this the restaurant thread? no! And Ally why be vegetarian? Hopefully its not on some wimpy its cruel to eat animals thing- life is life, no less cruel to eat plants!

Anyway back to important matters- the mega-edit is FINISHED!!!!!
Now I've just got to watch it, recompress it to a smaller size and make it into a dvd! Bugger.

Yummy

Good news, Petty

Yeah glad its done I can switch my pc off tonight so it doesn't melt! Been on for nearly 3 days straight.

Final film is exactly 8hrs 16mins long and 10.8gig in size.

I had a pet carrot but my pet rabbit ate it. I ate my pet rabbit as punishment, and nourishment - one must not see things too narrowly no matter how specific the Moral one is spruiking - but my rabbit tasted of carrot, and so I was punished too (and nourished?) with guilt. Sin is very nourishing. It must be. Born Again Christians seem to live on it - well, sort of. Anyway, it was all very sad and bizarre in a sense, like this post, eating my rabbit, that is, but no more sad (or bizarre) than my rabbit eating my carrot. You know folks, if we drank only water we would soon have no guilt. I'm not sure how long "soon" is. Does anyone know how long one can live just drinking water? Maybe I should have said "sooner or later", as "soon" is not a very definite thing, time-wise. A bit like elvish time... all this... I don't how many gig this is though. Here to help!

You can last a while on buckie- but then its a meal in a bottle, albeit a highly alcoholic one.

Talking of buckie I watched Fotr and most of TT of the mega-edit looking for mistakes. I had a pad and pen at the ready to note anything I wanted to change. I think describing the notes will suffice to explain how it went.
For a start they are numbered 1,2,3,4,5,6,6,8,10.
They start neat and organized; 1. Move '17 years later' lower down screen.
My crabbitness and mood by the end are well captured by note 10 the final one I made before collapsing into blissful sleep. Its a scrawl even I can barely read but it says; 10. Gollum Smeagol transition f***ed.
So more work to do yet sadly!!

I've made a change to the opening- apart from dropping the prologue- I've added the Ring verse- "Three rings for the elf..." etc as read by Tolkien with visuals and music from the prologue and put it between the Miramax titles and the main LotR title. Wish PJ had thought of that as its been a bugger to get right!!

Nice touch! Sounding better and better

Right got a choice to make and would like some thoughts. I've uploaded two different version of the Ring-verse intro to the skydrive.

IntroA is read by Tolkien.
+'s its Tolkien.
- he is not always distinct, the recording is not great quality, he tends to trail off at the end of sentences.

IntroB is read by Michel Hordern from the radioplays.
+'s Its theatrical and enunciated.
- its set in Bag End by an open window there's some bird tweeting in the background.

Both versions still need some sound balancing done I know! But would appreciate anyone given them a viewing and saying which they prefer (not liking either is not an option! Well it is, you can, but I'm putting one of them in so you may as well pick one!)

Watched both.

Like both!

Don't know which I prefer. I like the Tolkien one right up until he rushes straight through the last two lines (wondered if you had cut the audio between first and second line to match Audio - I think maybe a visual cut there might work well - although I understand that this might affect the music). I actually prefer his reading through, somehow sounds more sombre.

On the second one, I didn't notice the tweeting until I specifically listened for it so it's not so bad. I did however feel it gave a better finish to the intro.

Final point on the visuals - titles, I think it should lift straight to the Lords of the Rings from the visuals with the other little bits before them, although it maybe that this is purely due to expectation from PJs prologue!

(of course I undersand I'm getting picky, it's your edit and you've already invested hours in it, feel very priviledged to be able to see it, so disregard anything that is me getting too picky )

You are never too picky Kafria- just helpful. I am very grateful to those who have taken the time to watch my pet project. It has been very helpful.

I have much the same feelings about the Tolkien one as you, its great except he rushes a couple of lines and it kills the end of it.

With regard the titles I did have it as you suggest, with the Wingnut films presents etc right at the start before going into the visuals- the reason I moved that bit to after was it seemed too rushed and sudden as the LotR title is only a few seconds long.It just seemed to need a bit more time before starting Bilbo's Concerning Hobbits prologue.

Again thanks for taking the time (although asking a women which she prefers is a bit like asking an elf- they will say both yea and nay )

I'd go with the Tolkien version, loved it The other one was good too, but Tolkien's reading was great (especially the part about Men).

SPOILER: Do not continue reading if you are going to watch Petty's RotK edit and don't want the whole thing spoiled by me beforehand!




Watched the RotK edit! First things first, liked the new beginning (however, El Señor de los Anillos was unexpected ). Opening with Arwen going back was a good idea, good thinking Your opening was also much closer to the book (no surprise there, I guess ) with Gandalf and Pippin riding to Minas Tirith that early in the film - thumbs up Putting all the Gandalf & Pippin scenes in Minas Tirith together was also nice, made the film much tidier. Another thing I liked about your Minas Tirith scenes was when you showed that fleeting image of a Palantir when Denethor says "Do you think the eyes of the White Tower are blind?". That was brilliant

Gothmog - didn't even notice he was missing! Some really good edit work there, I can't remember anything that showed that the scenes with him had been removed. Both the attack on Osgiliath and the Battle of the Pelennor were much better without him, never liked that character too much.

The beacons - putting that scene in the middle of the attack on Osgiliath was both cool and clever - you made it look like Denethor suddenly realises his danger and lights the beacons himself. Much better than Pippin doing it, and it doesn't make Denethor look like he's lost it completely.

I noticed you managed to fit in quite a lot of Arwen/Rivendell scenes without ruining the flow, which was nice. The scene where Arwen comes back to Rivendell works great without the reforging business, and the same goes for Aragorn riding away to the Paths of the Dead without first speaking to Erlond at Dunharrow. I can't imagine people who've not seen Jackson's edit will ever notice there was more to those scenes than what is shown in your edit. Good job

The scene where Pippin tries to save Faramir and Denethor releases him from his service - I'm assuming this scene was meant to be black, and that it was Faramir who was listening to what was being said (I think you might have mentioned this earlier, though I can't really remember)? Assuming that's what you meant: excellent! Have you done something to the sound in that scene to make for example Denethor dragging Pippin away sound more distant? Might have imagined that, but sounded different to Jackson's cut. The Pyre of Denethor was also ten times better. The whole thing is just messy and silly in the original edit.

In fact, the film turned out much better after you removed all the silly bits. I don't really mind those bits, but they're far from necessary and the films are better without them. For example, removing Gimli's ridiculous behaviour in the Paths of the Dead, Eowyn and Legolas single-handedly taking down Mumakils and the silly Pippin scenes are scenes you don't exactly miss.

Arwen dropping the book after Aragorn drops that jewel thingy - nice! Don't know how you came up with that, but it was a great idea and it worked great

The biggest difference, I guess, was that there is no intercutting in your edit. I suspected after a while that you would put all the Frodo scenes together, and wasn't quite sure how that would work. However, when I saw it my worries vanished: I loved it Worked much better than I had thought. The good thing about it is that your edit isn't as messy as Jackson's version. There are too many different stories and places/persons of importance in RotK for intercutting to work, you get both confused and annoyed with it. Also, the fact that there were fewer scenes with Frodo was a huge plus

I wonder, though, why did you remove the scene where Denethor is hallucinating (when he sees Boromir walking towards him). Not that I dislike it, I quite liked your version, but just wondering. Was it to make Denethor appear less mad?

Another thing, I thought you might have removed Pippin's line "he called us out to fight" (right before he saves Gandalf from that orc). Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm assuming he means Denethor, and Denethor didn't call them out to fight, he ordered them to flee. This is one of Jackson's stupid ideas that make no sense, and aren't cool either. I love his films, but some scenes just make my own crabbit meter spin. A similar example is Gandalf in FotR saying "There are many powers in the world, for good or for evil. Some are greater than I am. Against some I have not yet been tested" (my quote might not be entirely correct, but you know what scene I'm talking about). That line has been taken out of context, and makes no sense in Jackson's film. An equally senseless line is Saruman's in RotK (or in your TT edit): "Something festers in the heart of Middle Earth. Something that you have failed to see. But the great eye has seen it". Maybe I'm not understanding or missing something here, but what is Saruman referring to here? What's "festering" in Middle earth besides Sauron and his evil?

Anyway, another excellent edit! My favourite so far I think (I say so far, as I suspect there might be some Hobbit movie edits at a later time ) A much tidier version without the intercutting, and less of the silly bits - both made the film more enjoyable. The fact that it was an hour and a half shorter didn't exactly hurt either, though the length of Jackson's film isn't something that I mind. Thanks for uploading

Thanks for watching RIngdrotten, makes it seem so much more worth it at 4 in the morning with matchsticks propping my eyes open as I try to edit!

"El Señor de los Anillos was unexpected"- lol, yeah I had a problem with my EE dvd, its got a scratch so rather than go out and buy it again I admit I just d it this time and used that to work from (in the mega edit theres only the LotR title at the start so its n ot a problem).

Ive improved the beacon bit a bit in the new cut by using the set up shots of the main Gondor beacon and enlarging the screen so that Pipinn climbing it is out of frame, makes it a little smoother going into it.

"I'm assuming this scene was meant to be black"-umm, no. I didnt know it was black, although I like your reasoning for it- a render glitch only!

"Don't know how you came up with that, but it was a great idea and it worked great"- the bit where Aragorn looks in the palantir to challenge Sauron sparked it- Arwens wearing the same clothes in the palantir as she is in that scene, making me suspect in the original script they were somehow linked already. It certainly seems to fit there rather seamlessly and I wanted to try to keep the Aragorn story focused on his love for Arwen.

As to not intercutting Rotk, I had two main reasons for this, firstly I like the Mouth of |Sauron (though not Aragorn negotiating tactics- not auspicous for the future king!) and it works better if the viewer doesn;t know Frodo's fate. And secondly there is so little Frodo stuff to cut to and some of it, remarkably is only a minute or two long as individual bits meaning there would be huge gaps of Gondor stuff between Frodo bits, seemed just better all round to put it all together.

"Was it to make Denethor appear less mad?"- yes, he's a raving loon in PJ's version. That and Pj believes his audicience has an attention span of a gnat which is why I also removed the Pippin flashback to Boromirs death when Denthor brings it up as its unnecessary.

"he called us out to fight"- maybe it was an offscreen Beregrond! Yeah it is a bit silly but he is seen just before hand marching out of the citadel with a group so smeone must have sent them out, the Captain of the Guard maybe.

"Something festers in the heart of Middle Earth. Something that you have failed to see. But the great eye has seen it". - hate that too. Its gone in the mega edit as is the stupid notion Gandalf doesn't know sauron is likely to attack Gondor. I think what Saruman is getting at is Denethor, he is the weakness festering at the heart of ME.

And thanks again- hope youve got the will power for the meagedit!! Its 3/4 of the way there- but still at least a week or two away from being a finished dvd (or 2 if I cant get the file size small enough).

"I'm assuming this scene was meant to be black"-umm, no. I didnt know it was black, although I like your reasoning for it- a render glitch only!


Try watching it with a black screen, worked great


As to not intercutting Rotk, I had two main reasons for this, firstly I like the Mouth of |Sauron (though not Aragorn negotiating tactics- not auspicous for the future king!) and it works better if the viewer doesn;t know Frodo's fate. And secondly there is so little Frodo stuff to cut to and some of it, remarkably is only a minute or two long as individual bits meaning there would be huge gaps of Gondor stuff between Frodo bits, seemed just better all round to put it all together.

A wise decision



"he called us out to fight"- maybe it was an offscreen Beregrond! Yeah it is a bit silly but he is seen just before hand marching out of the citadel with a group so smeone must have sent them out, the Captain of the Guard maybe.

Could be. I'll imagine that's what happened the next time I watch RotK, maybe it will be less painful then

Its gone in the mega edit as is the stupid notion Gandalf doesn't know sauron is likely to attack Gondor.

Thank god for that

And thanks again- hope youve got the will power for the meagedit!!

My pleasure And don't worry about my will power - I'll spare some for the megaedit