All right, Folks! Let the outrage begin! I present you with "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: Unholy Edition"...sure to piss off all lovers of Spielberg's original.
I never knew there was so much I disliked in this movie until I sat down to edit it and started asking for suggestions. Type12point posted an outline of an edit he'd been working on, so I carefully considered each of his listed changes, along with many other suggestions that were posted on the forum. Some of them great. Some of them impossible.
There were always a few things about the original that annoyed me, but for this edit I really tried to hold it up against Raiders whenever there was a doubt of whether or not to rework something. What I initially thought would be a pretty gentle edit turned out to be as drastic as my Temple of Doom edit. Though it still seems slightly lighter in tone when compared to Raiders, (thanks mostly to the whole premise of Indy running around with his dad.) I feel with a little editing, I've been able to turn it into a fun, dignified, slightly more serious and much more worthy sequel to Raiders.
Here's what makes it different from the original:
*) Added Lucasfilm Logo.
1) With apologies to River Phoenix and thanks to gaith1 for the courage of his suggestion, the entire Young Indy opening sequence was removed. Too much like a slaphappy Looney Tunes episode. Everything was too "on-the-nose" with the explanation of how he got the whip, how he got the hat, how he got the fear of snakes...the whole tone of that sequence was off. And the supporting actors were horrible. It's so off in fact, it makes me wonder if Lucas directed that portion himself. It was Lucas' way of getting a commercial in there for the TV series he had planned, and the few redeeming qualities of the sequence weren't enough to justify saving it. Anyway, the film is given new
life by being freed from this goofy and awkward beginning.
2) Instead, we start the film with the Paramount logo fading to a ship on the stormy high seas, which leads right into Indy getting punched in the face on the Coronado. I inserted shots from a different film to accomplish this, and I'm sure you'll all guess which one. (See Pics...)
3) New credits, obviously.
4) Removed white-suited villain's line "This is the second time I've had to reclaim my property from you," to avoid confusion.
5) Back at the college, removed Marcus Brody's line "...my treat..."
6) When they get to Venice, removed Indy's line "and my mother's ears, but the rest belongs to you." and then Elsa's response..."Looks like the best parts have already been spoken for."
7) Removed librarian comedy schtick in library. Now Indy simply grabs the brass rope stand and cracks open the floor.
8) Removed Indy's line in the tomb about the water being petroleum before promptly lighting a torch. Thanks to ShiftyEyes for the suggestion.
9) Removed Indy's line in the tomb about his father never making it past the rats. "He hates 'em." Too much symmetry. (Thanks Type12point.) We get the idea later when Connery asks, "Rats?" No need to beat us over the head with it.
10) During the end of the boat chase, Kazim shouts "My soul is prepared!" but doesn't ask Indy "How's yours?"
11) In Venice, Indy and Elsa kiss and drop below frame. They don't come back up to say "Ah, Venice."
12) Removed Indy and Elsa's conversation in the car outside the castle.
13) By popular demand, I removed Indy's Scottish-accent tapestry artist scene. Now we see an exterior of the castle followed by Indy and Elsa sneaking up to the Nazi control center.
14) When Vogel takes Elsa hostage, there was a little too much back-and-forth for me. Now, he simply says, "That's far enough. Put down ze gun or ze fraulein dies." Cut some of Connery's lines like "Don't worry he won't." Indy has much less time to make a decision now. "Enough! She dies!"
15) After Elsa says "I'm sorry." Removed Indy's line "Don't be."
16) Once captured and in front of Donovan, removed Connery's diatribe about how he knew Walter would "shell his mother...blah, blah, blah...to the shlime of Humanity."
17) Removed Connery's line about Marcus not being "up to the challenge".
18) Reordered the Marcus train station "punchline" scene: Marcus meets Sallah at the train station but we cut it at "Don't panic. Everything's under control." Then cut back to Indy and Dad tied up in the chair. We get the Austrian and German goodbyes. Then, when Indy tells his dad "Are you kidding? Marcus got lost in his own museum once." we cut back to Marcus and Sallah meeting the Nazi director of antiquities guy. Cut the stupid bow the guy gives Marcus. They ask for Sallah's papers. Sallah looks at them and says "Papers?"and we cut back to Indy and Dad tied up, "Can you try and reach my left jacket pocket?"
19) Reordered a few shots in the fireplace scene to fix some awkward editing and poor music-editing in the original and to eliminate the "Dad! What? DAD! What??? DAD!!! WHAT???" comedy routine.
20) The fireplace flips only once now before the Nazis notice them. Thanks to Type12point for suggesting it.
21) Removed the gag with Indy tumbling down the stairs after "a solution presents itself". Now he simply says "Come on, Dad!", Nazis pursue and the next time we see them, they're riding out of the crate on the motorbike.
22) After the motorcycle chase, I re-edited the scene with them arguing about whether or not to go to Berlin. Cut Connery's speech about "the armiesh of darknesh" marching all over "the facesh of the Earth". I like this scene
so much more now. It's far less preachy and they're going to Berlin to get the diary back for the wealth of info it contains...not just the three simple-to-remember booby trap clues. Thanks to gaith1 for the suggestion.
23) Removed the "No ticket!" scene. It's cute...but, no.
24) Reworked the dogfight sequence. Now, there's no dogfight at all. ME109's swoop in and shoot them down, then one pursues them on the ground with strafing fire. (Thanks, gaith1 and Kolpitz!)
25) Removed the ME109 flying into the tunnel. What pilot would be that stupid? Plus, the special effects are extremely dated and the plane passing them in the next lane is just ridiculous. In my version, the plane chases them down the road, pulls up, then turns around and drops the bomb.
26) Removed the King of Hatay's lines about "Tanks"..."You're welcome."
27) Removed Conney's lines in the back of Sallah's car. "Now they have the map." (We already know that.) "And in this short of racesh, there'sh no shilver medal for finishing shecond."
28) Removed Donovan's line "Care to wet your whistle, Marcus?" and Brody's response, "I'd rather spit it in your face. But seeing as I haven't got any spit..."
29) Removed Connery and Brody's thing, whatever it was, about "That genius of the restoration, aid our own recussitation", nonsense. Now it appears the Nazis captured Connery and brought him into the tank.
30) Cut one of Vogel's slaps, "What are you hiding?"...so that on the third (instead of the fourth) slap, Connery responds.
31) Cut Indy and Sallah's argument about "No camels..." What was all that about anyway? It brought all the momentum that had been building in the scene to a complete standstill.
32) I wanted desperately to cut Connery squirting the pen in the Nazi's face. But there was no way to do it and still keep the continuity. The guy had ink all over his face later on, and what he did impacted the rest of the scene, and there was just no way. So, that's my one caveat with this edit. But, at least we could lose Marcus' cringeworthy line "the pen is mightier than the sword," which was the real offender of this film and probably my main inspiration for making this edit.
34) Removed Vogel stomping on Indy's fingers while he's holding on to the tank. Now, he just goes right for the shovel. Much more vicious.
35) Removed Connery's and Brody's lines about "It's a war!" and "Didn't I tell you this was a rescue?" This was the equivalent of C-3PO and R2-D2 in the Attack of the Clones end battle.
36) Removed Connery asking "Where's Marcus?" on the top of the tank when he just watched him fall off.
37) Removed Indy and Connery yelling "Dad!, Junior!, DAD!, JUNIOR!"
38) Removed Indy shouting "Sallah! Get Dad!" And then Sallah's line "Father of Indy! Give me your hand!"
39) Removed Vogel's ridiculous close-up "Dr. Strangelove" death scene shot (by request of GAD).
40) Removed Connery's exposition about how he "never told him anything. Five minutes would've been enough." I feel Connery's face, being the actor he is, says all of this in subtext without him having to vocalize it. He also says to Indy later "I thought I'd lost you, Boy..." So I think that says it all.
41) Removed Sallah's and Brody's reaction shots to Indy and Dad's hug. This was their moment, brief as it was, and doesn't need to have shots of Marcus making goofy faces crowbarred into it.
42) At Petra, Marcus still has a gun pointed in his face, but he doesn't do all the nodding comedy schtick.
43) Removed a couple of Connery's "Penitent, penitent..." lines. Don't worry, there's still plenty. You won't even notice.
44) Removed Connery's joke, "but in Latin, Jehovah begins with an I". Indy tells us the same thing two seconds later.
45) In the final scene, I removed possibly the worst line of the entire movie..."Indy! Henry! Follow me! I know the way! AaaahhhHHHH!" Poor Marcus. I also had to take out a couple of brief shots of Indy's horse catching up with Marcus' and replace them with title cards.
46) Added a tribute to the cast in the end credits.
Runtime: 1hr 44min.
Format: NTSC, 16:9 widescreen
Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround
I also took the constructive criticism of from my Temple of Doom DVD and improved the scene selection menus. Each scene is numbered and titled now and only four chapters per page.
The first copy of this will be mailed to Throwgncpr, TJDavis1138, and Sluggo tomorrow. From there, I'm assuming
(hoping) it will filter through to the usual channels of distribution so that you guys can see this real soon.
All the best,
--InfoDroid
