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Licence Revoked - A 007 edit by Last Survivor

LastSurvivor

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CBdFXFy.jpg




Original title:  Licence to Kill

Fanedit title: Licence Revoked

Studios: Danjaq, Eon Productions, United Artists
Faneditor: Last Survivor
Originally released: June 1989
Fanedit release: February 2020
Original running time: 133 minutes approx
Fanedit running time: 111 minutes approx
Cut time: 22 minutes cut
Started edit: November 2016
Finished edit: February 2020

Synopsis and Purpose of Edit:

After the success of Timothy Dalton's first outing as James Bond in The Living Daylights, anticipation was high for the follow up.  However, with a more ruthless take on the character and more violence which caused particular trouble in the UK market where it became the first Bond film to receive a 15 rating, Licence To Kill did suffer somewhat at the box office.   It was still a hit, but due to legal issues it would be the last Bond film for 7 long years and the last Dalton Bond film.

It's a shame, as the film on the whole has a lot to offer.  Dalton is terrific as Bond, arguably the closest anyone has got to playing the character as Fleming wrote him, and Robert Davi's Sanchez is one of the most realistic and finest villains in the long history of the series.  However, the film is not without its problems.  Considering John Glen is an experienced Bond director, the film feels somewhat clumsy at times, particularly in some of the editing and most noticeably in the performance of Talisa Soto as Sanchez's girlfriend, Lupe.   Also, such is the serious nature of Dalton's Bond, the few attempts at humor do not work that well.  

Licence Revoked is an attempt to streamline the film to make it more like a Fleming novel.  The new pre-credits scene highlights this, as it shies away from the big action set pieces we've come accustomed to for a Bond movie, and instead concentrates on character driven drama.  The awkward love triangle is also removed, as I attempt to refocus this to be the hardest hitting Bond movie up until the Craig era arrived.

** A huge thank you to Problem Eliminator for allowing me to use some of the ideas from his Licence to Kill edit **

Cutlist:

 


- All scenes involving Felix and James chasing Sanchez before Felix’s wedding are cut.  New pre-credits sequence starts with Sanchez having already been caught and we then concentrate on his escape, leading into Sanchez and his men killing Felix’s wife and then Felix himself – yes, in this edit, Felix dies
-Cut a couple of brief shots during the divers rescuing Sanchez and Killifer, to remove obvious use of stunt doubles
-Some scenes at the wedding party are trimmed
-Zoomed into picture as Bond arrives at Felix’s house, as it’s too obvious that the extras walking on the sidewalk suddenly quicken their pace to ensure they are not in the way
-Credits now start just as Bond has discovered Felix has been murdered
-Cut scene of Bond calling for an ambulance and the subsequent scene when the CIA have arrived
-Cut scene at hospital as Felix is no longer alive in this edit
-Trimmed scene where Krest visits Lupe, to remove line about Sanchez fixing a beauty competition for her
-Trimmed scene where Bond causes havoc as Krest attempts to off load a drug shipment in exchange for money, to remove the shot of Bond smiling as he flies off piloting the plane – As Bond is on a personal vendetta and it’s still very early after Felix has been killed, it seems unlikely he would smile to himself like that.  Also fixed a jump cut as Krest fires his pistol
-Heavily trimmed fight scene at the Barrelhead bar, to make it less like an old fashioned bar brawl where suddenly everyone is fighting each other. Also replaced the Dirty Love song, with Richard Marx’s “Satisfied”, which was released in 1989 when this film was released
-Slightly trimmed scene of Bond and Pam on the speedboat, now ending on them kissing, leaving the rest to the viewer’s imagination 
-Cut exterior shot of Bond arriving at the bank, as you hardly see him due to a poorly structured shot where passing extras get in the way
-Trimmed Professor Joe’s shots as Sanchez watches from his casino
-Trimmed scene of Bond meeting Sanchez for the first time – we no longer see Bond searched.  This is partly to trim down the Professor Joe scenes playing on TV in the background
-Scene with Bond and Pam meeting Q trimmed
-When Bond arrives back at the casino this scene is shortened and begins with Bond picking up the drinks tray and impersonating a waiter
-As Bond abseils down the casino building, have cut the sequence so the rope is no longer in plain view outside the window where Sanchez is
-Cut scene where Lupe tries to warn Bond to stay at Sanchez’s place
-As Pam and Bond are aboard the wavekrest planting the drug money to set Krest up, have slightly trimmed scene of Pam running into the corner to hide, to make it more believable that she is not seen
-Cut scene with Lupe warning Bond that Sanchez is onto him – this is to help avoid any love triangle developing
-Heavily recut sequence where Lupe warns Pam and Q that Bond is in danger – it now plays so she warns them, but does not say that she loves James so much and doesn’t know what she would do if anything should happen to him
-Cut sequence of Q dressed as a road sweeper – instead we see the point of view from Q using binoculars to spy on Sanchez and report to Pam
-Finale at Sanchez’s base restructured.  This includes trimming Pam’s meeting with Professor Joe, removing Bond’s awful one liner that “he came to dead end”, and the tanker chase which is altered so we no longer see Bond doing a wheelie in his tanker truck.  Involves audio replacement work
-Cut scene with Felix at the hospital
-Trimmed final scene at the party to ensure that there is no real indication that Lupe was properly involved in a love triangle.  We still see her kiss Bond, and Pam gets jealous, but that’s all
-Cut ridiculous scene of the Fish statue winking

Special Features:

Audio Commentary
Fanedit Trailer

Technical Details:

16:9 Anamorphic. NTSC DVD-5 
Stereo.
Software used: Vegas Pro 16, VirtualDub, Audacity, DVD Architect, HC Encoder, DG Index,  Xara Photo & Graphic Designer

Special Thanks:
Problem Eliminator
Sophie Welch
Bionic Bob
 

MusicEd921

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AWESOME!

Felix being dead adds a whole additional edge to Bond that it looks like you're going to bring out.  If I remember correctly, Felix does not appear in the remainder of the Bond series until Craig's re-imagining.  The closest was Joe Don Baker's American agent in GoldenEye, so this works perfectly.

Can't wait for this!
 

LastSurvivor

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musiced921 said:
AWESOME!

Felix being dead adds a whole additional edge to Bond that it looks like you're going to bring out.  If I remember correctly, Felix does not appear in the remainder of the Bond series until Craig's re-imagining.  The closest was Joe Don Baker's American agent in GoldenEye, so this works perfectly.

Can't wait for this!

hey musiced921!

Hope you're well.  

Thanks for the comments.  Yeah, I've always had a big problem with the way the whole Felix character plays out in Licence to Kill... he should be devastated that his wife has been murdered, but at the end of the film he's as cheery as anything and joking with Bond... just seems so off - therefore it seems right somehow to make this a really dark personal vendetta story by having Felix die.  Hopefully it works well ;)
 

Zarius

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It's finished. Congratulations mate, I know how much of a steep hill this was for you to climb, but you powered through. Looking forward to watching. ;)
 

LastSurvivor

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Zarius said:
It's finished. Congratulations mate, I know how much of a steep hill this was for you to climb, but you powered through. Looking forward to watching. ;)

Many thanks Zarius... yep, for some reason Licence to Kill is a tricky one to edit.  Really enjoyed it in the end though and I have to give a big shout out to Problem Eliminator for managing to inspire me after he completed his take on the film, in Licence To Kill Recut.... without that, I'm not sure I would have completed my edit.  

Anyway, hope you enjoy it when you see it :)
 

bionicbob

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LastSurvivor said:

Love the poster!!!  

Congrats on finishing my friend.   Really looking forward to watching this.  :D
 

LastSurvivor

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bionicbob said:
LastSurvivor said:

Love the poster!!!  

Congrats on finishing my friend.   Really looking forward to watching this.  :D

Many thanks mate... I only discovered that poster existed recently.  The poster campaign for Licence To Kill was not great, with the main poster being a horrible patchwork early photoshop style abomination.  However, there were a handful of promo posters before the film came out which were reasonable, like this one ;)

Hope you enjoy!
 

bionicbob

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From my IFDB review:

Bond is back and with Last Survivor's help, he has never been better!

Another thoroughly enjoyable Bond edit by LS.  Gone is the action packed traditional opening.  In its stead, is a darker, more intimate toned opening which continues through the rest of the movie as Bond embarks on journey of cold vengeneance.  Only nitpick here, the pre-credit opening does feel a tad bit longer than normal.

Some clever edit magic done on the opening titles, such as inserting the License Revoked title card and the new scene replacement/transition through the camera lens -- marvelous stuff!!!

Lots of small trims/cuts to keep the tone consistant, most completely unnoticeable.   The subplot of the love triangle has been expertly removed -- thank goodness!  It was the most painful element of the original to watch lol.

Audio replacement work -- WOW!!!  Last Survivor is now the reigning master in this department.  I know he made changes but the movie gods help me, most of them went by me completely unnoticed until he pointed them out in his commentary.  BRAVO!

And the commentary!  What can I say at this point that I have not said many times before?  Deeply informative and entertaining.  What more could you want or need?  Professional home media bonus content creators should take lessons from Last Survivor on how to do good commentary.

Highly recommended!  A fan edit by one of our Best!!!  You can not go wrong.  :)
 

Zarius

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Left you a handy review mate, great job as always, that was well worth the wait and my time :cool:
 

TM2YC

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hnahini said:
is it possible if i can see this awesome edit you did?

Send @"LastSurvivor" a PM. He's usually somewhere around.
 

hnahini

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thanks i did that he didn't reply. probably he's busy at the moment
 

LastSurvivor

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hnahini said:
thanks i did that he didn't reply. probably he's busy at the moment

Always busy hnahini ;)  But i'm just replying to your PM now
 

lapis molari

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Review posted. I didn't want to post a whole essay, so it may read a bit staccato. If you'd like, I'm of course happy to go into detail further in this thread.
 

LastSurvivor

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lapis molari said:
Review posted. I didn't want to post a whole essay, so it may read a bit staccato. If you'd like, I'm of course happy to go into detail further in this thread.

Hey Lapis, 

Many thanks for taking the time to write a review - I always appreciate when people who have watched any of my fanedits do this.  I think your points are valid ones and it was a fairly constructed and written critique on the edit.  Glad you had fun watching it.
 

LastSurvivor

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Just wanted to say a big thank you to dpw2001 for the review on Licence Revoked... really appreciate you taking the time to do that and I'm glad you enjoyed it :)
 

LastSurvivor

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Yads... thank you so much for such a detailed review of this edit on IFDB.  Really appreciate your kind words and glad you enjoyed it.
 

LastSurvivor

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My thanks to @Mike for taking the time to write a review for this edit. Glad you enjoyed it - in hindsight I actually agree about the start of the film being a bit choppy... never really noticed it when I was editing it, but watching it again now it really does feel that way.
 

Mike

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Oh you welcome, about the edit review. I think If you add the first 8 minutes of the movie it would be a much better. If want to re-edit it.
 
Last edited:

Editzilla

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therefore it seems right somehow to make this a really dark personal vendetta story by having Felix die.
Know this edit has been done for a few years but I always took Bond's vendetta against Sanchez as somewhat vengeance for Tracy from OHMSS.

With it being referenced in the film itself, one could have Bond finding the dead body of Delia so soon after her marriage triggers his trauma from losing Tracy so soon after their marriage as well. And that's one of the main reason Bond makes hunting Sanchez so personal.

Did your edit take advantage on this take BTW?
 
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