Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers Feanor Edition

[mukankakuna]

Fanedit Film Name The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers Feanor Edition
Faneditor Name mukankakuna
Original Film Name The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
Fanedit Type FanFix
Original Running Time 235 minutes
Original Release Date 2002
Fanedit Running Time 154 minutes
Fanedit Release Date September 2012
Amount of time cut 64 minutes

Brief Synopsis

More serious and maturer, with better pacing and more faithful to Tolkien's book.

Intention


To make the most faithful edit of Tolkien's book.



Editing Details

I liked, more or less, the original movie but, also, I profound dislike some licenses that they did and they are way different than the book (in fact, some of them are the exact opposite).

And it's not only the story changes but also the tone of the book. No offense here, but the original movie is in the line of Disney (just an example) when it could be as HBO Game of Thrones (just an example). Take Gimli as an example. Do you imagine Tyrion Lannister "The imp" falling off all the time in comic way and with a childishness sense of humour? Me neither.

That's why I decided to edit the movie trying to make it the most faithful to the book as possible.

Now it's not only a closer movie to the book in terms of story but also in tone (more serious).

For the last version I learned rotoscoping. That allow me to do some key changes in order to be more faithfull. There are 10 new FX shots.

All together, took me hundreds of hours to do it.

Cuts and Additions

Reveal message

There to many to make the list (more than 150). I'm going to put the most relevant.


No osgiliath.
Ents decided to go to war.
Faramir quality improved.
No elves at Helm's Deep.
Theoden vastly improved.
No more Gimli's jokes.
Many characters improved.
Arwen stays in middle earth.
No more Legolas' stunts.
Eomer is not banished.
Altered root scene (when Merry & Pip are drinking Treebeard's water).


Additions
Aragorn scouting.
Faramir's temptation.

Release Information

HD MKV

Additional Notes

Regarding the tech info. It was my first edit but I wanted the best quality in video and sound. The source of the video was a BD and the edit is presented in 1080p (also 720p). For the audio, I wanted DTS sound. That was tricky but in the end I learned how to do it. It's more complex than AC3 but it can be done and the final results are good. The spanish subs. were a pain. Anyway, I hope it will be welcome for all the spanish speaking viewers. List of programs; Sony Vegas SurCode DVD DTS Audacity mochapro MeGUI mkvmerge Adobe After Effects foobar2000 SubtitleEdit Photoshop

Other Sources

Some audio and video from The Return of The King.

Special Thanks

Barrabas
Romel
R.R.
L.P.
BladeRunner391
Spelledaren

Artwork

Trailer

 

[spelledaren]

Congratulations! I'll be sure to watch this finished version. When I find time again. And I still have to watch The last of the mohicans...I was supposed to review that like two years ago.

Congrats again!

 

[Neglify]

http://fanedit.org/ifdb/component/c...rd-of-the-rings-the-two-towers-feanor-edition

 

[mukankakuna]

Thanks.
Oh, wow, two years. You should do that review.


P.S. Then, I should expect your review of my edit in around 4 years

 

[spelledaren]

Haha!

Still trying to work out some usenet thingies. Oh look! A special thanks! Thanks yourself

 

[mukankakuna]

720p version available via bittorrent.
Edit: for a limited time only.

 

[shooting_star_vast]

Looks good Will check this out

 

[mukankakuna]

You trimmed Gimli pretty mercilessly. Case in point: You removed Gimli and Eomer's sharp exchange when they first meet, as well as most of his early dialogue. The audience would feel removed from the character, whereas merely trimming a few bits would have been effective.

I know and you are right. Other people say me the same.
I feel sorry for Gimli. I, indeed, cut him mercilessy. But this is because PJ & co. They made a clown of Gimli, to be the comic relief. I dislike a lot such decision. He is out of context most of the time. It have not much to do with Tolkien’s Gimli.
To match the tone of the book I had to cut him drastically.

To trim him the less possible I even change his tone of voice (his tone was comic) to keep some of his lines.
I like you bring up the first meeting with Eomer. Here is a perfect example of what PJ did to Gimli. That scene is in the book, and even the lines are mostly the same, but I removed it, why? Because they removed, on purpose, just the firsts, and just a few, lines of the conversation between Gimli and Eomer. That way Gimli’s lines are out of context and the whole scene turned in a comic way. PJ succeeded creating a comic scene but it’s not respectful with Tolkien’s book.
Because I wanted to maintain the tone of the books I had to cut so much of Gimli.

Sorry Gimli, It is not your fault.

I don't think you handled the Ents as well as possible

I agree with you with the Treebear’s introduction. It can be improved.

You left in the introduction of Brego the wonderhorse, which I thought was strange. Of course, this edit doesn't capitalize on this introduction, and we immediately get more interaction between Aragorn and Eyowen afterward anyway.

I keep that scene because Aragorn explains a bit more about his story.

You kept a small part of Grima and Saruman's discussions, though so brief that it sticks out.

I never feel it that way, but it is interesting to know.

You cut cold to the Arwen scene, which felt awkward. There were opportunities for a better transition, such as Aragorn's conversation with Eyowen or even his dream scene.

Hmm, good point. I never thought about the night scene. Good suggestion.

Your edit of Aragorn eating Eyowen's stew was great, making it look like Aragorn only hesitated when she mentioned Theoden's comment, rather than Aragorn obviously disliking the stew.

I just want to say that this is one of my favorites cuts.

 

[mukankakuna]

For TTT, as I told you by pm, I really loved a lot fo the character restructuring that you've done (the Theoden edits for example was masterful. So, I'm only going to provide criticism:

ahem! I can deal with more good comments.

The scene of Faramir meditating works, but it comes out of nowhere. You have to frame it by showing Faramir at the beginning so you understand what is going on. The clip of Denethor looking at Faramir and saying "a chance to show his quality" works really well and feels like he's talking straight to us in a dream. Maybe put that at the start right after seeing the shot of Faramir meditating.

The fact is I did it so shocking on purpose. In other words, I wanted to be that way.
But I like to know, thanks.

Also, some of the effects shots in Osgiliath didn't quite work which is surprising considering how good your rotoscoping work was in ROTK.

I suppose you are referring to the very last of them. It can be improved, of course, but it is more tricky than it seems. It is because the way the camera moves (just in one shot) and the, lovely, hair of Faramir. Perhaps some day I'll try to improve it...

 

[stretch009]

I really want to see these Feanor edits but there's just one obstacle I have to overcome to do that. It has to do with the subtitles which are always a pain. I want to make an AVCHD out of the mkv, which I've done a million times, but I don't want to re-encode and make hard-subs with Ripbot because of the loss in quality. I've read that it might be possible with Tsmuxer but I just want to be sure and I want to make them forced or burned-in (hard-subs). Any help would be appreciated.

 

[mukankakuna]

I don't know about Tsmuxer but, before try it, you must know the edit hasn't english subs. Well, it has subs. but only for the elvish lines (just 2 or 3). You can do the subs and I will be grateful to you but it is a real pain work. I did the spanish subs. and it took me easily 4 hours.

 

[stretch009]

I don't know about Tsmuxer but, before try it, you must know the edit hasn't english subs. Well, it has subs. but only for the elvish lines (just 2 or 3). You can do the subs and I will be grateful to you but it is a real pain work. I did the spanish subs. and it took me easily 4 hours.

I know that the english ones are elvish-only and that's exactly what I wanted. Ideally for me would have been that you hard-coded those into the mkv. Then I would have no problem right now with making the final AVCHD. Apparently you can force the subtitles with MultiAVCHD so I might try that. I also have a program called ' Correct BD.exe ' I might try that.

 

[Joshua_Blue22]

I have finally watched this edit. I generally liked most of the editing choices, but at the end it just did not work for me. Because there are some bold edits, some cuts are too abrupt and obvious. I also loved that you wanted to make Faramir appear kind from the start, but at the end for me it did not work.

A good effort, but I currently still prefer Sharkey's edit of TTT, mainly because I have not yet watched all Kerr's book cuts. I have seen the 1st book, which I really loved so I hope Kerr will make his HD book cuts soon. Until then I still have to watch your ROTK edit. Based on the reviews is looks better than TTT edit.

 

[mukankakuna]

Thank you for the comments