Thanks again for the reviews, guys! It's incredibly gratifying to hear that the edit seems to work both for people who were frustrated by the original and for people who liked the original as-is.
Yeah, in the original the engineer-sacrifice scene is presented as objective history, but in the edit it's in the subjective space of Elizabeth's dream -- so it could be just her imagination's reaction to what she's found out/what she's undergoing, or it could be a vision of the truth (spicediver brought up the interesting possibility of 'racial memory') -- I wanted to leave that open to interpretation. So I agree that part is made more mysterious, and I also wanted to make 'what will be discovered by the crew' more mysterious (even though any Prometheus viewer will know it) since, as mentioned in in a post above, in this edit your discover the engineers along with the crew, instead of being set-up to expect them by the engineer-sacrifice scene.
But I do understand Dominic's comment about the tone of the edit overall being less mysterious. I still haven't listened to Scott's commentary (I kind of didn't want it to affect me during editing ), but I did listen to Lindelof's, and from what he said about his and Scott's decisions, it sounded like they both got wrapped up on making Prometheus have a mysterious vibe a) to continue the tone of mystery set by that initial sacrifice-scene b) as a function of having a sequel in mind - how much to reveal now/how much to withhold?
My own take is they got *too* wrapped up in the pursuit of that, to the point of chopping things (seen in the deleted/alternate footage) that gave needed character motivation and context of the overall situation, but which did not, IMO, take away from some central mysteries (though they may take away from some of the mysterious tone).
Scott and Lindelof got mystery-happy (and Lindelhof added his additional issue of sacrificing character intelligence/motivation on the altar of Notice-My-Big-Theme).
Now, I love films that are mysterious, and puzzle-films that make the audience work to put the pieces together. And I really do love the engineer-sacrifice as the start of the original film - it's breathtaking, and sets up a great expectation for something amazing to unfold in the rest of the film. And an example of where the original did a good job of seeding clues that explain something that seems to come out of the blue when you watch the first time:
But for me, there are those other (oft-complained-about) elements of the original that get worse with multiple viewings, making it hard to fully enjoy the original as mystery or puzzle, despite all that's beguiling about it. When I first watched the deleted footage I realized there *was* more thought behind several things that bothered me in the original, and I got inspired to tackle an edit...
geminigod said:DominicCobb said:But the movie, as a whole, is a lot less mysterious.
Funny, I thought this edit made things more mysterious, but maybe my opinion is tainted because of interviews with Ridley Scott that I have seen.
Is there a difference between mysterious and confusing? I think so...
The dream of the engineer, for example, makes it less likely IMO that we are seeing actual history vs. just something in her imagination.
Yeah, in the original the engineer-sacrifice scene is presented as objective history, but in the edit it's in the subjective space of Elizabeth's dream -- so it could be just her imagination's reaction to what she's found out/what she's undergoing, or it could be a vision of the truth (spicediver brought up the interesting possibility of 'racial memory') -- I wanted to leave that open to interpretation. So I agree that part is made more mysterious, and I also wanted to make 'what will be discovered by the crew' more mysterious (even though any Prometheus viewer will know it) since, as mentioned in in a post above, in this edit your discover the engineers along with the crew, instead of being set-up to expect them by the engineer-sacrifice scene.
But I do understand Dominic's comment about the tone of the edit overall being less mysterious. I still haven't listened to Scott's commentary (I kind of didn't want it to affect me during editing ), but I did listen to Lindelof's, and from what he said about his and Scott's decisions, it sounded like they both got wrapped up on making Prometheus have a mysterious vibe a) to continue the tone of mystery set by that initial sacrifice-scene b) as a function of having a sequel in mind - how much to reveal now/how much to withhold?
My own take is they got *too* wrapped up in the pursuit of that, to the point of chopping things (seen in the deleted/alternate footage) that gave needed character motivation and context of the overall situation, but which did not, IMO, take away from some central mysteries (though they may take away from some of the mysterious tone).
Even with all the extra footage, we still don't know why the Engineers made us, anything about their civilization (did they seed other planets? was this particular installation once a research lab that got converted into a bio-weapon lab?), or (outside of Scott comments in interviews) why they turned against us, not to mention how did that *other* Engineer ship ended up on LV-426, to be discoverd in Alien. Plenty of mystery to still go around! (and for Shaw to presumably explore in the sequel)
Now, I love films that are mysterious, and puzzle-films that make the audience work to put the pieces together. And I really do love the engineer-sacrifice as the start of the original film - it's breathtaking, and sets up a great expectation for something amazing to unfold in the rest of the film. And an example of where the original did a good job of seeding clues that explain something that seems to come out of the blue when you watch the first time:
Weyland being asleep on the ship -- well, I mean David speaking to his sleeping form is more or less a giveaway, but there are some nice touches that make more sense upon multiple viewings: 1) When Vickers first wakes up, she asks David, "Has anyone died?" - she's wondering about Weyland (Lindelof talks about this in his commentary). Given her distaste for the mission in general, I assume if Weyland had perished during the voyage, she'd keep everyone asleep and turn the ship right back towards Earth. 2) The med-pod is calibrated for male patients only, which seems stupid at first, but makes sense if it's meant for Weyland (Shaw asks Vickers, "It does bypass surgery, what do you need it for?"). In fact, my suspicion is the entire "lifeboat" was intended for Weyland, given that he's surprised to see Vickers when he's awoken - this would also add more meaning to her "please don't touch that" comments to people when they're in the lifeboat module - she's not warning them off her stuff, she's warning them off her dad's stuff. Along these lines: Weyland being Vickers' dad, which can seem out-of-the-blue in the original, is foreshadowed by her discomfort when hologram-Weyland talks about David being close to a "son" of his.