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The Hobbit Part 2 (Sequel to my Hobbit hybrid)

samspider3

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Now the Hobbit: Battle of the Five Armies has come out, I've been working on some stuff to continue my first Hobbit hybrid, where I transformed An Unexpected Journey and Desolation of Smaug into a single 3 hours and 16 minutes movie.

I must emphasyze 2 things about these films. First, I know a lot of people here want to cut a lot from the movies in order to make them more close to the original book, but personally, I don't really care if the movies are or not close to the book because what I really care about is the coherence, the plot, the presentation of the movie itself. When you know a lot about the source material, you give prejudices on the film, and you will probably notice a lot of people that liked the movies or not don't have to use the "because it's not like in the book" argument. As I said, I care more about the presentation of the Fan Edit, because if you try to make some purist edition or something, some problems will be noticed, and that's why I believe TolkienEditor failed in some of the cuts he proposed, because it's so close to the book that he cuts some parts that give coherence or continuity to the scenes. Mistakes that I don't want to make.

Second, I actually liked Battle of the Five Armies. I enjoyed it. But I cannot stop feeling that it's kind of short. Like it lacks some important scenes or the cuts are rushed. I believe they chose the WORST moment to make the film that short. So basically, I would cut very little from this film, and In fact i would actually like to wait a little bit for the Extended Edition to add all the scenes. But still, I need to make some cuts because there are some little things I did not like and I want to establish continuity with my Hobbit Part 1 Fan Edit.

These are some of the changes i've been working on:

-No "The Hobbit" tittle card or "Battle of the Five Armies". The movie begins with Smaug escaping from Erebor and going to Lake Town to destroy it, as I wanted to make it feel like it's still the same film, but cut in two parts.

-Bard will not be shooting a lot of arrows to Smaug, just one. I think it's a very nice scene, but kind of stupid if you think about it, because Bard knew Smaug can only be killed with a Black Arrow, why would he lose efforts? It's like he forgot something that important. Also, I removed the part where Kili says "he hit the Dragon!" and Tauriel says the Dragon's armor is tough and cannot be penetrated. We already know that, don't know why they did this line. It's like Jackson did not trust the audience would remember important details like this one.

-I would like to cut as much as possible a lot of Alfrid scenes. I think he's stupid and it's the closest thing to Jar Jar Binks in Battle of the Five Armies. I would like to make him more like Bard's loyal sidekick than some coward and mean human being. I know Alfrid is supposed to be an ass, but he becomes the comic relief and I think he's not funny at all. It's Childish comedy. Anyways, I will show him not as a coward, but one of the men who fought in the Battle.

-As in the First Part Fan Edit, there will not be a Love Triangle. Tauriel and Legolas will only be friends. There is a scene where Legolas says to Tauriel "Yes, he is my father. But he doesn't command my HEART". I searched a little bit and Found out that this is a translation mistake. It's "But he doesn't command my WILL", something that favours me a lot because I want to cut Legolas love feelings for Tauriel, so I changed the subtitles.

-Bilbo will have an extended Flashback, when he was with Smaug and took the Arkenstone. This is my opportunity to include a scene that I decided to suppress in the last Fan Edit, but will work perfectly in this one.

-Tauriel will die after he falls with Bolg off the cliff. I edited a little bit the scene where Kili dies to not make it that tragical or dramatic, because as I said, i cut the love story. Tauriel's death will lead to Legolas to enrage and fight Bolg. Everyone hates Tauriel, that's a fact. I don't. I just think she is a bland and a little bit uninteresting character, so I decided killing her is a wise choice. I mean, we don't know anything more about her after this movie, so I don't think it won't hurt anyone if she gets killed.

-Legolas jumping rocks is gone. I can tolerate a lot of things Legolas has done on Lord of the Rings saga, but this looked like a Mario Bros. scene.

-As I already said, the deleted scenes will be added once the Extended Edition comes out.

-Finally, I changed the ending a little bit. This is one of the reasons I felt a little bit disappointed with the movie. The Idea of Bilbo going to the door and welcome Gandalf is good but... I thought the ending was going to be longer. I didn't expect something like Return of the King, where the ending was like 2 hours long or something like that, but I thought they were going to take their time to conclude the film. My proposed change was this. Once Bilbo installs again in Bag End, we get a soft transition to old Bilbo wrtting his book, and we get some Narration. "That, my dear Frodo, is where I come in". I will use some takes from Fellowship of the Ring Extended Edition to accomplish this. After this, I will use the footage where Bilbo talks with Frodo that I decided not to use in the first Fan Edit. After Frodo goes to wait Gandalf, we see Bilbo smoking and narrating and then we get another soft transition of Gandalf arriving Bag End, while Bilbo is seeing the ring. Then Bilbo welcomes Gandalf and the film concludes. This is basically an approximation of what i was expecting to see when I was watching the film in the theather.

Basically, these are all the changes I Pretend to make. But until the Extended Edition comes, we will have to wait a little bit :)
 

HobbitFixer

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Welcome to the club! Hahahah!

I've combined the Hobbit trilogy into a single movie also (and I know I'm not alone in this desire). You're making some really good points and I concur with most, if not all of them generally. The problem with the Hobbit movie (are very, very many, but in terms if technical subjects): really bad editing. Okay, maybe not that bad, but very sloppy.

Either the editor just wasn't that good or Peter Jackson was drunk or otherwise intoxicated through the editing process. It's horrendous. Too many swinging cameras that actually ruin the scene (Gandalf's slip at the High Fells for example) - really bad choice of camera angles (When Thorin throws his crown to the floor we switch to a long shot, rather than a close-up (!!!)).

But the biggest problem is the run-on cuts for each camera angle from scene to scene during entire sequences. The pacing is just all screwed-up the way I see it. Si my cut focussed a lot on actually just trimming every freakin' scene, camera-angle by camera-angle. This really helped to shorten the finished product.

Though I'm not as big a Hobbit fan as many others, this film just challenged me to do from the first frame of Unexpected Journey flashing up onto the silver screen (oh, and why does Frodo look like a full-sized adult? because there is *no costume* - he doesn't look like a Hobbit or even Dwarf at all. Immersion destroyed for the entire rest of the full three hours in that Theater chair.

Okay - sorry for my ranting. What I wanted to say is this: I like the Hobbit, but I'm not all purist and whatnot. However, this Trilogy should be such an embarrassment to Warner and MGM that I am fascinated to see how other people have fixed this train wreck. I hope to follow your ongoing updates regarding your edit. I'd be happy throw feedback at you whenever you're ready.
 

samspider3

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HobbitFixer said:
Welcome to the club! Hahahah!

I've combined the Hobbit trilogy into a single movie also (and I know I'm not alone in this desire). You're making some really good points and I concur with most, if not all of them generally. The problem with the Hobbit movie (are very, very many, but in terms if technical subjects): really bad editing. Okay, maybe not that bad, but very sloppy.

Either the editor just wasn't that good or Peter Jackson was drunk or otherwise intoxicated through the editing process. It's horrendous. Too many swinging cameras that actually ruin the scene (Gandalf's slip at the High Fells for example) - really bad choice of camera angles (When Thorin throws his crown to the floor we switch to a long shot, rather than a close-up (!!!)).

But the biggest problem is the run-on cuts for each camera angle from scene to scene during entire sequences. The pacing is just all screwed-up the way I see it. Si my cut focussed a lot on actually just trimming every freakin' scene, camera-angle by camera-angle. This really helped to shorten the finished product.

Though I'm not as big a Hobbit fan as many others, this film just challenged me to do from the first frame of Unexpected Journey flashing up onto the silver screen (oh, and why does Frodo look like a full-sized adult? because there is *no costume* - he doesn't look like a Hobbit or even Dwarf at all. Immersion destroyed for the entire rest of the full three hours in that Theater chair.

Okay - sorry for my ranting. What I wanted to say is this: I like the Hobbit, but I'm not all purist and whatnot. However, this Trilogy should be such an embarrassment to Warner and MGM that I am fascinated to see how other people have fixed this train wreck. I hope to follow your ongoing updates regarding your edit. I'd be happy throw feedback at you whenever you're ready.

That is why I decided to make a 3 hours hybrid, the first one released in this website. I don't believe The Hobbit has material for 3 movies. Maybe 2, but 3? That is too much. Personally i am very sattisfied now with The Hobbit and this is what i will watch when i want to see The Hobbit. Now i need to finish what i started. Thanks for your interest xD. It looks like it became a fashion: transforming The Hobbit into a 3 hours or 4 hours movie.
 

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What's with the "T" at the end of the thread title?
 

eldusto84

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As the other poster said, welcome to the Hobbit Fanedit Club, lol. There are many of us floating around! Your ending sounds interesting.

It does seem like the sweet spot is 3.5-4.5 hours for The Hobbit. I am not sure how anyone can get it down to 3 hours or less without totally ruining the pacing of the film. My own version is a single film just under four hours, but will probably go up a bit once the EE for BOFA comes out later this year. I'm splitting the film with an Intermission so it's easier to watch.

Like many other editors, I was dreading the work on BOFA because it was such a train wreck. However, I was surprised how much of the film was salvageable once I started editing.
 

samspider3

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eldusto84 said:
As the other poster said, welcome to the Hobbit Fanedit Club, lol. There are many of us floating around! Your ending sounds interesting.

It does seem like the sweet spot is 3.5-4.5 hours for The Hobbit. I am not sure how anyone can get it down to 3 hours or less without totally ruining the pacing of the film. My own version is a single film just under four hours, but will probably go up a bit once the EE for BOFA comes out later this year. I'm splitting the film with an Intermission so it's easier to watch.

Like many other editors, I was dreading the work on BOFA because it was such a train wreck. However, I was surprised how much of the film was salvageable once I started editing.

My original Idea was to make The Hobbit a single 4 hour film, but i decided not to do this because the film would feel too loaded, and I don't want that. I believe 3 hours is enough. And second, many of the cuts I was doing were ruining the movie because they feel rushed. Then I thought 2 movies, as it was originally intended, was a wise decision. My First Part of the Hobbit now has a better pacing, in my opinion and it covers most of the important things and moments of the films.
 

Moe_Syzlak

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I'm curious, as a non-editor, why one would have a target time in mind? It seems to me the best course of action is to edit it as best as can be and let time be what it is. I get that you need to have an arc that can be enjoyed in a single sitting but if you go over four hours why not just make it two films? I personally really enjoyed the Arkenstone Edition and Into the Fire. I'd be fine with three films if the third was as good as those two. However I'm also curious to see if one or two film versions work even better. But ultimately I'll choose my "go to" version based on storytelling, not length.
 

samspider3

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Moe_Syzlak said:
I'm curious, as a non-editor, why one would have a target time in mind? It seems to me the best course of action is to edit it as best as can be and let time be what it is. I get that you need to have an arc that can be enjoyed in a single sitting but if you go over four hours why not just make it two films? I personally really enjoyed the Arkenstone Edition and Into the Fire. I'd be fine with three films if the third was as good as those two. However I'm also curious to see if one or two film versions work even better. But ultimately I'll choose my "go to" version based on storytelling, not length.

Sometimes, you need a target time because we don't want to make the movie too loaded. It can be a little bit heavy for the audience to watch. That's why I decided not to make The Hobbit Part 1 a 4 hours and half montage of the three films and decided to use only two.
 

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samspider3 said:
Typying mistake, sorry about that :v

Not a problem, but did you know you can fix it? Just do an advanced edit of your first post in the thread.
 

HobbitFixer

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Moe_Syzlak said:
I'm curious, as a non-editor, why one would have a target time in mind?

It's about discipline: there are many scenes, angles, dialogs and stuff you love and want to keep in there. But then the movie starts getting bogged down. So you do an edit pass, check the runtime, too long? Do another edit pass, check time. Do it again and again. I've made something like 7 or 8 passes, always whittling it down, finding those areas I can either cut or trim tighter.

This is the standard in Hollywood, too. Why you often see a "Deleted Scenes" section on DVDs and such; those are the things they would have wanted to keep in, but needed to cut for various reasons.

The problem with PJ's Hobbit trilogy is that he needed the movies to be LONGER, not shorter. it's the only way they could justify stretching it out to three movies so they could sell more tickets. Which is why PJs Hobbit is often referred to as a Hollywood Cash-Grab - and it has created a train wreck as far as editing, pacing, and the rest go. It's a genuinely sloppy movie overall as released.

Lord of the Rings? Yes, it needed to be long. Hobbit" Are you fecking serious? LOL
 

samspider3

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I know it has past a lot of time since my last update on this thread, but anyways. My greatest goal in this Fan Edit is to give Battle of the Five Armies a perfect ending, cause as it was said before, the original was kind of rushed and at least I could not connect with it. The idea is there, but it was poorly executed.

So, my ending will use some footage that I decided not to use from An Unexpected Journey and add it to the ending from Battle of the Five Armies, with some footage from The Fellowship of the Ring Extended Edition as well. This way will make the ending have to take it's time to conclude the story. This is the ending of my edit.

 

yoshif8tures

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Ugh is that Frodo...?

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samspider3

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Seriously, people. I don't see what's The problem with Frodo in this scene. I mean, he may not be doing anything important and he is not part of The story, but in The way i edited it, i think it is a nice touch, and not only is a nice cameo, it is a nice way to connect The Hobbit Story to The Lord of The Rings
 

samspider3

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yoshif8tures said:
Cos it's unnecessary and contributes nothing to the plot

But as I said, The cameo works better At The end of The story than in The beginning, So i thibk Now it is justified. The order of the scenes change a lot The purpose of Them if You edit them well or put them in The movie correctly.
 

samspider3

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So, as I said before, my main goal is to kill Tauriel, so in this video you can see what I did. Tauriel will feel bad because of the death of his friend and ally, not because she was in love with her. After this, Tauriel sacrifices herself to kill Bolg, with no success. Legolas notices this, and after Tauriel dies, Legolas enrages and goes to fight Bolg.

The fight between Azog and Thorin/Bolg vs Legolas have been separated, so the battle with Bolg ends first and then Thorin and Azog's fight begins. I cut Legolas Jumping blocks a la Mario Bros. Becuase it's obvious it's too silly for all of us, and cut the giant rock that smashes Bolg after he falls because it was supposed to be a dramatic scene, but after the rock smashes him, I cannot help but laugh.

 

samspider3

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As I said before, there are some stuff that I decided to NOT use in the first part of my Hobbit fan edit, but i chose to insert it in Part 2. This scene, for example. Here we can see an extended flashback scene of Bilbo taking the Arken Stone. I wanted to save time in my first Fan Edit and i decided not to use this scene, but here, we have plenty of time, and looks perfectly fitting

 

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I have made a modification to the ending I originally edited. It's almost the same but with the difference we don't hear anymore Bilbo saying "He doesn't approve being late" and bla bla bla. I replaced that part with some footage from Fellowship of the Ring Extended Edition. Also, I cut the shot of Gandalf arriving Bag End in his charriot and just left that one where he opens the door.
 

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Regarding your ending: it's silly of some people to decry the inclusion of Frodo on principle. A character's appearance that takes place where he lives will not shatter the illusion of reality lol. The problem I have with the sequence, from a screenwriting perspective, is the unnecessary questions that are raised at a point in the movie where answers should be given instead. Why has Bilbo waited 60 years before beginning to write his book? What has he been doing all those years? And what is the significance of the book, anyway? Especially since he had put off starting it for 60 years. It would be effective if you could somehow imply that Bilbo's reasons for recording his journey were a way to connect with Frodo and leave them as a legacy after he has gone, but you're not quite there yet. He seems too grumpy when Frodo is around for that to be the case.

And then Gandalf is reintroduced on top of that, and it's just too much for what should be the end of the film. It's just my two cents but if your goal is to deal with the bloat of the film's, then this seems like the perfect thing to leave out.
 
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