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The Postman: Spark of Hope

theomega

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English is not my native language, so forgive me for any errors.

Trailer #1

Trailer #2

Intro:
From the first time I saw The Postman, I liked it very much. I know it received a lot of negative reviews when it was released, but I still liked it.
From time to time I will sit down and watch this movie and loving it every time.
The post-apocalyptic theme is one of my favorite themes, and I really like movies that tell a hopefull underdog message.
That being said, ofcourse there were a few things that I always though were a bit off and goofy perhaps, especially the ending, the St. Rose scene if you will.
I like the message that the movie tries to tell, but the scene always felt "off" to me.

The scene is supposed to be about 20 years later, but it's dated badly. I know, the movie came out in 1997, so ofcourse it would be dated.
But there's more, the overall abundance of technology displayed in the scene. We are supposed to believe that civilization was
able to rebuild in 20 years, from only small pockets of survivors with almost no tech left, to a full world, with yachts, camera's, modern tech, etc, with no visual change to how civilization looked before the world was destroyed.
It never really worked for me, if they would just have changed the clothing, filmed in a different setting, reduced the "tech", that could have worked.
And I never liked some of the reluctance of the Postman character throughout the movie. The movie has been written like that, but that's what we're here for.

I recently discovered BionicBobs excellent fanedit of The Postman and was really excited for it, especially when I read he had done away with the entire first part of the movie.
And the fact that I share most of his ideas about what the movie is trying to tell.
I watched it and I loved it. I actually always liked the first part of the movie because it shows the Postman's relationship with Bethlehem and sets it up for the fight at the end. But it does bog the story and pacing down. Removing it keeps the message focused.
Cutting it away debloated the movie in a big way. It streamlined the storytelling and I truly liked the idea of making the Postman a mysterious character.
Thank you BionicBob for your excellent edit and great ideas. All credits to you.

My edit will share a lot of similarities with BionicBob's edit, but this is by no means an exact copy of his.. I have some ideas of my own and I'll try to make the best of it.
Again, thank you very much for your fantastic ideas and your great edit BionicBob, it was a great inspiration.
Also thank you ArtisDead for reviewing my edit and helping me make this thread better and for the poster.

Cutlist/changes:
- remade the intro with introductional texts. Some exposition text to tell the backstory.
- removed almost the entire first part of the movie, as per BionicBob's idea. It creates a mystery around the Postman and it focuses the story.
- I kept a portion to introduce General Bethlehem and his ruthlessness. I removed the postman from all footage before the shelter in the storm. However, it
was not completely possible. But it might work because in the last fight scene, they seem to know eachother.
- made some small cuts so that the Postman doens't take the uniform from the skeleton, now it seems he's just taking shelter. Also made a small cut so the
cobwebs on the postman hat are a bit less obvious, they were the most obvious while moving the letters in front of the hat.
- removed Costner's caveman impression while trying to light the Zippo. Costner's grunting is very much in the background now.
- removed the part where the Postman looses his hat while trying to get into Pineview, I thought it was silly and very obvious on purpose.
- made some small cuts in Pineview to remove the notion he might not be what he says he is.
- removed the part where he flees and made it so that it seems like he's searching for the postoffice.
- I wanted to keep the Sheriff Briscoe/Postman confrontation, there's a notion of the Postman lying and sneeking away in the scene. I tried removing that
notion and keeping the scene, because I think it makes Sheriff Briscoe's "turnaround" and ultimate death more impactful.
- I made a small change to the scene where Bethlehem notices Abby, I think the "piece of ass" line doesn't fit the character.
- I added the line "a few days later" to the introduction of the town of Benning, later on in the movie Abby tells what Bethlehem did to her every night,
indicating she was in captivity for a few days. But somehow that never came across in the movie, this is my way of trying to correct that sense of time.
- some small cuts in Benning, much like Bob's version.
- I removed Bethlehem kicking a barrel when Abby shoots him. Also Bob's idea :)
- the Postman shoots two guards, I removed an extra shot of the second guard emptying a clip only a few meters away and not riddling him with bullets, and
the Postman missing a lot of shots. The scene feels more realistic and the Postman now seems to be a better gunman.
- I removed Abby butchering a Holnist, now you only see her smack him once on the head. Abby is a bit weird, but not psycho.
- I removed the Holnists still looking for them in the snow and inserted stock footage to replace the shot. It seemed as if the snow had fallen instantly while
Holnists were still on their trail. Now it seems as if they covered some distance and some time has passed.
- Abby still discoveres something on the postman's shoulder, which makes her somewhat hostile, except it's not yet revealed to the viewer.
- I removed the scene in which Abby tells the postman Michael had died and confronts him with being a Holnist.
- removed the line "I'm nobody Abby" also the line "In direct contact, I can't believe this".
- removed the traitor Luke subplot, also the Postman doesn't think he looks familiar anymore.
- removed the line "If I told you the real reason how I became a postman..." to Abby.
- a few cuts here and there in the postman leaving and taking Abby with him.
- made some cuts in the scene where Ford delivered the letter to General Bethlehem, even though the letter reads that there is no Postman, Bethlehem doesn't
believe it, I hope the viewer doesn't also and regards the Postman "giving up" as a way of protecting the people. I also really liked the fact that the Postmen
movement has expanded even beyond Ford's knowledge.
- removed Luke from these scenes as much as possible.
- removed the line "shall we fire?", I thought this line and Bethlehem's reaction made Ford's fate too hopefull. I kept the biggest part of this scene because I
liked the fact that Bethlehem is obsessed with finding the postman.
- removed Tom Petty's line "I ride it sometimes...", it fits the character, but I felt it distracted from trying to get across why the Postman is going to ride that
cablecart.
- removed the copymachine salesman line, the Postman couldn't have known that.
- created and inserted a small scene as Bethlehem remembers Shakespeare. It shows the audience that they have a history together and that the Postman was
at one point captured by the Holnists. I hope it doesn't raise more questions than it answers.
- removed Bethlehems death, as BionicBob said in his cutlist, it defeats the new message of hope.
- removed the original ending and created a new one with expositional texts. A actual scene would have been better, but it simply doesn't excist. I could have
removed the ending, but I wanted the leave the hopeful message in there.
- added credits in the credits for the used stock footage.

Some arts

Clips


In this clip General Bethlehem remembers the Postman

This clip tells the audience that Bethlehem goes great lenghts to enforce his believes. It's heavely edited

This is the edited scene of Ford delivering the letter of surrender.
 
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bionicbob

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Nice to see some love for this flick!

Now that I have HD ripping capability, I have often thought of doing a Redux of my Expediated Edition.

Narratively, my only real regret is I did not more clearly establish the branding, which of course helps pay off the ending.

Just curious, does the Blu Ray contain any deleted footage? I know from the original trailer the scene between Costner and the young boy at the Dam is longer and always wanted to see it in full.
 

theomega

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BionicBob, thanks for your reply. I hope you don't feel passed. If you do, we can surely work something out. Stepping on someones toes is the last thing I want to do.

About establishing the branding, I hope I understand correctly, you mean more exposition of the relationship between the Postman and Bethlehem? If so, I think it's rather difficult.
I had considered putting more flashbacks into the movie, but there wasn't really a place for them, and every insert felt "off".

There's no deleted scene on my blu-ray, unfortunately.
 

Last Impressions

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Are there different cuts of this film....for some reason i own two copies on bluray in a storage box and i cant for the love me understand why. I just presumed they were different versions :ROFLMAO: . I bought them so long ago with the intention too watch them but they are still in the wrappers...just another film i need to get around too seeing. I think i've seen it back in the 90's but i can't remember :LOL: this will nudge me to watch it in the next few weeks....
 

theomega

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As far as I know, there aren't any different versions.
The copies you own, have they got different box art?
Are they both HD?
 

theomega

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I ran into some problems with exporting my project from Davinci Resolve Free.

I don't know if it's just the free version or it's simply my computer, but I noticed audio glitches after exporting and I used several timelines which I joined in the end in one big timeline, but even though the join shouldn't have been noticable, it was by a slight audio hiccup at the join.
I never noticed these issues when using Premiere.
To get the audio right, I exported it as wav only and then joined it with the video, but still there was another glitch.

So I've exported it a second time and joined it again, I'm just not very keen on watching the movie yet again so soon. I have no problem watching movies multiple times, but not so soon after each other 😆.

I've also made a 5.1 mix, but I think I'm going to drop it. For two reasons; I'm not an 5.1 expert and I have no gear to test the 5.1 mix. I'm editing and viewing in stereo. So if I would include a 5.1 mix, I have to check it on stereo hardware, which is far from ideal.
 

bionicbob

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Check your project settings/preferences.

I know with VEGAS it automatically adds a couple seconds of audio fade in at the beginning and end of clip, and I had to go into my settings to change that to zero to eliminate a very similar problem. Maybe DaVinci is the same???
 

theomega

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That could be a possibility, I'll have to check it.
In the mean time I have created a workaround, an easyfix by just overlapping a small part of the audio, that solved the slight drop in audio.
 

krausfadr

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Oh yeah simple crossfades can sometimes work wonders. Hence the reason for my name.

I even crossfade (krausfad) in and out of a muted center channel. You can edit in 5.1 using regular stereo headphones. You can clearly see the volume of each channel on the main work window if you first go to the fairlight tab and go into the menu and change the bus from stereo to 5.1.

And if you need to know what the center channel sounds like by itself you can simply mute the other channels by right clicking on the clip and configuring the channels.

But if you don’t like watching movies multiple times (in rapid succession) maybe you picked the wrong hobby.
 

theomega

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Thanks Krausfadr for the suggestion. I might still include the 5.1, I haven't decided yet.
Your suggestion makes me more confident in keeping it.
 

krausfadr

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In fact you can just treat a 5.1 track in Resolve like you would a stereo track. Meaning chop it up however you like and blend with crossfades. If you need to add music a plug-in called nugen halo upmix will convert a music track to 5.1 automatically.
 

theomega

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I continued with the 5.1 mix and I think all is well.
The audio is checked, the video is checked. Everything seems to be in order. I submitted a First time request, fingers crossed.
 

theomega

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My edit is awaiting approval, in the meantime, here are two clips. The resolution and compression are not the final product.

This clips is the cut I made for Sheriff Briscoe. I really wanted to keep the scene so I did my best to make it work. I tried various this, incorparating other shots, but nothing really seemed to work. Until I thought of this solution.

This clip is a little exposition of Bethlehem remembering the Postman. It still keeps the Postman origins a mystery, but it explain a little bit where they're both coming from.
 

bionicbob

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This clips is the cut I made for Sheriff Briscoe. I really wanted to keep the scene so I did my best to make it work. I tried various this, incorparating other shots, but nothing really seemed to work. Until I thought of this solution.
The picture quality looks very good.
But the change back and forth in the camera position I find very jarring and does not work for me.
 

theomega

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Yeah, I was afraid that might be an issue.
I struggled with this scene a lot, there's always the possibility to drop it, but it'll be a last resort. I'll have to take another look at it.
 

bionicbob

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One of the hardest lessons of fan editing is learning to cut the things you love and keep things you dislike in order to best serve the narrative.

If you can find another way to make it work, that would be awesome! But in its present state it distractingly plays like something has been on cut.
 

theomega

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Ok, so I had this idea on how to possibly make it work. I don't have much time before I have to go to work, but I couldn't let the idea go and had to make a small test to see if this might work or not.
 
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