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True Romance - The Tarantino Cut

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boon23

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True Romance - The Tarantino Cut (new extended & recut version)

by Spoke

Think you've seen True Romance? Think again.

You certainly haven't seen the film that its writer envisioned.
The original screenplay by Quentin Tarantino, much like his Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction, had an answers-first, questions-later structure to it. And that, more than anything else, was what made it interesting.
True Romance was written, very carefully written, to be a non-linear story. And Tony Scott, the director, shot it that way. But at some point during the editing process, Scott got cold feet. Worried that the audience wouldn't understand the movie, he decided to put all the scenes in chronological order.

And he ruined the film.

The story of True Romance was supposed to be divided into three parts. Part one: the characters know more than the audience. Part two: the audience catches up. Part three: the audience knows more than the characters.

By putting the film in chronological order, Scott spoiled everything. Say goodbye to all the surprises and say goodbye to anything approaching subtlety. Say hello to dialogue that's repetitious and pointless.
This is especially true of the early part of the movie, where every line was meant to tease the viewer and slowly dole out information. Scott took that away.
All this to say that assembling a 'Tarantino' cut of True Romance has been a long held dream of mine.
Using the original screenplay as a guide, and re-inserting as much cut footage as possible, this new version of the film is probably the closest any of us will ever get to seeing Tarantino's vision.
With the scenes of the film back in their proper non-linear order, small throwaway lines are suddenly much more meaningful, and otherwise minor sequences suddenly become quite relevant.
The deleted scenes are also worth mentioning. Quite a bit was cut from the theatrical release. Dialogue that was deemed too nasty, or scenes that served as bridges in the original structure were all removed.

The saddest, most inexcusable victim of the Scott cut would have to be the character of Alabama. For reasons (at least to my knowledge) unknown, Scott left most of her best moments on the cutting room floor. Several scenes where she talks with Clarence, tells him stories about herself, or just plain explains where her head is at, were inexplicably omitted.
But that's the beauty of fan edits. In this new cut, everything is restored. The scenes all return to their proper place, and Alabama gets the screen time she always deserved.
Oh, and the ending is fixed, too. Gone is the happy happy 'Magic eye patch, frolicking on the beach, Elvis Junior' ending. We return instead to Tarantino's much nastier, much more satisfying finale.
Before I go, I'd like to mention that I did't like True Romance very much when I first saw it. Other than the Hopper/Walken scene, and Oldman's trippy performance, I thought it was fairly forgettable. Just a boy meets girl story.
Sure, the boy was psychotic and the girl was a hooker and they kill or are responsible for the deaths of nearly every person they meet, but that's besides the point. It just didn't do much for me. Of course, at the time, I didn't know that it had been so severely mangled. At the time, all I knew was that it didn't have that spark that made Tarantino's other work sing.

Well, now it hits the high notes. You're welcome.

I've been waiting fifteen years for someone at the studio to wise up and realize that there's money to be made from a 'Tarantino' cut of True Romance. Fact is, I'm pretty sure that if someone put the work in, this would surely merit a re-release in theaters. Hey, if a less good version of Donnie Darko can get one, 'The Tarantino cut' of True Romance should be a shoe-in.

Thanks for listening.


Feel free to send any praise, complaints, or legal threats to:
spoke.of.romance@gmail.com

Assembly map:

[spoiler:3m1fq17k]The title cards were made to match, in font and size, the ones that appear in Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs. Transitions, fades to black and sound transitions, mimick the style used by Sally Menke, Tarantino's editor on all his movies.

All excerpts from Disk 2 are from deleted scenes.

01 - Disk 1 - 0:00 to 4:50 (fade out before narration begins)
INSERT TITLE CARD: MOTORCITY
02 - Disk 2 - Drexyl Does Business (3:32)
03 - Disk 1 - 34:23 to 40:23 (up to : Son of a bitch.)
INSERT TITLE CARD: HOLLYWOOD
04 - Disk 1 - 40:23 to 58:21 (up to : Boss, get ready to get happy.)
INSERT TITLE CARD: CLARENCE AND ALABAMA HIT L.A.
05 - Disk 1 - 58:21 to 59:50 (up to : screaming woman on tv)
06 - Disk 2 - An Amazing Girl (1:30)
07 - Disk 1 - 1:00:19 to1:00:44 (up to : So what are you doing in L.A. anyway?)
INSERT TITLE CARD: DETROIT, TWO WEEKS EARLIER
08 - Disk 2 - At The Movies (3:28)
Footage from "The Streetfighter" has been inserted over the original footage because the credit "Directed by Ridley Scott" originally appeared over the image and since this scene now appears in the middle of the movie it made no sense and had to be covered up. Interestingly enough, the dub used in True Romance is different from the copy I used. Also, the sequence as it appears in the movie was re-edited out of sequence for some reason. The editing was made to match what appears in the original movie.

09 - Disk 1 - 8 :45 to 13 :11 (up to : sex and billboard shot)
10 - Disk 2 - He Really Loved Her (1:20)
11 - Disk 2 - Coming Clean (5:07)
12 - Disk 1 - 17:38 to 19 :05 (up to : A son of a bitch like that)
13 - Disk 1 - 20:42 to 24:29 (up to : I love you too.)
INSERT TITLE CARD: CASS QUARTER, HEART OF DETROIT
14 - Disk 1 - 24:29 to 34:21 (up to : These aren't my clothes)
15 - Disk 2 - No cheers (4 :32)
16 - Disk 1 - 1:03:55 to 1:27:45 (up to : We just want the collar. - You got it.)
17 - Disk 2 - Vincenzo's vendetta (1:42)
INSERT TITLE CARD: THE BIG DAY
18 - Disk 1 - 1:27:46 to 1:31:09 (up to : And some cleaning products.)
19 - Disk 2 - We Know What We're Doing (2:16)
20 - Disk 2 - Playing What If (1 :59)
21 - Disk 2 - Elliot's Motivation(1 :12)
22 - Disk 1 - 1:35:13 to 1:51:03 (up to : Sweetie!)
23 - Disk 2 - alternate ending (6:20)

The alternate ending features flashback scenes that are slightly longer to cover the missing footage that was replaced with storyboards on the deleted scenes of the DVD.[/spoiler:3m1fq17k]
 

Sprug's decapitated head

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This may be really cool if edited well. I'll attempt to download it, but I wish it was a full quality DVD, though. Thanks for the heads up, Boon!
 

kerr

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Just finished watching this. It's decent, but with some really annoying errors, such as missing frames and sudden shifts in audio volume. They're not frequent, but noticable. Some of the deleted scenes also have much lower video quality than the rest of the film. Many of the deleted scenes are unneccesary anyway, and I think the edit would have been better if it had ommitted most of them. Some of the cuts are also a bit iffy, either because they're too sudden or because of fades to black, which often seem a bit weird. Despite these errors, most of the editing is pretty flawless, and the restructuring of the film works really well. I also like the alternate ending better than the original one. All in all it was a fun edit to watch, although I wish someone would make a really good Tarantino cut of True Romance, which this, sadly, wasn't.
 

JMB

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Well, I have been working on one on and off for a month now. I have about 40 minutes edited and have added some new music as well:

viewtopic.php?f=21&t=2028&p=73817#p73817

Unfortunately, I never requested it be put to the in-the-works section, as I was waiting for my Batman Begins cut to be released before officially announcing any further projects. Sadly, that means I have to change my title :( Oh well.
 

boon23

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nope, it does not mean that, only if you want to be unique AND if this one here gets an approval at all.
 

boon23

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Review of True Romance - The Tarantino Cut by Spoke

prologue:
So I sat down with a rather bad feeling, being warned about annoying errors by a previous comment on faneditforum.com, but still started to watch to have my own opinion about it. First off: I am a true fan of the original, from start to finish and I did not miss the QT touch in the original. I am also a QT fan.

The edit:
The fanedit is an ultra-extended cut of True Romance with scenes being put in a new order according to the original script by Quentin Tarantino and also featuring the alternate QT ending instead of the original one. About every available deleted scene is included, some of them were quite nice, but most of them rather redundant, not too distracting or annoying though. The new order of scenes does unfortunately make not too much sense to me, so I do understand why Tony Scott did create his film in chronological order. The jumps were at times confusing and with the location title cards given not always appropriate, as the location changed in at least one scene drastically.
However, I was entertained, loved to see the scenes again after about 2 years, when I watched TR the last time. It's still a great movie. The starting credits were nicely done as was the music. The title cards throughout the movie are kind of well inserted and usually are about locations, where the action is happening now. This had a somewhat pulp-fictioness feel to it, but the movie was not Pulp Fiction, it was still True Romance. To me the jumps took away more than they added.
I have to agree that the image quality for the deleted scenes is at times very obviously worse than the movie footage and there are a few fades that have an artificial feel to it. I also noticed a few black frames during the movie, but it was still watchable for me. Same goes for the switching audio volume and the lack of background noises in some of the deleted scenes.
The alternate ending: well, some favor it over the original one, but I for one like it that Clarence and Alabama lived happily ever after. They deserved it. The "asshole" monologue did not really fit to Alabama IMO, but to each his own. It was an acceptable, yet a bit frustrating way to end this movie.
The end credits are the ones from the original movie, no changes were made there (which is always a bit of a disappointment to me).
Overall this is an ok fanedit. Personally I would call it "True Romance - The Quentin Tarantino Workprint", because of the image variances and the audio issues. It is not an improvement over the original, but a nice addition. If flawlessly executed this might be a bit more.
editing: 3 of 5,
entertainment: 3 of 5

Image quality:
The image quality is varying, which is a bit distracting. The quality of the deleted scenes most of the times worse than the original footage. The original footage was a bit blurry already (unlike my original DVD). There were some black frames and the coloring of some of the deleted scenes also differed from the original scenes. This had a workprint feel to it.
video quality: 2 of 5

Audio quality:
The audio of the deleted scenes has at times a different volume than the original scenes, sometimes there is a bit of white noise and some of the scenes have not all the background noises completed. Some more work should have went into this. Most audio cuts are clean.
audio: 2 of 5

presentation:
The Avi is split into 2 parts for CD burning, which nowadays seems a but unnecessary to me and I would have preferred one file. In the folder there is also an info file and a poster, which is nice. And there is the Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos" #18 comic in a format I could not open. Nice addition, unfortunately a bit of piracy. I suggest to everyone who does not have that comic book to delete it from the folder. For a 1.4GB avi the quality is rather bad: Mp-2 audio (although 224 is not the worst I have seen for that), blurry image. Some 700mb avi movies looked a lot better.
presentation: 3 of 5

resulting in a weak 3 of 5 overall rating from me. With it's workprint charm of containing all the deleted scenes and the huge difference to the original this is a nice addition to the original, but not at all an improvement. A better executed version could come a lot closer.
This is hereby approved to FANEDIT.ORG.
18596830yi7.png
 

Frantic Canadian

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Would the comic have been in .cbr or .cbz format Boon? I use a program called CDisplay to be able to view them. Although you can also right click the file and choose to open it with WinRar and extract the files that way or just right click it and hit extract. I'm just curious but what does the comic book have to do with the movie?
 

boon23

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it was .cbr.
from imdb:
The comic book that Clarence shows Alabama is "Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos" #18. In this issue, Nick has gotten a ring for his sweetheart (Pamela Hawley) that he keeps on a chain around his neck. Later in the story, he gets in a fight with a Nazi and the ring falls overboard but Fury dives into the ocean to retrieve it. What Clarence doesn't tell Alabama is that when Fury returns to give the ring to his love he finds she's been killed.
 

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Sprug's decapitated head said:
This may be really cool if edited well. I'll attempt to download it, but I wish it was a full quality DVD, though. Thanks for the heads up, Boon!
I contacted Spoke and he said that there may be a DVD @ FE in the next week or so but he wasn't 100% about it.
 

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Hi everyone, new to this forum and this is my first post. Here are my reactions and comments to boon23's review, which I posted on the project page:

First of all, thanks for the review.

I haven't included any comments in the movie folder so here they are, including my reactions to your review (which do not necessarely reflect Spoker Spoke's opinions):

From the start, my intention has always been to re-edit the film following scrupulously the screenplay, without any regards to how well it flows. I am well aware that some cuts are confusing or abrupt, and that some scenes might be redundant - but I didn't want to make any changes to what Tarantino had written. You are right that calling it "True Romance - The Quentin Tarantino Workprint" might have been more appropriate, especially considering the image quality of the deleted scenes.

Movies are made in the editing room, and I'm sure that although pretty much everything that Tarantino had written was filmed, that the finished product, had it kept the non-linear structure, would have ended up different than the edit I have made. But like I said, I didn't try to second guess what the editor of that movie would have done, nor have I edited this according to what I think would be a smoother watch. I merely followed the screenplay.

As for the technical aspect of it: I'm sorry for the black frames. The DVD master doesn't have those so I'm guessing the software I used is not the ideal tool for converting DVDs to AVIs. But I'm happy that it isn't too distracting. I will up the DVD if there is enough interest.

The image quality of the deleted scenes couldn't be helped much - we have the source we have, and that's that. I did try to play with color adjustment but to dissappointing results.

My major mea culpa is the audio - especially the deleted scenes. It's true that more work could have been done, especially in the background noise department. But I chose to leave the scenes as is.

Overall, I'm still very happy with the result. You'll notice that I haven't labeled myself as a faneditor in the credits, merely as the assembler. I only hope this project brings attention to Tarantino's film and that perhaps someone will come up with a true fanedit, one that might reflect better what could have been, had Tarantino had his way.

Thanks.


Sorry to have stolen your thunder, donor. I had no idea somebody else was working on a True Romance fanedit. Actually, I had no idea this had ended up here until Spoker told me about it.

I don't really consider this a fanedit, though, in the sense that there were no creative choices involved other than trying to make the transitions as smooth as possible, and trying to come up with the correct style for the title cards. I'm just flattered this web site has decided to feature it.

Look for my first true (public) fanedit in a couple of weeks. A movie no one has done before, probably with good reason :wink:

Thanks.
 

boon23

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blueyoda said:
Look for my first true (public) fanedit in a couple of weeks. A movie no one has done before, probably with good reason :wink:
great news!
 

blueyoda

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Sprug's decapitated head said:
Cool. Thanks stomachworm!

Edit: blueyoda, are you the person who put this cut together? I'm a bit confused.

Yes, I'm the person who put this together, under Spoker Spoke's direction. Sorry for the confusion. Incidently, I'm also the guy who submitted that imdb trivia bit that boon23 quoted :)
 

JMB

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blueyoda said:
Sorry to have stolen your thunder, donor. I had no idea somebody else was working on a True Romance fanedit. Actually, I had no idea this had ended up here until Spoker told me about it.

You stole my thunder and I want it back! :)

No, you did nothing of the sort. There are multiple edits of many movies. No worries there. It was just a bit of a surprise for me is all. I got over it though.

Oh, and my name is jokersmailbag (JMB for short), not Donor. Donor next to someone's avatar indicates a financial contribution to FE.org. I highly encourage everyone to do so BTW, doesn't have to be a lot but every little bit helps keep the dream alive ;)

Welcome to FE.org... Now get cracking on that next edit!
 

Dluppers

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i'm working on a dvd cover for this,this is the WIP - it should be finished sometime today :)
3DtrueromanceDVDcoverWIP.jpg
 

Spoke

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Aughhh!

You make one typo and pay for it forever.

My name is Spoke Spoker, not Spoker Spoke.

I thought this got fixed, but now that I see someone is doing a cover for us...

Wow, by the way. Awesome!

If it's still fixable, please fix. If not, oh well, my own damn fault for typing the info too quick.
 

Dluppers

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Spoke said:
Aughhh!

You make one typo and pay for it forever.

My name is Spoke Spoker, not Spoker Spoke.

I thought this got fixed, but now that I see someone is doing a cover for us...

Wow, by the way. Awesome!

If it's still fixable, please fix. If not, oh well, my own damn fault for typing the info too quick.
it said your name was spoker spoke on the main site...not to worry i'll fix it shortly

edit - i have now updated the cover and reuploaded it
 
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