It seems that Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice couldn’t get any longer than the theatrical cut. The film runs at two and a half hours, which is pretty long. A common criticism is that the film had pacing and editing problems with one too many plotholes. If anything, extending BvS would only add to those problems. So when it was announced that there was going to be a 3-hour Blu-ray Ultimate Edition, there was a chance that it could have solved some of those issues. Though that remains to be seen.
Now it appears that there is a much longer cut that no one has seen yet. A near four-hour version of the film that only BvS editor David Brenner knows about until now. Check out what he had to say here below.
Speaking to Pro Video Coalition, Brenner spoke at length about deciding what would stay and what would go no matter what the size of the budget was. According to him, the goal was to get the story and characters to work:
As always there was too much originally shot, so there were a lot of choices to make to get the film to play. Sometimes things don’t work out as well as they might have on the page. Sometimes they didn’t on the page either! So no matter what the budget or scale, as the editor, you’re just trying to get the story and characters to work.
This isn’t the first time that Brenner has worked in the DC Extended Universe or with director Zack Snyder. The editor previously worked on Man of Steel and will be editing Justice League Part One. With the two already having a working relationship, they know what each other wants from each other:
Zack knew that on “Man of Steel” we addressed a lot of script questions in the film editing. So he was confident we could do it again.
Brenner confirmed that BvS had more subplots and revealed that Lex Luthor was supposed to be revealed later on.
In the script there were more storylines than you see in the movie today. That was probably our biggest editorial issue in trying to get the cut down to a reasonable length.
In the script there are more subplots than you see in the movie right now. Also in terms of building this beginning we had to move things around. In the script, Lex was introduced much later, but we found that in watching the movie – because he’s such an important player, it was best to set him up sooner. Plus, his presence has so much energy, a twisted comic energy that boosted the film. Generally, BvS was a unique challenge in that we had not one but two protagonists, each with an alter-ego. So there was Clark Kent, Superman, Bruce Wayne and Batman. And then surrounding them are Lois Lane, Lex Luthor, Wallace Keefe (the guy who loses his legs when Wayne Tower falls), Perry White, Martha Kent, Holly Hunter’s character (Senator Finch), and still more characters orbiting them.
It was a lot to juggle. So the plot lines of a couple characters had to go. These people are currently in the movie but we don’t track them, and it’s okay. What’s kind of fun is that we went back and did an extended cut where we put a lot of this stuff back, and we refined it into the same rhythm as the theatrical release. So what was once a nearly four hour cut with absolutely everything was ridiculous – ended up being about a three hour cut, once all these added storylines were refined with the fat was cut out.
With rumors of the R-rated extended cut possibly getting a theatrical release, Brenner spoke about how much fun he had editing the film, and confirmed that there was a four-hour cut:
What’s kind of fun is that we went back and did an extended cut where we put a lot of this stuff back, and we refined it into the same rhythm as the theatrical release. So what was once a nearly four-hour cut with absolutely everything was ridiculous – ended up being about a three-hour cut, once all these added story lines were refined with the fat was cut out.
Be sure to click on the link below to see the entire interview.
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice is out in theaters now.
[Source: Pro Video Coalition]
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