The editor, David Brenner, recently spoke with Pro Video Coalition about the process of cutting the movie and how many plot points had to be left out in order to streamline the narrative to a movie going audience. Here are just a few highlights from the interview:
“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. For us, the trickiest section was the beginning of the film, until the point where Bruce Wayne tells Alfred the truth about what is on the ‘White Portuguese’ ship… the truth about his plan.”
“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.”
“It was a lot to juggle. So the plot lines of a couple characters had to go.”
“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.”
“I remember being a little worried. Three and a half hours, okay, that’s fine for a movie of this size, the way Zack likes to work. This was more daunting. But we cut down ‘Man of Steel’ from about 3 and half hours, I knew we’d get this done.
“[Zack Snyder’s] a super visual guy. He was a painter before he was a director, and more than anyone I’ve ever worked with he thinks in terms of pictures. He storyboards his movies himself. The whole movie from start to finish, he draws. He keeps books. ‘BvS’ had maybe three books of his drawings.”
Some fans and critics have complained at the pacing of Batman v Superman and maybe the cutting process played a role in what some have perceived as unusual editing. This bit of news will give fans plenty to argue with for the next couple of weeks and it’ll be interesting to see if the Ultimate Edition will change the minds for those who didn’t enjoy it the first time round.
Did you like Batman v Superman? Would you like to see the subplots played out properly? And if you weren’t a fan, what would you do to make it better? Sound off down below …