Review Detail

I’ve been desperate for the fabled 6+ hour IT Supercut but at this point I doubt it’s going to happen so I’ve decided to dip my toes into the world of fanedits. I watched both IT: The Bookish Cut and IT (A Film), both attempting to combine IT: Chapter One (2017) and IT: Chapter Two (2019) into a single film but with different goals and methods. I will be reviewing each movie separately but as I watched them so close together there will be some elements of comparison. This review contains spoilers for the original films.

The Bookish Cut (4:43:50) edits the two films together in a way that preserves the flow of the original films, starting with the opening scene of Chapter One and Chapter Two back to back before going into the title card. The movie introduces the adults before moving into almost the entirety of Chapter One (up past the first Neibolt House encounter). I was expecting more back and forth to match the structure of Chapter Two but thanks to setting up the inciting incidents of both time periods and introducing the adults immediately the eventual transition into Chapter Two and its use of both time periods felt a lot more natural than the original release and kept the strengths of Chapter One intact for the viewing experience. The ending significantly truncated Chapter Two’s ending which is a massive improvement, it was one of my biggest gripes with the original film. I was sad to see the confirmation of Richie’s ‘secret’ fall victim to this trim though.

The Bookish Cut is very similar to how I imagine an official supercut would be put together, favouring the structure of the film over the book’s original structure and it works very well. It’s definitely a better viewing experience than watching the two films separately. It trims down a few scenes (especially from Chapter Two) that help this longer edit flow better and focus more on the Losers rather than Pennywise but I couldn’t help but miss some of them (like Vicky’s scene). Some deleted scenes are added in as well to flesh out Chapter One and these stand out a little and slightly impact the pacing of the movie but that’s another thing that’s really hard to mitigate without access to more footage to play around with. Most of the editing was well done, but there were some very harsh cuts and odd cross dissolves, particularly when cutting to adult Bowers and some of the intercutting of the final action sequences of both movies. Some of this could have been mitigated but it’s also a symptom of the films not being filmed with this kind of cross editing in mind and is probably why Muscietti wanted to direct new footage for his official supercut.

I would definitely recommend this edit for fans of the movies as it improves the experience of IT: Chapter Two (a film I already really like as is) by setting up the intercutting at the start, despite the middle of the two films primarily playing sequentially. I do think a ‘director's cut’ of this edit with the tertiary horror scenes added back in could make for a superior experience to watching the two films separately, but as it stands it is better watched after having experienced the two films first, and will probably enhance your appreciation for the (in my opinion) overhated Chapter Two.

Due to this edit’s focus on the Losers Club, a lot of tertiary horror scenes involving minor characters have been removed, which de-emphasises the horror elements and accentuates the comedy and drama aspects of the movies. My opinion is that the horror mostly served to emotionally heighten the other aspects of these films, and I already suggested these movies to people who wanted to get into horror but were a little too anxious or squeamish to start with something more scary or violent, so this edit might be even better for squeamish fans or for people wanting to ease themselves into horror.

Edit Comparisons:
Watching The Bookish Cut and It (A Film) so closely together was very interesting as the editors made different decisions with the same footage. Much of it was due to different goals (so I won't be covering that kind of thing here) but some differences were changes or choices that both editors made, especially if it that altered characterisation or left something in that I expected to be cut. I’m sure there are many small interesting differences I missed over the 8+ hours I spent watching these edits but these are the ones that stood out:

The Bookish Cut and (A Film) both cut a different part of Adrian Mellon's line to Vicky, with The Bookish Cut making Adrian seem much friendlier (“Hey, thanks for letting me win”) and (A Film) choosing to make him seem much more standoffish (“Hey, girl. You want this?”). I significantly prefer the characterisation of The Bookish Cut here.

Both edits use a stormwater drain to transition from the adult introductions into IT: Chapter One but (A Film) does so significantly better, using a bridging monologue from adult Mike and the roaring of the flooding water rushing through the pipe to transition to the loud ringing of the school bell. A Bookish Cut’s transition uses a cross dissolve from the end of adult Beverly’s introduction into the camera flying from the sewer out into the barrens from Chapter One’s title card and another cut into the slaughterhouse scene with child Mike.

Both edits removed the reveal of Richie’s “dirty little secret” from the end of Chapter Two which was a shame. Making Richie explicitly homo/bisexual is one of my favourite film additions. It’s how I viewed the book character anyway so it was good to make it explicit.

Both edits made the captains call to keep the worst CGI in either movie, where Pennywise’s face melts while yelling “COME BACK AND PLAY!” to a fleeing adult Richie. It would probably be pretty hard to cut but I would’ve liked it gone.

Both films kept most of Chapter One (including reinserting deleted scenes) but both removed sizeable sections of Chapter Two. A bookish cut kept all of the Loser's subplots except the ending of Richie's, but (A Film) excised entire characters and subplots. Both edits removed a child murder from Chapter Two but they each removed a different one.

The Bookish Cut’s faithfulness to the format of the original films made for a smoother watching experience despite not having as much editorial flair. (A Film) is very interesting and has some really skillful and stylish editing, especially the final sequence, but the films don’t lend themselves as well to being rearranged into book sequence as they do a more simple blending of the two, at least not with the footage currently available. Both are definitely worth watching and incredibly well done.

Link to my review of It (A Film): https://ifdb.fanedit.org/it-a-film/discussions/13641/