Dark Knight Saga Recut, The - Part II

Updated
 
9.2 (13)
6585 0 1 0 7
DKS Recut Part II - Poster.jpg
Faneditor Name:
Original Movie Title:
Franchise:
Fanedit Type:
Original Release Date:
2008
Original Running Time:
152
Fanedit Release Date:
Fanedit Running Time:
141
Time Cut:
11
Available in HD?
Brief Synopsis:
The Dark Knight is undoubtedly the crowning achievement of Nolan's Bat-Trilogy. It is rightly considered a classic of modern cinema, however, it is still victim to many of the flaws that plague the trilogy as a whole, including poor humour, weak performances from supporting characters, clunky exposition and jarring narrative details. This edit attempts to tighten up The Dark Knight, trimming those elements that detracted from this wonderful film, hopefully allowing what remains to be all the more enjoyable as a result.
Intention:
This series of edits intends to streamline Nolan's Batman films, keeping the tone consistent throughout and emphasizing the strongest elements of the series.
Other Sources:
Batman Begins (shot of Batman using his grappling hook)
The Dark Knight - Trailer (shot of Batman saying, "Then you're gonna love me").
Special Thanks:
Dwight Fry and INH5 for their great feedback and ideas.
Release Information:
  • DVD
  • Blu-Ray
  • Digital
Editing Details:
Editing Software: Premiere Pro CS6, Encore CS6, DVDFab, Bigasoft Audio Converter, Photoshop
Cuts and Additions:
GENERAL GOALS:
- Tone down Bale’s performance as Batman (less shouting, less duck face growling)
- Try to make the police less stupid and remove their jokey one-liners.
- Cut any dialogue that sounds like it was written to be in the trailer (I.e.,dialogue that sounds unnaturally shoe-horned into the scene).
- Cut bad jokes where possible.
- Cut Batman’s strobing, epilepsy inducing sonar vision.
- Cut story points that don’t make much sense (fall from building, riding batpod through a shopping centre, flipping batpod by riding up the wall).
- Cut poor performances from Gotham citizens where possible (i.e., copycats, press conference, on the ferries

FULL CUTLIST:
- Cut “Why do they call him the Joker?” “I hear he wears makeup, to scare people. You know, like war paint.”
- Cut, “He’s out, right?” Joker nods. Goon gets shot. “Where did you learn to count?”
- Cut drug dealer’s, “You’ve got more chance of winning the power ball than running into him!”
- Cut copycat vigilantes and all references to hockey pants from the Scarecrow drug deal scene.
- Fixed an error in the original cut where the Chechen gangster gets into his car afterit has already driven away.
- Cut Batman attempting to saw into the side of Scarecrow’s van.
- Cut Bruce and Alfred’s dialogue about copycats with guns.
- Cut unnecessary first scene between the annoying accountant and Lucius.
- Cut “Three buttons is a little 90’s Mr.Wayne.” I’m not talking fashion so much as function.”
- Cut Rachel’s, “Harvey, the last person to take control of Rome was called Caesar, and - he never gave up his power.” Harvey: “Fine, you either die a hero, or livelong enough to see yourself become the villain.
- Cut "He's a symbol...", so that when Joker asks "Why do you dress up like him?", the answer is "we don't have to be afraid of scum like you!" Hopefully the implication is that Joker dressed him up in the outfit, not that he's trying to be a copycat/vigilante himself.
- Trimmed conversation between Ramirez and Gordon, cutting “The Joker’s telling us who he’s targeting! Get a unit over to Cerilo’s house, tell Worts to find Dent, get them both into protective custody, where’s the Commissioner? “ “City Hall” “Seal the building, no one in or out until I get there!”
- Cut the couple making out/undressing during the Joker’s attack at the fundraiser. “Hey Wayne, what’s happening out there? Oh, Thank God, you’ve got a panic room…. Oh you’ve gotta be kidding me.”
- Trimmed police to Cerilo, “These are dangerous people judge.” “But you’re not giving me a lot of information here!” “Even we don’t know where you’re going”
- Re-inserted a shot from Trailer 1 of Batman saying “Then you’re gonna love me”, which was not used in the original cut of the film. Inserted shot has been color corrected to match film colour grading.
- Recut Rachel and Batman’s fall off the building, adding footage/sound effects of Batman firing his grappling gun from Batman Begins to help explain how they could have survived such a fall.
- Small trim to Alfred's story about the jewel thief, cutting "You squeezed em...". Now, same as the teaser trailer, he just says "You hammered em, and in their desperation they turned to a man...".
- Cut Ramirez stating the obvious, “Harvey Dent!”, after Gordon names Joker’s victim’s, “Richard Dent… Patrick Harvey.”
- Cut Wayne firing four different bullets in the bat cave. Now cuts straight to him scanning the evidence he gathered from the crime scene.
- Cut Batman’s, “WHERE IS HE?!” Marone: “Nobody knows where he is”, B: “He must have friends” M: “Friends? Have you even met this guy?”, B: “SOMEONE KNOWS WHERE HEIS”. After Marone’s fall, first line of dialogue is now, “Nobody’s gonna tell you nothin”.
- Cut “The night is darkest just before the dawn, and I promise you, the dawn is coming”.
- Cut Gotham citizen during press conference, “Things are worse than everrrr”.
- Swapped a shot of crowd reacting to Harvey’s press conference, to avoid woman shaking her head at Harvey before he has actually said anything.
- Cut angry Gotham citizen’s, “He should turn himself in!”
- Cut Rachel's "You make your own luck".
- Cut swat van policeman's, "I hope you've got some moves pal!"
- Cut police convoy diversion down to the lower levels due to the flaming fire truck.
- Cut policeman’s “c’mon, get us out of here, let’s go!”
- Cut policeman’s “we’ve got trouble guys!” & “lock and load!”
- Shortened Joker shooting the police van with small guns. He now goes for the bazooka as soon as it becomes clear the machine gun won’t break through.
- Cut policeman’s, “what is that, a bazooka? I didn’t sign up for this!”
- Fixed editing of tumbler’s crash, so that it doesn’t appear to lose momentum twice before crashing through a wall and coming to a stop.
- Cut shots of Tradesmen watching and eating bread rolls while batpod emerges from broken batmobile.
- Cut batmobile saying “goodbye”
- Cut Policeman’s “that’s what I’m talkin about!”
- Cut guy picking his teeth in the rear view mirror before Batman breaks it as he drives past.
- Cut Batman driving batpod through heavy traffic, breaking everyone’s mirrors.
- Cut joke with kids pretending to play machine guns in the car.
- Cut policeman’s “That’s not good…. Ok, that is not good!” as the helicopter crashes towards them.
- Cut batman driving through the shopping mall on his batpod.
- Cut batpod scaling the wall to turn the batpod around.
- Cut policeman’s, “you can’t stop here, we’ll be like sitting ducks!”
- Cut Dent to Gordon, “Gordon! You do like to play things pretty close to the chest!”. Previously this phrase was used between Wayne and Lucius, and it seems strange to hear it again in a totally unrelated context.
- Cut stupid police comments: "He's got some kind of contusion... Is that a phone?"
- Cut Alfred to Bruce, “Will you be wanting the batpod sir?” “Middle of the day Alfred? Not very subtle.” “The Lamborghini then. Much more subtle.”
- Cut Gordon’s, “It’s Mr.Wayne, isn’t it?”. He knows who Bruce Wayne is…
- Cut Lucius/Batman, “You’ve turned every cell phone in Gotham into a microphone.” “And a high frequency generator receiver.”
- Significantly cut down all scenes of Gotham citizens on the boats deciding whether to blow up the other boat.
- Cut most of Batman’s epilepsy inducing sonar night vision POV shots.
- Cut policeman’s “He’s out of the game!”.
- Cut Batman’s one liner, “No, but I know how you got these!”
- Cut "We'd better stop this fighting, or we'll miss the fireworks!" "There won't be any fireworks""
- Cut, "What were you trying to prove? that deep down, everyone's as ugly as you?"
- Cut batman’s, “You’re alone”, due to significant duck face.
- Cut Batman’s, “This city….Just showed you….That it’s full of people…ready to believe in goooood”. J: “Until their spirit breaks completely. Until they get a good look at the real Harvey Dent, and all the heroic things he’s done.” Good dialogue, but so strangely performed by Bale. It had to go… No more duck faced Batman.
- Cut Harvey’s “you thought we could be decent men in an indecent time, but you were wrong”.
- Cut Batman’s, “Because you were the best of us. He wanted to prove that even someone as good as you could fall.” H: And he was right.
- Cut out Gordon’s son’s, “Dad? Dad, is he ok?”
- Cut Batman’s “You either die a hero, or see yourself become the villain…” reprise.
- Cut Batman’s, “I can do those things. Because I’m not a hero, unlike Dent”. Serious duck face.
- Cut Batman running away awkwardly, and Gordon’s son’s “Batman! Why is he running dad?”. G: “Because we have to chase him.” Son: “He didn’t do anything wrong!" Gordon “He’s the hero Gotham deserves, but not the one it needs right now.”
- Cut Gordon’s, “because he’s not a hero.”
- Replaced ‘The Dark Knight' title card with Dark Knight Saga Recut – Part II.
- Added Bill Finger as co-creator of Batman in the end credits
Cover art by njvc (DOWNLOAD HERE) image

Cover art by njvc (DOWNLOAD HERE) image

Recut scene example (added grappling hook).

User reviews

13 reviews
 
77%
 
23%
5-7 stars
 
0%
3-5 stars
 
0%
1-3 stars
 
0%
Overall rating
 
9.2
Audio/Video Quality
 
9.9(13)
Audio Editing
 
9.5(13)
Visual Editing
 
9.3(13)
Narrative
 
8.6(13)
Enjoyment
 
8.5(13)
View all user reviews View most helpful
Overall rating
 
9.6
Audio/Video Quality
 
10.0
Audio Editing
 
10.0
Visual Editing
 
10.0
Narrative
 
9.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
I recently watched this trilogy edit and really enjoyed it. This is my least favorite of the three edits though.

There were no problems at all with the video or audio just as with the other movies. And many of the cuts were good, such as a lot of the humor and much of the pacing. But I think a little too much got cut. 1st being the copycats which I felt brought a lot of depth to what effects batman was having on the people of gotham. And the 2nd being the boat scenes at the end. I think this removed a lot of the tension and struggle the people were going through making it feel like not a huge deal. The pacing here just felt really off.

I think the good mostly outweighs the bad though. The pacing throughout the rest of the movie was great, as other reviewers have said the fall off the building having the grappling gun shot inserted made that so much better, and toning down Bale's Batman performance was great. I'd recommend this edit to anyone, but I think I'll personally stick with the original.

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
A
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
(Updated: May 09, 2018)
Overall rating
 
9.0
Audio/Video Quality
 
9.0
Audio Editing
 
10.0
Visual Editing
 
9.0
Narrative
 
8.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
I have seen the original movie so many times, that it was nice to see a different cut of the movie. Though I love the original, and I did love the re-cut of Batman Begins, this one felt rushed, at least at the start, but I guess if one is trying to jump straight to the action/story, that's how it'd be edited.

I recommend it!

Great job, njvc

Once I finish Rises Recut, I'll review that as well.

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
Overall rating
 
9.2
Audio/Video Quality
 
10.0
Audio Editing
 
9.0
Visual Editing
 
9.0
Narrative
 
9.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
Equally great editing in this the second part in The Dark Knight Saga. Just about everything suited me. A bit too quick in the beginning, though, with the van and Scarecrow. Otherwise I felt all the poor jokes and exposition were dealt with beautifully. Definitely an improvement from the original. Recommended!

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
M
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
(Updated: September 29, 2014)
Overall rating
 
8.8
Audio/Video Quality
 
10.0
Audio Editing
 
10.0
Visual Editing
 
8.0
Narrative
 
8.0
Enjoyment
 
8.0
Thank you NJVC! :]X

User Review

Format Watched?
Digital
A
Top 500 Reviewer 20 reviews
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
Overall rating
 
9.6
Audio/Video Quality
 
10.0
Audio Editing
 
10.0
Visual Editing
 
10.0
Narrative
 
9.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
This edit is great. I agree with the changes because I feel its meant to be experienced in continuity with the previous and preceding films as one long epic. Great job njvc. Highly recommend all three of njvc's Dark Knight edits

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
View all user reviews