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Dune: The Complete Saga (by Michael Warren August 2015) (Released)

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 (Edited)

Has anyone viewed this fanedit? It can be found on kickasstorrents (3.77 <span>GB)… this is Warren’s description:
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<span>This 3 hour version of David Lynch’s Dune (1984) integrates footage from the original Theatrical Cut, the Extended TV Cut, and deleted scenes to make the most complete version of the film as of 2012. I have done this as a labor of love to give fans of this under-appreciated gem an alternative version to the two flawed cuts currently available on the DVD.

I only acted as a fan editor and did not originate the content of this movie. MCA Universal and its associated parent companies own all rights to this material. They have released a beautiful Blu-Ray and DVD of David Lynch’s classic movie, which I highly recommend you buy to demonstrate to the studio that there is market for this movie to be fully restored one day, ideally with a new master cut of the film to restore as much of the story as possible with the utmost attention to detail that I could never hope to match in this good-spirited fan effort.

Viewers will notice the footage from David Lynch’s Theatrical Cut is expertly edited, color corrected, and sound designed better than the far poorer extended TV Cut, which was originally created without the director’s authorization or oversight when the movie was prepared to air as a reconstructed mini-series for television in the late 1980’s.

For this reason, the elements culled from the extended TV cut are inferior, more poorly edited, not color corrected well, and are lacking certain basic special effects (such as the Fremen’s lack of blue eyes). The sound design was also of poorer quality in the TV cut, which was was particularly egregious since this film’s original sound editing and design were nominated for the Oscar.

If I had the resources, time, and equipment necessary to correct these issues in a thorough re-edit of the original material, then I would gladly do so. And I would offer my services to MCA Universal free of charge to help see the project come to fruition.

As is, I only had the material available on the DVDs to work with, and used the most basic of editing software suites available. For this reason, this particular cut of the film is unavoidably choppy and rough at times. But I meticulously reconstructed Dune with nearly all the available footage of the film, with an entirely new structure differing from both the Theatrical and Extended TV Cuts to better preserve story continuity and improve the dramatic flow.

David Lynch’s efforts in bringing this film to life have been often criticized in the past, and I believe is his most unfairly maligned film. My only intention in creating this cut of Dune (1984) is to show a sliver more of his amazing directorial efforts and show more of what the film could have been were it given more time to run than the too short Theatrical Cut and if it had been edited with just a bit more care when it was released as a mini-series. Thank you.

I also created an original trailer for Dune, which you can find here: vimeo.com/50930027

  • Michael Warren</span>

<span>On Warren’s facebook he posted this in which he levels some pretty hard (but fair) criticism of Spicediver’s edit:</span>

<span><span data-ft="{" tn":"*g",“type”:45}"=""><span>I have encountered many people online asking what are the differences between my fan edit “Dune: The Complete Saga” and Spicediver’s fan edit “Dune: The Alternative Edition” and I finally got my hands on a copy of Spicediver’s cut of Dune for the first time.

Rather than than fully catalog all of the changes between the two, I will just touch on a few salient topics to give you all an overview of <span>what both edits do and accomplish.

Spicediver’s cut is geared more toward fans of the book who were annoyed by different creative liberties David Lynch took when adapting the source material. For fans of the movie itself, Spicediver’s cut is a mixed bag.

And for general viewers, the pacing of Spicediver’s cut is interrupted frequently by title cards of quotes from the book. It’s an interesting concept, but it kills some of the cinematic magic of David Lynch’s pacing and tone.

They even removed all of David Lynch’s internal thought monologues for the characters. They also overlay narration inappropriately over tense dramatic moments, such as the Guild navigator’s arrival to meet the Emperor, destroying the tension of the scene building up.

And the blue within blue eye effects were added to the Navigators, too, which although is accurate in the book, David Lynch chose to take in a different direction and keep the blue eye effect exclusively with the Fremen.

In short, there are many times it feels like Spicediver is removing David Lynch’s imprimatur on the film. Particularly when he removed the ending of Paul causing it to rain on Arrakis. Sure, David Lynch created that ending specifically for his movie and it contradicts the ending of the book in several respects, but it was a key moment of catharsis to complete the cinematic viewing experience and Spicediver removed it entirely.

Spicediver’s Dune: Alternative Edition Redux is great for what it is: a fan of the novel Dune transforming the movie to feel much more like the novel. And there are plenty of readers of the novel who love that. But it is altogether a very different cut from mine, which I created with the explicit intention of making it feel as close to David Lynch’s original vision of the film as possible.

There is plenty of room for both our cuts to coexist. I acknowledge what Spicediver and his colleagues did in creating their book-centric cut. The visuals were beautifully rendered with excellent equipment and software, for sure. And the attempts to digitally clean the deleted scenes and add the blue eye effect back in were great. But I love David Lynch’s artistic flourishes and my cut does represent a more well rounded representation of his intent with the film.

Now let’s get Universal Studios Entertainment to make an officially restored and remastered release with as much of the original story preserved as possible. I would love to see a child viewing an epic length fully remastered and restored master cut of Dune on a 4k UltraHD Display at the same age I first saw the Dune Extended TV cut.

There is no need for fans of our different Dune cuts to troll one another. We all love Dune here. Let’s let our mutual love for Dune bring us together. I prefer David Lynch’s vision and flourishes. Others prefer an approach more similar to the novel. Everyone can be happy and watch whatever versions they want to. That’s the beauty of the world we live in right now.

But as for me and my cut of Dune, the Kwisatz Haderach will make it rain.</span></span></span></span>

And even more interesting than that is the comments that are on kicasstorrents:

blessthemaker • 17 Aug 2015, 15:57
not worth watching
the rain in the end disrespects the book
and genuinely amateurish editing 😦

anonymous • 17 Aug 2015, 12:51
For the love of the Maker, please do not download this utterly horrible edit and instead search for Spicediver’s Alternative Edition Redux 2012. This “edit” has audio inconsistencies between cuts, bad edits (Gurney, Yueh, Hawat entrance scene is twice, they literally come twice through the door!) and it’s overpacked with the attitude of “hey, let’s add every single deleted scene and call it a film, doesn’t matter if they fit or are relevant at all”

I hope to view this edit myself soon. I agree 100% that Spicediver’s edit is not consistent with the director’s intention (which is why Lynch’s name should not be in the credits IMO), it is however by far the best cut I’ve seen of the film, and a clear indication that the director’s vision for this film was imperfect.

If anyone’s seen it do post a review!

[ Scanning stuff since 2015 ]

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Okay so I haven't watched it yet but I will confirm that the criticisms above are accurate. The scene with Gurney Yueh & Hawat entering has the door opening twice (before any of them come through) and then the scene repeats itself first with voice over and then without - it is very poorly edited for sure in that scene. This isn't the only time this happens either - in the beggining the lady from the Theatrical edit starts explaining the history - you know all this stuff:

"the most precious substance in the universe is the spice milange. The spice extends life. The spice expands conciousness. The spice is vital to space travel. ... The spice exists on only one planet in the entire universe - a desolate dry planet with vast deserts. ... The planet is Arrakis - also know as Dune."

Then the male narrator says the same thing word-for-word with pictures. I'm serious, it's just the Greedo-Han-Jabba information in SW except longer and even more directly one following the other!

The scene with the big alien creature in the glass container near the beginning has terrible quality audio editing also. You can clearly hear the difference between the theatrical and the extended versions - Spicediver's edit is much more seamless around areas of the film where he edits things together from different sources.

First Giedi Prime is depicted as red in on picture and then green in another. The "Book 1 ... 3" titles he added fell outside the 2.31:1 picture ratio. The criticisms on facebook that the video is stuttery is also true as it's 29.97fps.

And considering his (in my view fair) criticisms of Spicediver's cut it was silly of him to leave David Lynch's name in the credits.

I don't think I have the patience to watch this edit all the way through.

[ Scanning stuff since 2015 ]

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I tried watching this new cut as well and really didn't enjoy it. having both opening sequences didn't gel very well together

The TV version opening prologue has no place in any 'Lynch' inspired or approved edit IMHO. as far as i can recall, it was the TV Prologue that made him remove his name from the film

I do enjoying both versions of the film though. The theatrical version is amazing as it is (I'm quite a big fan of the film). The TV version is a mess but still interesting to watch. But combining the two just makes it a mess.

 I'm in the middle of reviewing the latest Blu-ray from Germany (It has both cuts in HD) so looking forward to getting my observations written up (Extended version is a hybrid of HD and upscaled SD footage btw)

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Thanks for the info. Always excited  see new cuts of Dune, but  think Ill give this a miss.

i never bothered with Spicediver, because the changes don't sound appealing to me.

What about Third Stage edit? I always thought  was quite decent.