logo Sign In

Interstellar: Where We're Going (Released)

Author
Time

Hello!

I recently finished an edit of Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar (2014). I’ve been a fan of his movies as far back as Following, but lately, increasingly, I find I have to bring out the rose-tinted glasses to get through them.

Interstellar has a lot of moments that are pure magic for me, and as a father, the core parent/child story still hits me in the jellies, but there are other moments that pull me straight out of the movie, as if Nolan himself has grabbed me by the collar, saying, “Here, look, I wrote this!” (sometimes it’s Jonathan, but I won’t stretch this metaphor any further). Anyways, I thought it would be fun to see if I could trim them out, and make something I could enjoy more fully.

Most of the changes are simple cuts to dialogue, but I also wanted to completely remove the section my brain insists on calling “Farmhouse Tension”. In this 'edit, Murphy doesn’t try to persuade Tom to leave the farm, and there is no burning corn and sneaking back into the bedroom.

Trailer
https://vimeo.com/784837685

Note: The music in the trailer is not a one-off. If you like Simon & Garfunkel, you may really enjoy this edit, but I won’t say any more.

Changes (Partial List)

  • Added fanedit.org disclaimer
  • Added credit titles leading up to the Kitchen scene.
  • Adjusted initial dialog between Cooper and Murphy. Murphy asks if he was dreaming about the crash sooner.
  • Removed, “That’s not a dust storm.” line as Cooper leaves the house.
  • Removed “old man” / “repopulate the earth” joke.
  • Fixed Murphy shifting. She was pushing the gear shift in the wrong direction for second gear.
  • Removed most of the gear grinding before the flat tire. If the gears are grinding, it’s a problem with the clutch, not what Murphy is doing.
  • In the meeting at the school, removed digression about tax dollars and their allocation.
  • Shortened faked moon landing discussion slightly.
  • Removed “We used to look up in the sky and wonder at our place in the stars” dialogue.
  • At NASA, removed Cooper’s vacuum cleaner joke (lawn mower joke left intact).
  • Reworked conference room scene:
    • Removed “supernatural” line and eye roll.
    • Removed “…nobody stumbles out”.
    • Removed Amelia’s smirk when Murphy says, “It was gravity”.
    • Removed line about leaving in the trunk of a car.
    • Doyle now laughs about Cooper not realizing he’s at NASA (instead of laughing at Cooper’s worry about his daughter’s safety).
  • While Brand is trying to convince Cooper to fly the mission:
    • Removed “we need a pilot”.
    • Adjusted cadence of “and this is the mission you were trained for” and placed it after, “…never left the simulator”.
    • Moved, “…but something sent you here” after “we had no choice”: “We had no choice, but something sent you here…”
  • During Cooper’s briefing on the plan,
    • Removed Amelia’s, “…that’s no long shot”.
    • Removed “There’s a plan A and a plan B”.
    • Moved Brand’s, “Did you notice anything strange…” line ahead to the next scene.
  • Removed Cooper’s, “We farmers, we sit here every year…” line.
  • While Cooper is talking to Murphy about leaving, removed the “…I can’t be your ghost, I have to exist” dialogue.
  • Removed Murphy’s exaggerated kick when Donald catches her as she runs out of the house.
  • Compressed leaving orbit scene and removed poem.
  • While getting ready for hibernation, removed Amelia’s, “That’s what I love. You know, out there, we face great odds…” dialogue.
  • Shortened transit of Saturn (35s -> 15s)
  • Removed scene where Romilly explains why the wormhole looks the way it does.
  • Removed Amelia’s “first handshake” line while they traverse the wormhole.
  • While discussing Miller’s planet, removed contrived conflict between Cooper and Doyle.
  • Removed, “That’s relativity, folks”.
  • During air-braking scene,
    • Added silent flashback to Cooper’s crash.
    • Removed one of the external shots (altitude and lateral speed didn’t match final CG shot)
    • During Doyle’s death, fixed small continuity issue where Amelia abruptly turns to the right.
  • After Doyle’s death, while Amelia and Cooper are talking,
    • Removed explanation from CASE about the signal repeating.
    • Removed Amelia’s dialog about gravity moving across dimensions (including time).
    • Removed discussion of the beings and how they might perceive time.
    • Removed, “…but you knew about relativity”.
  • After returning to the Endurance, removed Amelia’s, “reality’s different” line.
  • Removed Brand’s broadcast to Amelia where he’s reading the poem.
  • While discussing which planet to visit next, removed some of Amelia’s lines re: the socio-utility-of-love.
  • After the cut back to the farm, removed the dinner table scene, as it primarily serves to set up the later tension around leaving when we hear Cooper * Jr. cough. I kept the preceding scene with Murphy and Tom where they survey the burning corn, as we need to understand the stakes have been raised (corn is no longer immune to blight).
  • After Murphy learns the truth about plan A,
    • Removed the poem.
    • Removed scene on the Endurance as the Ranger leaves for Mann’s and we see the beginning of Murphy’s broadcast.
    • Removed “frozen cloud”.
    • Adjusted curves/contrast/colour for one of the exterior shots while the ranger is landing.
  • During the revelation on Mann’s planet,
    • Removed “monstrous lie”.
    • Removed “You never would have…evolution has yet to…” dialogue.
    • After this scene cut to Cooper preparing to go home, rather than the shot of Murphy entering the farmhouse (that comes later).
  • During the subsequent scenes, beginning with Mann and Cooper leaving to survey the landing site and ending with Romilly’s death:
    • Removed discussion around the power of human connection.
    • Removed discussion around survival instinct, and seeing your kids before death.
    • Instead of cutting to Murphy at the farmhouse, cut to Romilly investigating KIPP.
    • Removed one of Mann’s “yes”. He now says “yes” three times instead of four.
    • Removed the 50/50 odds joke.
    • Removed the poem.
    • Removed Mann asking if Cooper sees his children.
    • Removed cuts to the farmhouse and Murphy burning the corn, etc.
    • After the explosion, added music, removed cut to farmhouse.
    • Removed cut to the farmhouse while Mann is entering orbit.
  • During Docking,
    • Removed “it’s not possible”…“no, it’s necessary”.
    • Removed “Now for our next trick” and Amelia’s laugh.
  • After Cooper asks how bad the damage is, cut to Murphy and Getty discussing how worthless Brand’s equation is.
  • Different music while Murphy tells Getty about her ghost (while waiting for the storm to clear).
  • Removed, “Manually?”…“That’s what I’m here for.”.
  • Removed, “What about the time slippage?”…“Well, none of us have time to worry about relativity”.
  • While Cooper outlines the plan to use Gargantua, cut to Murphy arriving at the farm house and entering the bedroom.
  • Inside the tesseract, there are cuts back to Murphy in the bedroom, as before, except for any scene related to the original version where we are worried about Tom returning home.
  • Different music during one key section of the tesseract scene.
  • Removed, “Love TARS, love”.
  • Removed scene where Murphy hugs Tom after figuring out the watch. Instead, cut from her realization to translating the binary.
  • During Murphy’s eureka moment, she no longer kisses Getty.
  • After the tesseract closes, removed explicit shots of Cooper going through the wormhole. First handshake still happens, but we don’t see that it’s Cooper (maybe it is, maybe it isn’t).
  • Adjusted dialogue during the hospital scene.
    • Removed extra “take it slow”.
    • Removed “spring chicken”.
    • Moved the “…rangers found you…” line up.
  • Removed scene in the hallway while Cooper is being taken to his house.
  • Removed TARS asking, “Is this really what it was like?”. (I prefer the idea TARS kept his memories from Earth)
  • Removed voice-over from Murphy as the movie ends.

Please PM me if you’re interested.