Hey all, As just a little side project to kill time, I'm trying to edit Age of Extinction into a shorter, snappier and more focused film. My goal is to maintain the full plot of the film while trimming scenes that meander for too long, have unnecessary or forced humor (while still keeping humor that works) or ultimately don't matter. Length wise I want to try to at least get it down to the running time of the first film. Does anyone have any specific suggestions for things to cut, or even things to reorder? And before anyone says anything, yes, the Romeo and Juliet Law scene is gone. EDIT May 2022: Version 2 is complete! I shaved an additional 9 minutes off. This brings the runtime of each version to the below: Timestamp for when we reach the End Credits: Original: 2:37:10 Prime Cut V1: 2:22:40 Prime Cut V2: 2:13:40 Detailed changelog will be added soon; I got more aggressive with cutting redundant dialogue (i.e., soldiers fire a gun, someone yells "we're being shot at!") or establishing shots which helped a lot, and further shaved down the Savoy vs. Cade fight (which goes on way too long in the original) and the Vortex suction scene. Prime Cut V2 (2022) Edit Log: General edits: - Cuts have reduced total runtime by roughly 23.5 minutes (now 2:13 when credits roll). I exceeded my original goal of 20 minutes! - Removed obnoxious cases of product placement - Removed overtly Chinese pandering scenes, including the entirety of Joyce and Li Bingbing doing hijinks in Hong Kong - Shane is less of a loser, not constantly getting scared or giving up - Harold Attinger’s motivation is changed a bit, I've removed almost all references to him getting a huge paycheck as part of his deal with Joyce, so he comes off as more overtly fanatically nationalist - Removed many cases of overly descriptive dialogue or characters describing what you already see on screen (i.e., when Cade points to Lockdown's ship and says "it's a giant magnet sucking things up!") - Removed several very cheesy slow motion scenes, like Cade punching the ground after Tessa gets taken by Lockdown (left in the some that are action-oriented, like Optimus and Bumblebee catching the humans after Galvatron fires at them) Detailed edit log: - Heavily trimmed opening present day scene in the Arctic, just long enough to show Darcy and the “frozen” dinosaur. - Trimmed scene of Cade and Lucas visiting the theater. Removed several unnecessary bits of humor from Lucas. Almost entirely removed the theater owners. - Trimmed Tessa’s first few scenes to get straight to the point about her character and her relationship with Cade and Shane. - Cut some Lucas one-liners when Cade brings Optimus to the barn. - Removed scene of realtor trying to show Cade's house. - Trimmed some redundant exposition about the Yeager family situation. - Made very slight cuts to the Ratchet death scene, there's a lot of time spent on the soldiers walking through the boat and saying typical Bay military speak. - Made very small cuts to the Thomas Lennon meeting with Attinger scene to remove some extraneous dialogue while still keeping Lennon's humor. - Reordered scenes leading up to the barn attack – Cade and Optimus’ two short scenes together are now one continuous scene, Cemetery Wind scrambling is more to the point. - Made further trims to the Shane car chase scene, making it more direct and to the point. The bit where Shane drives through a bingo game to lose CW is cut, since they catch up again almost immediately after. - Sped up the needlessly slow slow motion when Shane drives off the ramp. - Cut Cade’s excessive use of nicknames for Shane where possible, he only calls him Lucky Charms once or twice now. - Cut Shane’s Red Bull endorsement. - CUT THE ROMEO AND JULIET SCENE! - Trimmed the scenes leading up to the Autobots reuniting to be more to the point. - Unnecessary humor in KSI introductory scenes cut, such as Joshua going on too long about the sound when he enters or arguing with his lead scientist over the background images - Re-ordered some introductory KSI scenes that were intercut with scenes of the Yeagers hiding out and planning. - Joshua and Darcy meet Brains before going to see the Galvatron render, so we build up more clearly to seeing him for the first time. - Cade pressing Shane for info while waiting to go in to have the car scanned is cut, they just get scanned and go in. - Cut a somewhat stereotype-based joke where Joshua says he can't understand Li Bingbing. - Cut the OREO Bot – while I don’t think this is too egregious and actually kind of funny, we have yet to see an active KSI drone at this point, so it feels out of place for this to be the first one. It works better when we see Stinger and Galvatron in action later. - Small cuts to Joshua and Attinger getting ready to deploy Galvatron. - Cut Thomas Lennon’s character’s second scene (phone call with Attinger). - Trimmed Tessa escaping from the smelting pit. - Trimmed several bits of the Knight Ship scenes. - Removed the scene where Shane wimps out and surrenders to Lockdown’s henchmen. - Significantly trimmed the tow cables scene to be tighter. - REMOVED THE BUD LIGHT SCENE! - Removed random bits of unnecessary Chinese focus. - Cut Harold Attinger laughing during his meeting with Joshua – doesn’t really fit with his character. Also cut his demands for shares in KSI. - Removed Li Bingbing saying she's going to bring Joshua to a special garrison she knows in Hong Kong. - Trimmed the scene of Savoy and Attinger in the car to remove references to them "getting paid for this". - Removed entirety of the Hong Kong chase where Li Bingbing’s character rides a motorcycle and does martial arts – Joshua, Darcy, and Li Bingbing now arrive in Hong Kong, split up and Joshua goes straight to the roof before the Decepticons arrive. - Removed Joshua’s f-bomb. - Significantly trimmed Cade vs. Savoy fight, and removed a weirdly grotesque moment where Cade squeezes Savoy's eye. - Removed the goofy slow-mo shot of Savoy falling out the window from above. - Removed Han Geng’s cameo when Lockdown’s magnet begins. - Trimmed gratuitous shots of destruction during Lockdown’s giant magnet scene, and cut several moments to give tighter pacing, including Joyce's over the top "OH MY GOD!". - Made very small trims to the final Lockdown battle for tighter pacing. The one thing I'd like to do but is probably too advanced for me is to remove the Imagine Dragons song from the Lockdown battle. Prime Cut V1 (2020) Edit Log: Spoiler General edits: - Cuts have reduced total runtime by roughly 15 minutes (now 2:23 when credits roll). I am trying to get this to at least 20 minutes. - Removed obnoxious cases of product placement - Removed overtly Chinese pandering scenes - Shane is less of a loser, not constantly getting scared or giving up - Harold Attinger’s motivation is changed slightly – he is not (or does not appear to be) in it for the money, so there is more focus on his blind authoritarianism. Savoy does let slip later on that they were expecting a big pay day from the deal as well, though. Detailed edit log: - Heavily trimmed opening present day scene in the Arctic, just long enough to show Darcy and the “frozen” dinosaur - Trimmed scene of Cade and Lucas visiting the theater. Removed several unnecessary bits of humor from Lucas. Almost entirely removed the theater owners - Trimmed Tessa’s first few scenes to get straight to the point about her character and her relationship with Cade and Shane - Cut some Lucas one-liners when Cade brings Optimus to the barn - Trying to figure out how to trim the realtor scene – unfortunately, their presence is what brings the characters out of the barn, so it may be needed - Trimmed some redundant exposition about the Yeager’s situation - Reordered scenes leading up to the barn attack – Cade and Optimus’ two short scenes together are now one continuous scene, Cemetery Wind scrambling is more to the point - Made minor trims to the Shane car chase scene – bit where Shane drives through a bingo game to lose CW is cut, since they catch up again almost immediately after - Sped up the needlessly slow slow motion when Shane drives off the ramp - Cut Cade’s excessive use of nicknames for Shane where possible - Cut Shane’s Red Bull endorsement - CUT THE ROMEO AND JULIET SCENE! - Unnecessary humor in KSI introductory scenes cut, such as Joshua arguing with his lead scientist over the background images - Re-ordered some introductory KSI scenes that were intercut with scenes of the Yeagers hiding out and planning - Joshua and Darcy meet Brains before going to see the Galvatron render - Cade pressing Shane for info while waiting to go in to have the car scanned is cut - Cut the OREO Bot – while I don’t think this is too egregious and actually kind of funny, we have yet to see an active KSI drone at this point, so it feels out of place for this to be the first one - Cut Thomas Lennon’s character’s second scene (phone call with Attinger) - Trimmed Tessa escaping from the smelting pit - Trimmed unnecessary bits of the Knight Ship scenes - Removed the scene where Shane wimps out and surrenders to Lockdown’s henchmen - Trimmed the tow cables scene to be tighter - REMOVED THE BUD LIGHT SCENE! - Removed random bits of unnecessary Chinese focus - Cut Harold Attinger laughing during his meeting with Joshua – doesn’t really fit with his character. Also cut his demands for shares in KSI. - Removed entirety of the Hong Kong chase where Li Bingbing’s character rides a motorcycle and does martial arts – Joshua, Darcy, and Li Bingbing now arrive in Hong Kong, split up and Joshua goes straight to the roof before the Decepticons arrive - Removed Joshua’s f-bomb - Trimmed Cade vs. Savoy fight - Removed Han Geng’s cameo when Lockdown’s magnet begins - Trimmed gratuitous shots of destruction during Lockdown’s giant magnet scene
Get rid of that scene where the action stops for the sake of a gag involving a beer can rolling right up to Cade and he drinks it.
That entire conversation between Mark and boyfriend about his uh..rights...despite Mark's daughter being underage. Was just cringeworthy.
Cut the add commercials like cade drinking in the middle of a fight and Stanley Tucci's character drinking milk. Cut the Chinese government part. It serves no purpose in the plot. Cut the Romeo Juliet scene entirely. Although Cade can ask his daughter about their relationship. She replies. Then cut to Optimus arriving outside and then back to cade telling them to pack things up ( if he did say anything like that ). Cut the human action sequences when Lockdown's ship was using the giant magnet. They serve no purpose in the long run as well. ( The entire car scene after Optimus gets caught in that water ) You can add Bumblebee dance with Tessa scene before Cade and Optimus talk in that church or whatever place. Hopefully all these will make it look as a better and more intense movie. Although, how can we watch it ??
Great suggestions from all the posts above. Also, try making the aspect ratio more consistent. It’ll make your work look professional, unlike the moron who edited AOE and TLK. Watch this scene for example: 10 seconds in and you’re greeted with a bizzare mishmash of 2.35:1 and 16:9 cuts. Some films employ changing ratios and to a pretty good effect like The Grand Budapest Hotel. Age of Extinction is sadly not one of them. It serves no narrative purpose (TGBH’s ratios represented the time period each individual acts were set in), and only makes one question why Bay can’t make up his effing mind on which camera he wants to use. Unless I missed an article on Bay explaining its significance, just remove it.
Have you done this work any of the other movies? I'd love copies of the movies without any crude humor and with several twins and Leo scenes cut out...
Absolutely. Should be doable. Gone! Working on what I can and cannot cut. I'm only really working with the film proper here, and I have the score handy just in case, but this is mostly just a cutting edit and I don't really have the capability to mess with sound effects or other things like that. Don't think I can add the dance scene as it's not a full scene, just a quick few shots in trailers. Honestly not sure how I will be able to share it, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it! So for the AOE Blu Ray, only the 3D version contained the IMAX aspect ratio. The version I'm working with is all consistent widescreen. To be honest the changing ratios in AOE didn't bother me too much because it was only two ratios. TLK was so messy; there like 6 or 7 and they rapid fire changed shot to shot. So I think we will be good here! I have not, I may try ROTF if this goes well. Honestly what I can cut amounts to what is still left that will make scenes work in the context of the existing shots in the film. For example I am trying to figure out how to cut out the bit where Cade threatens a realtor showing off his property with a baseball bat, but that action is what brings Cade out of his barn and is followed by a sweet conversation with Tessa. So if I cut that lame attempt at humor, there is no shot consistency that brings Cade out of the barn. So we'll see. Here's stuff I was able to do so far: - Trimmed the opening present day scene with Darcy in the Arctic - Reduced Lucas' screentime (mostly a lot of his meandering jokes that fall flat... but kept a handful of good jokes) - Almost completely excised the weirdos who own the theater Cade finds Optimus in - Trimmed some of the "Americana" style scenes of Cade and Tessa prior to repairing Optimus - Cut Romeo and Juliet - Reordered and trimmed some of the introductory KSI / Galvatron scenes - Cut Thomas Lennon's Chief of Staff character's second scene (kept his first, which is important in establishing things about Attinger, but looking at how to trim it) There are several other things I want to cut that will require getting creative, so I'll keep you guys posted. Only getting started here.
That scene would have been hilarious as satire in a better movie that had some tact with its product placement. Still hilarious in a "lmfao they actually did that?" way IMO, but you'd swear it was taking the piss on product placement if it was the only scene you'd known of the movies.
I feel that AoE's main problem is not so much that the plot meanders too much. It's moreso that it runs two mostly unrelated plots concurrently with each other, disrupting the narrative flow of each story as it jumps between the two. The KS/Galvatron story uses the Lockdown story as a jumping off point, but otherwise, the two plot lines don't intersect in any meaningful ways. If the movie were split in two, with the extra runtime space to flesh out each plot just a tiny bit more, then it would have been a fine movie(s).
Agree with all these edits, but I'd also add that some of the good scenes really need to be kept together and not chopped up. When Cade is helping to repair Optimus, it's a great scene that isn't given more than two seconds to develop, since they are CONSTANTLY cutting back and forth with really dull and generic shots of black vehicles driving to the house. I really hate that the movies have mostly not given the characters more than a minute to sit and develop cause Bay gets bored (yet he seems fine with a bunch of humans sitting around cracking jokes?). I'd say the same for the later scenes of the five autobots hanging out and planning, and the scenes on lockdown's ship. They need to stay together. And please, PLEASE cut out as much product placement as possible. I don't want to see any bud light or Chinese milk.
Hey all, with a lot more time on my hands lately, I got back to work on this and half a first cut ready. The run time has been reduced by 15 mins. The credits now roll at the 2 hour 23 minute mark, as opposed to 2 hours 38 minutes originally. I am attempting to do even further cuts, within reason. I am confident I can cut another 5 minutes. I wrote up a detailed edit log, please see below. I'll also update the OP with this: General edits: - Cuts have reduced total runtime by roughly 15 minutes (now 2:23 when credits roll). I am trying to get this to at least 20 minutes. - Removed obnoxious cases of product placement - Removed overtly Chinese pandering scenes - Shane is less of a loser, not constantly getting scared or giving up - Harold Attinger’s motivation is changed slightly – he is not (or does not appear to be) in it for the money, so there is more focus on his blind authoritarianism. Savoy does let slip later on that they were expecting a big pay day from the deal as well, though. Detailed edit log: - Heavily trimmed opening present day scene in the Arctic, just long enough to show Darcy and the “frozen” dinosaur - Trimmed scene of Cade and Lucas visiting the theater. Removed several unnecessary bits of humor from Lucas. Almost entirely removed the theater owners - Trimmed Tessa’s first few scenes to get straight to the point about her character and her relationship with Cade and Shane - Cut some Lucas one-liners when Cade brings Optimus to the barn - Trying to figure out how to trim the realtor scene – unfortunately, their presence is what brings the characters out of the barn, so it may be needed - Trimmed some redundant exposition about the Yeager’s situation - Reordered scenes leading up to the barn attack – Cade and Optimus’ two short scenes together are now one continuous scene, Cemetery Wind scrambling is more to the point - Made minor trims to the Shane car chase scene – bit where Shane drives through a bingo game to lose CW is cut, since they catch up again almost immediately after - Sped up the needlessly slow slow motion when Shane drives off the ramp - Cut Cade’s excessive use of nicknames for Shane where possible - Cut Shane’s Red Bull endorsement - CUT THE ROMEO AND JULIET SCENE! - Unnecessary humor in KSI introductory scenes cut, such as Joshua arguing with his lead scientist over the background images - Re-ordered some introductory KSI scenes that were intercut with scenes of the Yeagers hiding out and planning - Joshua and Darcy meet Brains before going to see the Galvatron render - Cade pressing Shane for info while waiting to go in to have the car scanned is cut - Cut the OREO Bot – while I don’t think this is too egregious and actually kind of funny, we have yet to see an active KSI drone at this point, so it feels out of place for this to be the first one - Cut Thomas Lennon’s character’s second scene (phone call with Attinger) - Trimmed Tessa escaping from the smelting pit - Trimmed unnecessary bits of the Knight Ship scenes - Removed the scene where Shane wimps out and surrenders to Lockdown’s henchmen - Trimmed the tow cables scene to be tighter - REMOVED THE BUD LIGHT SCENE! - Removed random bits of unnecessary Chinese focus - Cut Harold Attinger laughing during his meeting with Joshua – doesn’t really fit with his character. Also cut his demands for shares in KSI. - Removed entirety of the Hong Kong chase where Li Bingbing’s character rides a motorcycle and does martial arts – Joshua, Darcy, and Li Bingbing now arrive in Hong Kong, split up and Joshua goes straight to the roof before the Decepticons arrive - Removed Joshua’s f-bomb - Trimmed Cade vs. Savoy fight - Removed Han Geng’s cameo when Lockdown’s magnet begins - Trimmed gratuitous shots of destruction during Lockdown’s giant magnet scene I really think this helps keep the movie moving along at a much tighter clip. AOE has a pretty strong story underneath a lot of junk, so I hope this makes it shine through more.
After I'm fully done with this, I may give The Last Knight a try, but I'm not sure if there is any saving that one. Editing AOE worked because it was just cutting away that fat to keep the pacing tighter and focus on the real story, which is good. The Last Knight is just a total mess. But I'll try!
Aw man, that Bud Light scene was the most glorious product placement bit ever! Lol! No, you’re right to cut it. This is a great idea for a project. I’d love to see the finished product. Already it sounds like a better film.
Sounds like a fun project. I recall my main compliant with AOE being that the editing was a bit choppy. It could be fun to see a cut down version. I've always been curious if AOE and TLK could be combined into one film. Both movies seem to suffer from a lot of unnecessary stuff and scenes that drag on. But both mention knights and creators and stuff like that. I think that would be a really fun project to try. I've considered doing trying it, but I'm not sure how I'd distribute it.
I started one a while back but haven’t touched it in ages. Might be the perfect time to mess with it again.
Hey, would love to know how you approaching it! It seems like a tall order given how the movie ended up... but hoping you can pull it off! Age of Extinction was 90% just removing unnecessary bits and making sure it still flowed.
Sounds great. My only misgiving is dropping Joshua's f-bomb if it's the scene I think it is. If it's the one where he's stuck behind the slow walking old lady, leave it in. I did find that funny. Immature I know, but funny.
