The opening scene of “Rebel Moon,” Zack Snyder’s ambitious multi-part opera, looks very different now that the R-rated filmmaker’s directorial extra-feature has arrived on Netflix.
In the extended series, completely absent from the film’s initial cut, villainous General Atticus Noble (a nervous Ed Skrein) descends on an unsuspecting world. He represents two freedom fighters who threaten the dominance of the Galactic Empire. absolute madness. The women are stripped naked and branded with the insignia of the Empire. A man says goodbye to a puppy, a small gremlin-like creature. A few seconds later, the gremlin explodes, causing damage to the invaders. After 17 minutes, a boy is forced to murder his father with a piece of bone; Macabre figures collect the father’s teeth and upload them to a macabre image. Noble ends up killing the family anyway.
Not only is the series shocking (brutal, graphic, embellished with gremlins) but it also serves as a reference for the rest of “Rebel Moon – Chapter One”, now subtitled “Chalice of Blood” and running for 204 minutes. There are few filmmakers, apart from perhaps Ridley Scott, who have used the director’s cut like Zack Snyder. In Snyder’s hands, those expanded editions won’t just offer a bolder, more uncompromising vision. They are also an impossible to resist and highly marketable point of promotion.
Beginning with 2009’s “Watchmen,” Snyder was able to stream home video edits of his films that were too heavy, too bizarre and too long to be seen in theaters. Its adaptation of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ groundbreaking electronic comic book series has been expanded, incorporating more scenes that enthusiasts were desperately looking to see in live action. An even longer edition incorporated animated interstitials based on the comic book e-book. He also published his sequel to “Man of Steel”, “Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice”. “, somewhere else with its director, who envisioned an even darker and more mental landscape for his dominated characters. At this point, Snyder’s director’s montages have become the director’s fan montages. And it allowed him to own anything that, in recent years, just a gimmick for the then-lucrative DVD market. Now you were waiting for the editions chosen by Snyder to see one of the most exciting filmmakers of his generation, without inhibitions.
What was once derided as a crazy clone of “Star Wars,” stemming from the fact that Snyder had brought the films to Lucasfilm years earlier and featured features like a canteen full of creatures, takes on another tenor and form with the director’s cuts. . , which arrive on Netflix at the same time, months after the release of the PG-13 versions of Chapter One in December and Chapter Two in April.
The films, which focus on Sofia Boutella’s Kora as she searches across the cosmos for warriors to protect her remote, tranquil planet from the risk of excessive government interference, seem a far cry from protecting a galaxy far, far away. The characters have more time to shine, the action sequences are more visceral, and the strangeness that was resolved in the initial edit is entirely visual: here’s an anthropomorphic shipping engine that’s gained sentience after being fed bones and blood! !
As for the way in which these new versions were created, Snyder is indifferent. He describes those longer versions of the first “Rebel Moon” and its sequel (now subtitled “The Curse of Forgiveness” with a running time of 173 minutes) as “the “Videos I Wrote” with common collaborators Kurt Johnstad and Shay Hatten. Netflix asked if Snyder could simply shorten the epic, calling it PG-13 “I think for practical reasons,” the filmmaker guesses.
“Because of the extensive visual effects, they felt like there was a potentially larger market in the global PG-13 than in the R-rated global one,” Snyder told TheWrap ahead of the release of the director’s cuts of “Rebel Moon” on Netflix (the feature film). editions of both films have already been released). Netflix then told Snyder, his spouse and his spouse, Deborah Snyder, that they would provide “a little extra money to shoot those extra scenes. “That way, when Snyder combines the director’s inevitable cuts, “you’d have those scenes. “This made the director’s montages “truly independent films” and much more so than the original edition with more takes, as was usual in the halcyon days of DVDs.
Deborah described the procedure as “a significant amount of work. “”I love the fact that it’s not an afterthought,” she told TheWrap. In the past, he said, studios paid for it (in the DVD era). ) or Snyder and his producer would have to fight the studios (as in the case of the reconstructed edition of “Justice League”). “They said no, we have to plan for this, because he’s known for it,” Deborah said, “And for us, it’s the most productive case. “He said the director’s edits are “Zack’s true vision. “
She insists that if they had gone with the R-rated cuts first, they would have earned studio notes, which could dilute the finished project. “But it was the director’s cut. He had no qualification. They gave him complete freedom. Each one was given what she wanted. For Deborah, this made it possible to make a more sexy and violent film, but where the painting of the characters is more evolved and where the overall meaning of “Rebel Moon” acquires dimension.
As for how those remakes were produced, they were done during the initial releases and filming of the main feature film from April to December 2022. They rarely exchanged takes, especially when it came to language, but she admits that most of the extra gore and gore shots were added digitally, so they didn’t have to rearrange any sequences on set. (In the past, jokes were done with firecrackers and physical blood, which meant a complete cleanup and reset for every take. )
“Post-production was a little more complicated because we were running all of those cuts simultaneously,” Deborah said. They brought in more visual effects groups “because you have to make sure you’re as effective as possible, especially with the money. If you knew you had two versions, you had to keep running the PG-13 version. You’d do it once and cut the blood or something like that. ” .
The filmmakers delivered the films “according to their premieres. “”There’s a lot of content,” Deborah said, with two hours of new footage as well as tweaks to existing footage. After delivering the second film in its PG-13 format, I started fine-tuning the director’s cuts. “But I’ve been keeping an eye out [for other cuts], especially when it comes to visual effects and music. “
Zack said directing the PG-13 edition “allowed me to make R-rated movies. “
“Me, as a filmmaker, I don’t care about [PG-13 cuts],” Zack said. “Ideally, audiences would have noticed the R-rated versions first, but there’s some truth to that. ” He’s grateful that Netflix “was incredibly forgiving in allowing us to make those crazy versions of the movie that shouldn’t exist. “
At one point, Zack said that the PG-13 and R versions of “Rebel Moon” are so different that “the videos take place in two other timelines. The PG-13 and R versions of the film are almost mutual realities of each other. ” all”. others, not as additional sequences. It should be added that it is a very fun way to watch the videos.
When we asked why the film needed an official R rating, considering the fact that “Rebel Moon” would never be shown in a theater, Zack responded that he wasn’t obligated to abide by the “rating policy,” but the filmmakers were. they did. that getting an R rating for director’s cuts from the first film was a “struggle. ” This fight was connected to bound sex scenes (with Boutella’s Kora) and the aforementioned series about Toa. However, “we’ve noticed these things in other videos before. “
With the arrival of the director of “Rebel Moon,” making the films richer, more layered and visually prettier (there’s nothing like a human head exploding in slow motion), you’d think there’d been a theatrical revolution. “I’m certainly pleased to make a theatrical film. I love the theatrical experience. And I’m a big advocate and a big fan of video and watching video in the theater. Absolutely without a doubt,” Zack said.
“But I also perceive and have no problem with the fundamental concept of this film, which was that it was a streaming film and that it was noticed on the streaming service. That was precisely how this film was going to be felt. This does not mean, however, that he was going to substitute his technique for the material one. ” I don’t see it any other way. I’m still me. It’s 11 a. m. ,” continued the filmmaker of “300” and “Watchmen. “
As for what Zack is most excited about in those extended versions, he features the next one featuring Jimmy (voiced by Anthony Hopkins), a former robot turned mythical. “Everything has been affected, so it’s hard to quantify,” Zack said.
“The tone is just different,” Deborah added. You see it differently. “Zack agreed. ” Because the violence is exaggerated, it’s a little more satirical, it’s more of a gender observation,” Zack said.
Further, the Snyders have stated that they are contemplating several other films in the “Rebel Moon” universe; And indeed, the updated edition of the second film ends in an even more rushed cliffhanger. While nothing has been announced, the franchise has been slowly growing: several books have been published (and continue to be published), as well as several video games on the horizon and a series of narrative-focused podcasts. about adventures beyond Jimmy. Education
But when we asked if the Snyders had spoken to the film’s newly appointed frontman Dan Lin, Zack said that while he had spoken to Lin, he hadn’t been “specifically about it. “So, yes, the director’s montages may be the end of the road for “Rebel Moon. “It’s not that Zack thinks that way. ” These films were made to fill a giant mythological cauldron, so to speak. And we tried to make sure that all the corners were painted correctly.
“Army of the Dead,” a film the Snyders made for Netflix before “Rebel Moon,” had an ambitious plan, with several sequels and spin-offs in the works (one of them, the prequel “Army of Thieves,” was truly released), accompanied by an animated series. The animated series was quietly cancelled, along with upcoming film projects. Zack said, “We’re very ambitious about everything. ” And “Army of the Dead” is rarely completely dead, as Deborah pointed out; There will be a theme party at Six Flags theme parks this Halloween. “It’s going to be a literally great party,” she added.
Now that “Rebel Moon,” or at least that phase, is over, the Snyders are looking at several projects, some original, others based on pre-existing material, according to Deborah. “We’re just hunting to see what happens,” he said Zack. De any case, we’re sure it happens to happen until the 11th.
And one day, Zack Snyder’s director’s cut will be the one released widely, whether in theaters or streaming.
“Sure, you know, I take what I can get,” he said.