One activity I take part in, but have never really openly discussed, at least in anything printed, is fanediting - taking a movie that has been released on DVD/Blu-ray, creating a high quality copy on your hard drive, and editing out scenes, bits of dialogue, rearranging components, adding alternate footage, etc to create a new, sometimes better (though that is is entirely subjective) or an alternate version of a film, creating a DVD, and then sharing it with an online community of like-minded cinema-lovers.
The hobby is controversial, not so much among participants or even casual film goers (after all, don't like an edit? The original film is still there, which you should already own), but with the entertainment industry. There has been no large-scale media coverage that I know of, and I feel this would be an interesting topic for even non-cinephiles to get a glimpse into the sometimes obsessive world of film lovers.
The piece, designed for magazine publication, would not only explore the technical aspect of fanediting, but also a brief history, the dynamics of the community, and the thoughts of editors on how legal their hobby of choice is. More details to follow as the piece is formulated in my head. But for now, a pretty picture...
"Killer Horizon," a re-edit of the 1997 film "Event Horizon." Image courtesy of fanedit.org
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