As any seasoned filmgoer will tell you, a film that
goes into theaters before being released on home video or streaming
video-on-demand often ends up being very different when finally aired on
network television. Whether it’s due to
editing out content that would have earned the film an R rating including but
not limited to profanity, violence, nudity or sexual content, a televised
motion picture either ends up being shorter or significantly longer than the
version that ultimately went into theaters.
Sometimes it softens the edges or changes the
context of a film completely, forever altering the face or heart of the film
for better or worse. Most can point to
their favorite revised versions of lines that went from being shocking to just
plain hilarious now while decrying the deletion of crucial scenes for
censorship reasons, thus fogging up the context for viewers and creating more
confusion than clarification. Not to
mention all those pesky commercial breaks that disrupt the continuous flow and
rhythm of the picture getting in the way of one’s enjoyment of the picture as
it’s makers intended.
In rare cases however, there comes a televised
version of a film that is not only very different from what ultimately ended up
in theaters but also manages to stand on its own merits as a wholly unique
version of a film not to be found anywhere else. Rarer still are films that were originally
meant to be televised productions before ultimately being revised by shortening
or lengthening the proceedings for theatrical exhibition.
In an effort to make sense of this unusual
cinematic conundrum where our favorite big screen movies end up being a mere
shadow of their former selves when hitting the small screen, the Movie Sleuth
presents a unique focus on eleven films that became entirely different animals
when they were recut for television presentation.
The Godfather Trilogy: 1901-1980
When we first saw The Godfather in 1972, it marked the emergence of a major cinematic
talent’s first splash into the mainstream, Francis Ford Coppola and instantly
attained the classical status of being one of the greatest gangster films in
world cinema. Winning three Academy
Awards including Best Picture, Coppola returned to the series in 1974 with The Godfather Part II, garnering even
more accolades with six Academy Award wins including Best Picture yet
again. Considered to be an impeccable
and greatly revered film series, Coppola would not revisit the award winning
series for almost twenty-five years before bowing the gangster epic saga out
with The Godfather Part III in 1990
to decidedly mixed reviews. Something
curious happened in between all those years separating Part II from III however
when The Godfather would finally make
its debut on broadcast network television.
Facing censorship to edit the R rated films down to
a network friendly version while aiming to maintain the integrity of the series
as well as dealing with budgetary problems during the making of his seemingly
endless Apocalypse Now, Coppola
elected to try something new with The
Godfather’s journey to the small screen.
The result became The Godfather
Saga, a drastically re-edited version of the first two films resulting in
chronological scene rearrangements as well as the reinstatement of
approximately seventy-five minutes of deleted scenes from the first two films,
resulting in a seven-hour and fourteen-minute miniseries. Aired initially in this seven-hour version in
1977, The Godfather Saga was then
subsequently shortened for home video to around six-hours and twenty-six
minutes before being renamed The
Godfather 1902-1959: The Complete Epic, the transformation from the
cinematic form to television form is a shaky one for fans and Coppola
devotees.
While fleshing out numerous character arcs with
greater detail and more languid pacing, some fans complained the momentum
driving the standalone films previously was eliminated in the extension
process. As if the bloated and overlong
project wasn’t long enough, Coppola would extend the project once more in 1990
to include his third Godfather film,
resulting in a now nine-hour and forty-three-minute miniseries entitled The Godfather Trilogy: 1901-1980. Incidentally, this massive recut of The Godfather Trilogy only ever received
a VHS and laserdisc release and is now a rare collectible. Further still, HBO Go recently released yet
another version of Mario Puzo’s The
Godfather: The Complete Epic 1901-1959 which runs roughly seven hours now
while dropping the inclusion of Part III from
the series in its entirety.
Contrary to previous releases, this new cut for HBO
Go is fully restored in high-definition with 5.1 surround sound and all of the
uncensored violence, sex and language back in the picture. The question of course remains, like his Apocalypse Now/Redux conundrum, which
version is the definitive one? More of a
footnote to the theatrical films than a replacement as well as a unique
experiment designed with the intention of clearly up some of the financial
difficulties experience on Apocalypse Now,
The Godfather Saga in whichever form
you choose to see it will on the one hand expand the universe of the series but
on the other hand disrupts the flow of the theatrical films which needn’t have
been “improved upon” to begin with.
It’s customary for films aired on television to
include more footage than what was in theaters as a running time replacement
for objectionable content intended to be excised for network censors, but
rarely is the whole crux of a film so drastically altered in this way as to
smooshing two disparate films together as one single entity. It’s a unique idea on Coppola’s part but
ultimately is strictly for die-hards only who want to soak in anything and
everything related to this still towering gangster epic.
Problem Child
Have you ever picked up a VHS or DVD box for a
movie and can’t help but notice that the photographs on the back of the box
promoting the film aren’t actually in the film itself? Well, that’s exactly what happened with
Dennis Duggan’s 1990 juvenile delinquent comedy Problem Child starring John Ritter as a father who adopts the child
from Hell from a local orphanage.
Pitched as a summer family comedy, the directorial debut of Duggan
reportedly did so poorly with test audiences, including 70% of the audience
leaving the theater with audible complaints hurled at the screen, that two
weeks of reshoots were ordered including changing the ending, swapping
previously shot footage with new footage and so on.
Somehow the tactic worked and Problem Child opened in third place at the box office, raking in
over $50 million at the box office. This
was around the time Home Alone made a
splash at the box office and renewed interest in the violent slapstick family
comedy where the titular child outsmarts the adults with a myriad of schemes
and setting violent booby traps. And yet
Home Alone continues to endure as a
family holiday comedy classic while Problem
Child can now be found in the bottom of bargain bins. Understandably, studio meddling has had a lot
to do with the reputation surrounding Problem
Child. Reportedly Duggan shot so
much footage that he ruffled the feathers of studio heads who after retooling
the movie reduced the running time to around 75 minutes.
Back to the VHS box, upon renting the movie,
there’s an image prominently featured on the back of the titular Problem Child seated beside a remote
controlled model helicopter. Nowhere is
this scene to be found within the film, until syndicated television rolled
around of course. In an effort to pad
out the running time, a number of additional scenes including the
aforementioned model helicopter found their way back into the finished film. The most notable change involves Michael
Richards’ bowtie killer who undergoes a psych evaluation with Rorschach testing
and now has a flashback to a time when he was led to the electric chair and in
a scuffle manages to force the warden into the chair instead.
These scenes remain out of the film on home video
and aren’t included as extras on the DVD, but fans who taped the film off the
television broadcast have since uploaded the additional footage to
YouTube. With or without these scenes
back in the film, the finished product is still the result of there being too many
cooks in the kitchen after entrusting a first time director who didn’t deliver
and whose film was more or less taken away from him. Some of it might make you smirk but it
clearly hasn’t aged well with time. Years
later, Problem Child would achieve
scathingly black humor in a brief moment in Martin Scorsese’s Cape Fear where Max Cady (Robert De
Niro) enters a theater playing the film to harass his former attorney by
smoking a thick cigar and laughing maniacally at every scene. At least someone found it funny.
Dune
American surrealist filmmaker and artist David
Lynch’s career in Hollywood began with The
Elephant Man and ended with his much ballyhooed adaptation of Frank
Herbert’s Dune. After forfeiting his rights to final cut, an
experience Lynch referred to as a ‘nightmare’ before satirizing the ordeal
years later in Mulholland Drive, Dune was pared down from his originally
planned three-hour version to roughly 137 minutes. To this day, Lynch doesn’t speak well of Dune and has refused to participate in
any of the home video releases that have come since, instead focusing on moving
forward and finding his wings with Blue
Velvet, Wild at Heart, Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive.
Lynch legendarily with every production likes to
shoot a lot of footage, often leaving enough on the cutting room floor to edit
together another movie which is sort of what happened with the missing pieces
in Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me. For Dune,
roughly five hours of footage were shot, some of it consisting of outtakes,
test shots and stock footage. For the
syndicated television version of Dune,
editors prepared what became a commercial free 176-minute version of the film,
one which Lynch fought against before disowning it and leaving editors with the
unenviable task of crediting the new cut to Alan Smithee.
In this version of the film, like the Sid Sheinberg
edit of Brazil, still photos, test
footage and stock footage are utilized to fill in the gaps with many unfinished
visual effects sequences reinstated.
Basically, the extended version dumps all the dirty laundry on the table
with the hopes of sifting through the material and seeing what sticks and what
doesn’t. Some aspects were changed such
as the opening voiceover narration changed from female to male and viewers
can’t help but notice the blue color in the eyes of the Fremen are missing from
certain shots due to the fact that the stock footage was never intended to be
used.
Despite numerous attempts to reassemble a new
director’s cut done Lynch’s way, Lynch has refused every time, considering the
project a dead duck that should stay dead.
The footage shot hints at what Lynch could do with a heft production budget,
but his voice has obviously been bound and gagged in the editing department
given the constraints the studio placed on the film’s running time. The last time Lynch was asked about the DVD
release version of Dune and whether
or not he was involved in the production of the disc, Lynch wryly replied ‘I’ve
heard rumors’. Some things are better
left alone. If nothing else, the
experience paved the way for Blue Velvet,
his first true project from the heart since Eraserhead. While he may have had all the resources in
the world for Dune, Lynch quickly
learned that money can’t buy you final cut.
The Thing
By now you’ve probably heard of former MCA
Universal Studios CEO Sidney Sheinberg and the infamous battle with Terry
Gilliam over final cut to his 1985 dystopian masterpiece Brazil (also mentioned in this article). But few, myself included, are aware that John
Carpenter’s 1982 remake of Howard Hawks’ The
Thing met a similar fate in 1986 when Sheinberg and CBS drastically
reedited the film for syndicated television.
Much like the 70mm workprint version of Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner, this alternate version of The Thing designed to fit into the
television time slot and tone down the adult language, violence and gore is so
different it feels like a rough draft. With
exception to a couple scenes near the end of the film, the rhythm, use of sound
and music in every scene has been tinkered with. Needless to say, Sidney Sheinberg had a field
day in the editing room that manages to rival the egregious tinkering
administered on his cut of Brazil.
Instead of simply shortening sequences (which it
does), many scenes have been swapped out with alternative outtakes using
different angles, dialogue, camera placement and editing. Voiceover narration has been added throughout
to introduce each of the characters, certain scenes are now out of
chronological order, unused music cues and additional dialogue has been
restored and the ending is all but completely different now. The voiceover narration, much like the
theatrical version of Blade Runner, not
only states the obvious but it actually reads aloud the opening intertitle just
in case some audiences members can’t.
Many sequences throughout which were previously silent in the theatrical
version now have added musical cues as well as cues which were previously only
available on the soundtrack.
Another curiosity involves the deleted introduction
to what was originally intended to be Bennings’ death where he gazes into the
dog cannel as the camera zooms in on his face as a horrified look crosses
it. Ultimately Bennings’ death was
reshot and placed later in the film, but for some reason this early intro to an
abandoned concept was restored to the TV cut.
Why? It literally makes zero
sense to include this scene as early alternate versions of scenes are shot and
reshot all the time with no intention of including them. It is as though Sheinberg culled through the
archives of deleted footage and stuck on anything he could find whether it
worked in context or not.
Another baffling move is how little of the titular Thing is actually shown in this version
of the movie. In every scene aside from
the grand finale, Sheinberg cuts away from the creature, instead focusing on
unused reaction shots including one of a terrified looking MacReady trying to
reignite his flamethrower, almost out of character. Only a few second snippets show up and some
scenes are recut in such a way that you can clearly tell the footage is from
another scene hastily spliced together to give the illusion you’re watching the
same characters together in the same scene.
Nearly all of Rob Bottin’s visual effects magic that made Carpenter’s
film so timelessly iconic is gone from this version. If there’s ever a textbook example of how to
take a perfect science fiction horror film intended for adults and drain it dry
of whatever life was put into it, Sid Sheinberg’s revision of John Carpenter’s The Thing is it.
Halloween*
Of
all the TV versions of films, this one may be among the most notorious – not
just for what it contains, but for how it was first released on home video. The
TV cut of Halloween came into being in 1981, once the film was already a
well-established modern horror classic, and the pending release of Halloween
II had the film in greater demand than ever. Stations wanted to air the
film, but once it had been cut down for violence and nudity the remainder was
left too short, and with too awkward a running time, to fit a usual movie time
slot. Using this predicament as an opportunity to revisit the film, the studio
commissioned John Carpenter to produce about twelve minutes of new and alternate
scenes, which he shot during the sequel's production, using the sequel's crew.
While this was an intriguing concept, the results were mixed, and leaning
heavily towards the pointless.
Of
the three major sequences added, two feel decidedly shoehorned into the film,
and are pretty redundant; not to mention overlong, since they were added
specifically to pad the length to fit a time slot. One of these – an addition
to the prologue which gives Dr. Loomis a new introduction – is at least
interesting in its own right, but ultimately just repeats information already
given in the theatrical version. The third added sequence, however, does do
something pretty interesting, in that it retroactively adds in some
foreshadowing for Halloween II's big plot twist. It's a cool scene, and
since this TV version aired prior to the sequel's release it would have done a
fascinating job of teasing the audience with new information, and hinting that
there is more to Michael Meyers' story than originally thought. However, since
nothing else in the original foreshadows that twist, this additional scene
feels conspicuously like the retroactive addition that it is, and adds more to
the experience of Halloween II than Halloween itself. The other
issue with these added scenes is that, since the film is quite a slow-burn to
begin with, slowing the pace down even more badly harms the momentum of the
story. Ultimately, this TV version is a fun oddity for die-hard fans to check
out, but doesn't work particularly well on its own terms.
That is why the way that the TV version was first released on home video is so unfortunate. In the late-80s, when the original Halloween's distributor, Media Home Entertainment, released their third and final VHS pressing of the film, they used the TV version rather than the original cut by mistake. This mistake wasn't caught until the tape was already on the market, and viewers complained that the wrong version of the film had been used; after all, extra scenes or no, customers were understandably upset when they shelled out the money to rent or buy the film on tape, and found that it was the edited-for-television version they could watch for free. The tape was pulled, but the copies that had already been sold remained in circulation, and have since become a highly sought-after collectors' item. Anchor Bay eventually released the TV version officially – properly advertized as the oddity for die-hard fans that it is – but that third Media tape with the wrong version on it still fetches high prices on eBay, as one of the more notorious publication mistakes of the VHS era.
That is why the way that the TV version was first released on home video is so unfortunate. In the late-80s, when the original Halloween's distributor, Media Home Entertainment, released their third and final VHS pressing of the film, they used the TV version rather than the original cut by mistake. This mistake wasn't caught until the tape was already on the market, and viewers complained that the wrong version of the film had been used; after all, extra scenes or no, customers were understandably upset when they shelled out the money to rent or buy the film on tape, and found that it was the edited-for-television version they could watch for free. The tape was pulled, but the copies that had already been sold remained in circulation, and have since become a highly sought-after collectors' item. Anchor Bay eventually released the TV version officially – properly advertized as the oddity for die-hard fans that it is – but that third Media tape with the wrong version on it still fetches high prices on eBay, as one of the more notorious publication mistakes of the VHS era.
Halloween II**
When put Halloween
II under the microscope even for a passing glance, the plot holes show up
faster than you can say “hell, shit or damn.” But that’s what happens when a
studio wants to cash in on the craze of movies, all copying Halloween,
by making a slasher film that copies the copycats. With a plodding narrative
completely reliant on John Carpenter’s music and Dean Cundey’s cinematography,
Jamie Lee Curtis and Donald Pleasance do all they can to keep the ship afloat
while being dragged into the undertow of logical fallacy. The twist in this
film couldn’t make less sense if it were the end to The Happening.
Surely it couldn’t be any worse on television.
Well,
actually it can. To watch Halloween II on TV is to miss out on much of
what makes the film even slightly memorable. The scenes of gore added by John
Carpenter in post-production are the complete antithesis of what made the
original a timeless classic, but it turns out that when you have a weaker film
they’re wholly necessary to its enjoyment. It’s also missing that epic topless
shot of Pamela Susan Shoop that’s an essential bookend to P.J. Soles’ immortal
“see anything you like?” flash. Maybe “essential” isn’t the right word. That’s
not to say the television version isn’t without merit. There are more scenes of
dialogue inserted to develop characters who are essentially cardboard cutouts
of cows lined up for the slaughter. A scene here and there does nothing to
change their archetypes, but it at least gives us some idea of who they are
before they’re killed off… or in the case of Lance Guest, brought back.
There are
even some original touches put in place by the TV editors. Some slight of hand
with juxtaposition in suspenseful scenes is occasionally very effective.
There’s even some second unit B-roll of Michael walking around; it doesn’t lend
much, but it’s still fun to see. With that being said, these creative liberties
also backfire in ways that are borderline hilarious. Everyone remembers the
scene where Michael staggers into an old lady’s kitchen and scoops up her
sandwich knife, leaving a spot of blood behind. The editors tried to be clever
here, using some additional shots of Michael like he’s ready to strike. It’s
all well and good until they cut to what is obviously a still frame from much
later in the film — the hot tub scene to be exact. It’s so cheap and hokey and
out of place that I laughed out loud. But I suppose there really is no saving
this mess of a film. Just remember that the next time someone says it was Rob
Zombie who ruined the franchise.
Army of Darkness**
I was 16
years old when I was introduced to the Evil Dead Trilogy. Before you
could say “gimme some sugar baby,” Army of Darkness was my immediate
favorite. Never before had I seen a film so happy to be what it is and nothing
more. It’s so ridiculously entertaining and balls to the wall that it’s
impossible not to be swept up in the tidal wave of its B-movie charm. Somehow
this is Bruce Campbell’s one and only studio vehicle. With charisma for days
and a knack for physical comedy on par with Jerry Lewis, that is a travesty.
This movie couldn’t be any more fun. Or could it?
Army of
Darkness is a rare example of the television edit
actually enhancing the experience. Unlike its predecessors, the foundation of
the film isn’t built on riffing gore-hound tropes, but on comical sight gags
and dialogue, so it doesn’t lose anything in the translation to the smaller
screen. Several deleted scenes, previously glimpsed only in a piss-poor
VHS-to-DVD transfer on Anchor Bay’s “Bootleg Director’s Cut Edition,” are
integrated back in with pristine quality. There are short passages inserted to
create mood, atmosphere, and — be still my heart — a little bit of character
development. The rivalry with King Arthur and Henry the Red is given more
screen time and dimension. An extended passage of atmospheric suspense in the
windmill not only explains how Ash managed to get his horse back, but utilizes
one of Joseph LoDuca’s most elaborate musical cues that was mysteriously absent
from the Director’s Cut, which drastically undercut the humor of the scene. If
you’re gonna create a live action cartoon, you should have cartoon music! Even
the epic battle sequence at the end is edited better. And most importantly, the
one-liners we’ve all come to know and love from the theatrical release —
inexplicably replaced in the Director’s Cut — are alive and well. Hail to the
King of TV recuts!
Salem’s Lot*
Tobe
Hooper's 1979 adaptation of Stephen King's vampire saga is actually the exact
opposite of every other entry on this list: rather than a theatrical film that
was modified to air on TV, it is a TV miniseries that became so
critically-acclaimed and popular that it was re-edited for release in theaters.
At 3 hours in length (without commercials), Hooper's miniseries makes spot-on
use of its running time to develop its large ensemble of characters and
gradually increase its suspense and horror with a sure-handed slow-burn. While
some of the many Stephen King miniseries produced in the '80s and '90s feel
uneven and occasionally padded, Salem's Lot earns every minute of its
runtime, giving us not only the definitive adaptation of the novel, but one of
the very finest book-to-film King adaptations ever made. Unfortunately, when
its popularity inspired Warner Bros to turn it into a theatrical feature, they
had to heavily cut it down to fit the time constraints of the new medium.
Salem's
Lot: The Movie, as it
is typically known, runs just an hour and 45 minutes, exiling 75 minutes of
Tobe Hooper's well-paced slow-burn to the cutting-room floor. That is far more
time than the miniseries could afford to lose, and the shortened film version
ended up feeling rushed, poorly-paced, and obviously lacking in character
development. It turned one of the finest Stephen King adaptations into one that
was average at best, and very messy at worst. This version also wound up being
the one first released on home video, as the high price of VHS tapes in the
early-'80s made a single-tape release of Salem's Lot seem like a much
better idea to Warner than a two-tape set of the uncut miniseries.
This lead to
the heavily-cut version being the one that a whole generation of fans saw for
the first time; a most unfortunate way to be introduced to it. Finally, a few
years later, the uncut miniseries was released on two tapes, and the shortened
film version has been rightfully banished to obscurity as the miniseries has
been the only cut released on DVD and blu-ray. Still, it remains an important
warning, especially to the VHS collectors out there: if you're going to watch Salem's
Lot (and you really should!), make sure you're watching the full 3-hour
television version.
The Keep*
Most
great directors have that one black sheep somewhere in their filmography,
usually towards the beginning: that one movie that doesn't quite fit with the
others, has big problems the others don't, and generally makes fans scratch
their heads and ask, “what the hell happened here?” In this category Stephen
Spielberg has 1941, David Lynch has Dune, and Michael Mann has The
Keep. A dreamy and surreal period horror film about Nazis encountering a
demonic evil in an ancient fortress, the 1983 film immediately stands out as
odd in a body of work that consists primarily of meticulous and extremely
modern crime thrillers (he made The Keep between Thief and Manhunter).
Still, the film's wonderfully rich and spooky widescreen visuals are pure
Michael Mann, and they make it clear that despite the subject matter being
totally off-type for him, he was very close to turning this into something
quite unique in its genre.
That
is, until the film's notoriously troubled production ended with Mann being
forced out of the editing process, and Paramount subjecting the film to a
borderline-incoherent hack-job that left over a third of the movie on the
cutting-room floor, and the structure of the plot in shambles. Even in the
deeply flawed final cut, the film has enough eerie power that it has become a
minor cult classic in its own right, if only on the strength of its great
visuals, atmospheric Tangerine Dream score, and performances by Ian McKellen,
Gabriel Byrne, and Jurgen Prochnow. But it is basically a tantalizingly incomplete
puzzle; a ghost of what it should have been. Mann has disowned the film, and
largely refuses to even talk about it, so fans have been left wondering what an
extended cut (which we will almost certainly never get) might be like.
Fortunately, the film's TV version offers at least a glimpse of this.
The
story is the same as with many TV versions: cuts made for violence, nudity, and
pacing left the film too short to fill a two-hour time slot, so some of the cut
footage was used to flesh it out. For most of the film this just shows up as an
extra line or moment here and there; interesting, but not much of any
substance. Then the ending comes. The ending of the film was where the
production truly started to fall apart, when the special effects director died midway
through developing the elaborate, magic-fueled climax: an intended 2001-esque
light-show for which he had left no notes, and which no one could figure out
how to complete without him. Paramount's solution was to hastily slap something
together, which wound up feeling rushed and anticlimactic at best, and it was
one of the biggest complaints audiences had about the film.
So
when it came time to assemble the TV cut, Paramount went back to the footage
that existed and assembled a different ending, which is a good five minutes
longer. While the core problem remains true – the special effects required for
the clash between hero and monster simply don't exist – this ending is more
fleshed-out and complete-feeling, thanks to a good amount of new footage. Part
of this includes some of the shots filmed for the aborted climax, which are
very cool to see even in a different context, but mostly it presents new
character footage which changes the ending in both tone and implication. That
any of this material was cut in the first place is very odd; it only adds a
short 5 minutes to the running time, and is unquestionably a more fitting and
less abrupt conclusion. The only logical explanation for its omission is that
Paramount really didn't care, and only wanted to hammer out an ending as quick
as possible to get the over-budget project done with.
While
they didn't change anything for the TV version to address the film's myriad
other flaws, that they did something to improve this one obvious shortcoming is
pretty cool. No matter what, The Keep is a movie with some big problems,
but for those who enjoy the elusive what-might-have-been that is still visible
in the film as released, this TV version (or at least its ending, which is
currently on YouTube) is certainly worth a look. It's probably the only
extended footage that will ever see the light of day, so we might as well add
it to the incomplete jigsaw puzzle.
Needful Things*
While
most of the entries on this list are largely just curiosities, here is at least
one case where the TV version of a film is not only superior to the
theatrically-released one, but arguably the definitive version. Adapting
Stephen King's sprawling supernatural thriller Needful Things to the
screen was always going to be a challenge: it is a nearly-1000-page novel that
is about an entire town full of people, their regrets, resentments, and fears,
and the dark force exploiting them. It is a Ray Bradbury-inspired horror tale
of Faustian bargains, concerning a mysterious antique shop owner who sells
goods that can grant their purchasers' deepest wishes... if they'll just do
something for him in return. But to make a story like this resonate, the reader
or viewer must get to know the townspeople enough to give real emotional stakes
to the nightmare they go through in order to realize their desires... and that
requires a whole lot of attention to character development.
As
such, writer W.D. Richter (1978's Invasion of the Bodysnatchers) and
director Fraser C. Heston gave their big-screen adaptation of King's novel a
just-over-three-hour running time, which they used to build up the large
ensemble of major characters, and slowly ratchet up the suspense from
small-town drama to creepy supernatural chiller. However, Castle Rock
Entertainment perhaps unsurprisingly felt this was way too long for a film
being marketed as a horror movie, and they aggressively cut it down by an hour
and fifteen minutes, restructuring the film to accelerate the pacing in the
process. The result was widely regarded as decent, but choppy and rushed, and
lacking in the character development that it needed. One might have thought
that since the studio was named after the fictional town in which the film is
set, they might have shown a bit more respect.
Fortunately, TNT came to the rescue, and gave Heston the resources to rework his director's cut as a two-part TV event, in the tradition of well-loved Stephen King miniseries like Salem's Lot and It. The result is a much better, much more well-developed and evenly-paced version of Needful Things; the version that Castle Rock should have just released in theaters to begin with. Yes, its pace is quite a bit more leisurely in the first hour, feeling much more like a wannabe-Twin-Peaks off-kilter small-town drama than the horror film it will soon turn into, but that is exactly the idea. It never feels padded, it very effectively conjures up that distinctive feeling of Stephen King's Maine – beautiful, but with a brewing darkness below the surface – and the way that it builds tension is very effective. It still may not be one of the best Stephen King movies, but it is quite good, and a good deal better than the truncated theatrical cut. Even King himself has spoken in interviews about how this is an adaptation he has bittersweet feelings about, with the seldom-seen director's cut being very good while the theatrical version is comparatively a bit of a mess.
Fortunately, TNT came to the rescue, and gave Heston the resources to rework his director's cut as a two-part TV event, in the tradition of well-loved Stephen King miniseries like Salem's Lot and It. The result is a much better, much more well-developed and evenly-paced version of Needful Things; the version that Castle Rock should have just released in theaters to begin with. Yes, its pace is quite a bit more leisurely in the first hour, feeling much more like a wannabe-Twin-Peaks off-kilter small-town drama than the horror film it will soon turn into, but that is exactly the idea. It never feels padded, it very effectively conjures up that distinctive feeling of Stephen King's Maine – beautiful, but with a brewing darkness below the surface – and the way that it builds tension is very effective. It still may not be one of the best Stephen King movies, but it is quite good, and a good deal better than the truncated theatrical cut. Even King himself has spoken in interviews about how this is an adaptation he has bittersweet feelings about, with the seldom-seen director's cut being very good while the theatrical version is comparatively a bit of a mess.
Unfortunately,
the truncated cut is all that is available on home video. Due to the
complicated rights involved with the deal between Castle Rock and TNT, the
director's cut of Needful Things is effectively buried, from a legal
standpoint. When Kino released the film on blu-ray in 2015 they tried to secure
the rights to this cut, and deemed it all but impossible. Still, if you know
where to look online, off-the-air VHS recordings of the director's cut can be
found (as well as a fan-made composite which reinstates the DVD-quality footage
wherever possible) – and if you want to really be able to enjoy this film as it
was meant to be seen, sacrificing picture quality for an extra 75 minutes of
movie is a totally fair trade-off.
Brazil
By now you’re probably aware of Terry Gilliam’s
dystopian take on George Orwell with his bureaucracy as Hell nightmarishly
bleak gem, Brazil, and the very
public feud that ensued between Gilliam and Universal Studios’ CEO Sid
Sheinberg over final cut. While
Gilliam’s film came out in Europe unexpurgated through 20th Century
Fox at a running time of approximately 142 minutes, Sheinberg and a team of
editors swooped in without Gilliam’s consent to drastically re-edit the film
into a more audience friendly ‘Love Conquers All’ version running roughly
around 94 minutes. Gilliam rebelled and
took out an ad in Variety which read ‘Dear Sid Sheinberg, When are you going to
release my film, ‘Brazil’?’, signed Terry Gilliam. Further still, Gilliam went on Good Morning
America and publicly shamed Sheinberg by sharing his photograph on national
television.
After successfully holding illegal screenings
throughout the nation of his original director’s cut, Universal acquiesced and
finally allowed a slightly shorter version approved by Gilliam a theatrical
release. Eventually the Criterion
Collection released Gilliam’s intended director’s cut in a collector’s edition,
also including the legendarily infamous Sid Sheinberg edit which made brief
appearances on syndicated television. While ostensibly different and
significantly shorter, to call Sheinberg’s meddling a bastardization of
Gilliam’s film is putting it too kindly.
Not only is the film incredibly disjointed,
inexplicably leaping from scene to scene with zero continuity or flow, many
shots appear to be still photos that are zoomed in with the intention of
completely changing what was shot. With
much of the context excised, many of the more surreal sequences peppering the
film are absent of their dreamlike quality and thus become incomprehensible
upon being retooled. Most notably, the
infamously bleak finale closing Brazil has
now been souped up thanks to still photos and some unused footage suggesting
everyone lives happily ever after, completely out of touch with the dystopian
tone and ultimately contradictory towards the meaning of the film. It is worth noting shortly thereafter,
Sheinberg in his infinite wisdom spearheaded the production of ‘a quality
people picture’ known as Jaws the Revenge
and that many years later, fellow executives would tease Sheinberg about
whether or not he liked Terry Gilliam’s 12
Monkeys.
-Andrew Kotwicki
-*Christopher S. Jordan
-**Blake O. Kleiner