From: reiher@ficus.cs.ucla.edu (Peter Reiher)
Subject: Re: With cuts restored:  The Frankenstein Academy of Film.
Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department
Distribution: usa
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 92 15:01:23 GMT

In article <11AUG199213411558@portal.lasc.lockheed.com> le01167@portal.lasc.lockheed.com (Ron Nadel (x2025)) writes:
>All the discussion about the which is the real director's version of 
>Blade Runner (Blade Runner Too) has got me thinking about other movies that 
>have re-appeared _with cuts restored_ or _with 2823 frames not seen before!_ 
>etc.  
>
>What are some movies that you think are improved with the changes, and 
>which ones do you think were better left alone?  And some movies have been 
>found to have been cut and never restored, etc.  Here are some of my own 
>canidates for what I'll call the _Frankenstein Academy of Film_.  

Here are some more -

"Lawrence of Arabia" - Major cuts from the roadshow version, which was
never seen again until three or four years ago.  The full length version
is much better.

"Spartacus" - Some cuts were made before release.  Only one set of
pre-release cuts were really significant.  In my opinion, the inclusion
of this scene is a slight improvement, but other people feel the scene
is too obvious and the film works fine without it.

"The Wild Bunch" - Massive studio cuts prior to release.  "The Wild
Bunch" circulates in several different forms.  Generally speaking,
the longer, the better.  The cut scenes that make the most difference 
are a set of scenes showing how Robert Ryan's character was captured,
and a set of scenes showing the Mexican General fighting a battle.
The former is important for undercutting William Holden's character's
supposed commitment to loyalty (thereby making the final gunfight absolutely
necessary for his self-redemption, rather than an "oh, well, what the
hell" gesture).  The latter transforms the character of the Mexican 
General from a mere cardboard figure into a person, and gives important
motivation for why he needs to buy guns.

"Superman" - Shown with lots and lots of cut footage on network
TV.  (This showing suggests that the Salkind brothers, the producers,
had probably originally planned on pulling the same trick with
"Superman" that they did with "The Three Musketeers" - shoot "one
movie", cut it as two, pay the actors only once.)  Generally, this
footage only slowed the film down and added very little.

"Brazil" - At least three versions circulate - the studio cut, Gilliam's
original cut, and the American release cut.  The first is vile, opinion
is divided on the other two, with some preference for the original
cut.  (Though Gilliam himself has expressed a preference for some elements
of the American release cut.)

"King Kong" - Some overly violent and slightly sexy bits were cut
prior to the original release.  They were restored ten or fifteen years
ago.  They're a net plus, but only a small one - the essence of the film
doesn't require them.

And one that's still on the slab, waiting for a really big lightning
bolt that almost certainly will never come -

"Greed" - Eric von Stroheim's silent masterpiece.  Originally many,
many, many hours long, cut down to around 2 hours.  At two hours, 
film scholars regularly choose it as one of the finest films ever
made.  All opinion from those who saw the original cut said that it
was immersurably better than the cut version, but unreleasable because
it was much too long.  The general feeling is that the cut footage no
longer exists, but, if it does and someone turns it up . . .

And one that's on the slab, but needing a smaller, less improbable
lightning bolt -

"The Gold Rush" - the version most of us have seen is much shorter
than the original version.  There's good reason to believe that
the cut footage exists, but I haven't heard whether the full length
version is going to become generally available.
--
		Peter Reiher
		reiher@wells.cs.ucla.edu