How often does entertainment in one country get significantly altered before it’s released in other country? Such as remixing a CD, or adding scenes to a movie? (Let’s only factor in Western countries; obviously there’s going to be significant editing for content in countries like Malaysia.) I’ll start with a couple:
–British and American albums often differ in tracklisting because British albums often leave off hit singles while American ones don’t. The early Beatles albums and the first Clash album are the most famous, but it has happened more recently. For example a number of Blur albums had reshuffled tracklistings when released in the US or even had alternate versions of songs.
–Shania Twain’s Up was released in three different versions. One version eliminated the country oriented instruments such as fiddles, while another also added more keyboards in order to appeal to Asian audiences.
Lots of editing out sex and smoking – yes, smoking – in DVDs and VCDs here, which is one reason the bootleg stuff is so popular. No editing on those (plus they’re cheaper). And which is ironic, because I can go into one of several bars on any given night and watch live nude lesbians having a foursome 3 feet in front of me or, depending on the bar, get a blowjob as I’m sitting there drinking a cold frostie. Go figure.
How far back do you want to go? In the early sound days, they made separate versions of films for non-English speaking markets. There is a Spanish-language Dracula with Bela Lugosi that is highly regarded (evidently, it’s more atmospheric than the English version).
Laurel and Hardy used to reshoot their films for the Spanish-speaking market. The spoke their lines phonetically, and were wildly popular, since their accents and line readings were hilarious to anyone who knew Spanish.
The original Godzilla had all the Raymond Burr stuff added for the American Market.
Almost, but not quite. The Spanish version had an all-hispanic cast, in cluding carlos Villarias as the count.
The film IS better than tod Browning’s overhyped version. The sets , while the same, are lit more dramatically. The camera MOVES instead of being so static. Dracula’s wives are threatening and emote, not just standing in a line like three timid schoolgirls. And there’s no “Swan Lake”. And no damned armadillos. Definitely worth seeing.
They pulled a bigger thing with l"Atlantide , based on a best-selling fantasy novel by Pierre Benoit. It was filmed in three or four different languages simultaneously, with the same woman starring in each.
As for Godzilla, they evidently planned to film American scenes for the sequel , as they had with Raymond Burr, and to switch the action from Japan to the Phillippines. But it was thought too expensive, so they just cut the original and dubbed it. It was released as Gigantis the Fire Monster. It’s been made available on VHS and on DVD 9with the original uncut Japanese version) as – Godzilla Help Us – Godzilla Raids Again
installLSC writes:
> British and American albums often differ in tracklisting because British albums
> often leave off hit singles while American ones don’t.
You want to prove that by comparing the contents of the British and American albums side by side? It doesn’t appear to me that that’s true at all, although I haven’t gone through the list of British and American albums in detail. Please show us in what sense the British albums left off hit singles:
The Flashman books were somewhat edited in the Danish version - mostly because the Danish and the British audience lack a shared reference frame on such institutions as traditions in boarding school life and, in particular, the game of cricket.
A straight translation would not have worked.
Wendell Wagner , the list you linked to actually shows that “I Want to Hold Your Hand” and “I Feel Fine” were on US albums but not British ones. The Beatles’ 1967 singles were also compiled on the US version of Magical Mystery Tour but not the British version. The All Music Guide states in the entry on Traffic’s Mr. Fantasy states
. I’ll admit it happens a lot less today then now, but it’s not unheard of.
The Extras Christmas Special was changed for the United States.
It included Sanjaya and Kramer references that were not included in the British version.
installLSC, let’s go through the albums one by one. The first British Beatles album was Please Please Me. The songs on it were the following:
“I Saw Her Standing There”
“Misery”
“Anna (Go to Him)”
“Chains”
“Boys”
“Ask Me Why”
“Please Please Me”
“Love Me Do”
“P.S. I Love You”
“Baby It’s You”
“Do You Want to Know a Secret”
“A Taste of Honey”
“There’s a Place”
“Twist and Shout”
The first American Beatles album was Introducing… The Beatles. The songs on it were the following:
“I Saw Her Standing There”
“Misery”
“Anna (Go to Him)”
“Chains”
“Boys”
“Love Me Do”
“P.S. I Love You”
“Baby It’s You”
“Do You Want to Know a Secret”
“A Taste of Honey”
“There’s a Place”
“Twist and Shout”
So the only difference is that the American album dropped “Please Please Me” and “Ask Me Why”.
The second British album was With the Beatles. The songs on it were the following:
“It Won’t Be Long”
“All I’ve Got to Do”
“All My Loving”
“Don’t Bother Me”
“Little Child”
“Till There Was You”
“Please Mr. Postman”
“Roll Over Beethoven”
“Hold Me Tight”
“You Really Got a Hold on Me”
“I Wanna Be Your Man”
“Devil in Her Heart”
“Not a Second Time”
“Money (That’s What I Want)”
The second American album was Meet the Beatles!.
“I Want to Hold Your Hand”
“I Saw Her Standing There”
“This Boy”
“It Won’t Be Long”
“All I’ve Got to Do”
“All My Loving”
“Don’t Bother Me”
“Little Child”
“Till There Was You”
“Hold Me Tight”
“I Wanna Be Your Man”
“Not a Second Time”
So the only differences are that the American album dropped “Please Mr. Postman”, “Roll Over Beethoven”, “Devil in Her Heart”, and “Not a Second Time” and added “I Want to Hold Your Hand” and “I Saw Her Standing There”. So while the American album dropped a couple of songs (which may or may not have been hits), they also dropped four songs.
There was then a catch-up American album called The Beatles’ Second Album (even though it was the third album). The songs on it were the following:
“Roll Over Beethoven”
“Thank You Girl”
“You Really Got a Hold on Me”
“Devil in Her Heart”
“Money”
“You Can’t Do That”
“Long Tall Sally”
“I Call Your Name”
“Please Mr. Postman”
“I’ll Get You”
“She Loves You”
So this album consisted of three of the four songs dropped from the second album. It also had eight other songs. It’s not clear that they were hits.
The third British album was A Hard Day’s Night. The songs on it were the following:
“A Hard Day’s Night”
“I Should Have Known Better”
“If I Fell”
“I’m Happy Just to Dance with You”
“And I Love Her”
“Tell Me Why”
“Can’t Buy Me Love”
“Any Time at All”
“I’ll Cry Instead”
“Things We Said Today”
“When I Get Home”
“You Can’t Do That”
“I’ll Be Back”
The equivalent American album was also called A Hard Day’s Night. The songs on it were the following:
“A Hard Day’s Night”
“Tell Me Why”
“I’ll Cry Instead”
“I Should Have Known Better” (Instrumental)
“I’m Happy Just to Dance with You”
“And I Love Her” (Instrumental)
“I Should Have Known Better”
“If I Fell”
“And I Love Her”
“Ringo’s Theme (This Boy)” (Instrumental)
“Can’t Buy Me Love”
“A Hard Day’s Night” (Instrumental)
So the only difference here is that the American album dropped three songs. It added one song, doubled one song in both sung and instrumental versions, and changed three to instrumental versions.
That’s enough for now.
So it appears that only in possibly two cases so far did the British versions not include songs because they were hits, and I’m not really sure about that. It appears that the main difference was that American albums could only hold twelve songs while the British albums could hold fourteen.