I didn’t care much for most of the cut scenes from This Is Spinal Tap.
They seemed to be extremely dry and drawn out.
My unpopular opinion: The "Extended Edition"s of the Lord of the Rings movies are bad, bad, bad.
I have presently in mind specifically:
The Galadriel gift-giving sequecne–poorly edited, difficult to follow.
The “Hey Aragorn, I made some stew, do you like it?” scene–way out of character for Aragorn, corny, unnecessary.
“The Mouth”–great idea, would have been glad to see it as a deleted extra as a “what could have been,” but as inserted back into the movie, poorly edited, containing much that is gratuitous.
Things like the above three scenes really screw up the experience of watching the movie. I prefer the theatrical version.
-FrL-
I also was disappointed by the Blade Runner recut. I thought the voice-over helped the story, the unicorn dream doesn’t add anything especially insightful, and the so-called “happy” ending doesn’t feel tacked on (it’s perfectly foreshadowed by Rachel’s’ earlier line: “What if I want away, went North?”). Cutting the ending and simply having Rachel and Deckard get into the elevator leaves the film without an ending at all.
The “happiness” some might object to is the idea that Rachel doesn’t have a limited four-year lifespan. I don’t understand why she would. The Nexus-6 replicants were designed to kick after four years because it was anticipated that they might start to form their own (possibly unpredictable) emotional responses. Rachel, by having memory implants copied from from a human presumably selected for her emotional stability (in addition to being the CEO’s niece), has no such potential problem and no need for the four-year failsafe.
Granted, it’s explained in a clumsy manner (“Oh, by the way, Tyrell said she’s okay”) but that suggests to me a flaw in the original script. Speaking of which, the director’s cut didn’t address the “missing replicant” issue, where six fugitives somehow become five, one of whom is dead before the movie starts.
The Aliens extended version is megacool, and it helps explain why Newt is so adept at running the air vents (i.e. all the kids do it, and Newt’s small size gives her an advantage). Plus I liked the Robosentries.
I can certainly understand the cuts made to Terminator 2. The extra footage is interesting, but none of it is especially critical to the plot. Arnold describes himself as a learning computer, so it’s okay to leave it at that and not go through the whole “flip the DIP switch” scene. Likewise, Joe Morton’s scene with his wife enthusiastically explaining what the new CPU design will do, when the audience already knows that it’ll torch the planet. Interesting, but not strictly necessary. The T-1000’s glitches are also interesting, but I find they tend to distract from the seriousness of the final reel.
It was a pity to cut Michael Biehn’s scenes, since I like him, but it’s probably better to depict Sarah Connor as violently determined, rather than actually delusional.
The ending in which John is a Senator, though… burn it.
Don’t forget the scene with Arnold trying to smile! That one cracks me up.
I agree about the T2 deleted scenes though: interesting and entertaining for a fan, but cut for good reasons.
Since it hasn’t come up yet I’d like to mention the extended or “international” version of Léon: The Professional as the version I prefer. The extra 24 minutes sure give the film a different feel.
It’s been awhile since I saw the theatrical release of FOTR (I own the EE). Do Bilbo and Frodo even have a scene together before Rivendell? If not I think this is a weird omission.
I generally prefer the EE but I don’t like the whole ‘Concerning Hobbits’ bit. The theatrical release (which omits it) I thought started smoother.
The extra endings of 28 Days Later fascinated me for a couple of different reasons. The main ones being the realization that the movie could’ve been a LOT more grim, but also the commentaries on all the endings on why they decided to use or not use them. Finally, the… What did they call it? ‘Super different’ ending or something? The one that changes the entire second half of the movie? Amazing to watch and listen to, and I kinda wonder what it would’ve been like to see (it was all in storyboard form with the director and DP (I think) reading the dialogue).
A lot of movies have an alternate ending that’s obviously the ending the story requires, but you get the feeling they changed it after a test screening or something. The Tailor of Panama is like that.
Count me in as one who liked the narration, too; it gives a noirish, Chandler-esque feel to the film, and the deadpan delivery is perfect. After all, Deckard is supposed to be jaded and tired. See Double Indemnity, Out Of The Past, Farewell, My Lovely (the Mitchum version), et cetera for examples of. I also detest the implication that Deckard is a replicant; not only is it contradicted by many scenes in the film (Deckard is clearly neither as quick-witted or as strong and agile as the replicants, nor is he as inately driven) but it undermines what I consider to be the main theme of the film, to wit that both the replicants and the humans that created them want the same answers out of life, (“Where did I come from? Where am I going? How long have I got?”), and that it is no more justifiable to enslave or terminate replicants than it would be humans. I do dislike the happy ending of the theatrical cut, though; the bleak, open-ended ending of the so-called Director’s Cut is preferable.
Gilliam’s full-up Criterion Collection cut of Brazil (which is mostly just the European theatrical cut as opposed the anemic American cinematic release or the utterly butchered Sid Shinberg “Love Conquers All” version) is the best of all. [post=6735446]Here[/post]'s an old post that describes the different versions.
I really like the alternate ending of Ronin, too, and agree with Frankenheimer (as he explains in his excellent commentary track) that it presents a better appreciation for the consequences and ambiguities of working underground. But I guess test audiences preferred the theatrical ending.
I despise what Coppola did to The Godfather films with his chronological retooling of them; the cuts between father and son in Part II emphasized the differences between them and made Michael seem more tragic in his fallibilty. Putting the scenes in order destroyed that sense and brought nothing to the films. I guess he should have left Apocalypse Now alone, too, although a few of the added scenes are interesting in their own right (the Bunnies escaping by helicopter and the patrol later finding them crashed.)
It goes without saying that Lucas should have left the original Star Wars trilogy alone; warts and all, it was not improved by the additions, and oddly enough he failed to clean up many of the worst SFX like the obvious matting in dogfights.
Stranger
Das Boot was originally a mini-series on German television, some 12 hours IIRC. Having never seen it in that version I don’t know what the other ten or so hours had in them, but the ‘director’s cut’ could have been padded way more than it was.
I kinda agree that it did slow down the pacing, though.
DD
Not in the theatrical version, no. The EE has the little added scene during Bilbo’s birthday party where they hide from Lobelia Sackville-Baggins (also unseen in the theatrical version) and Bilbo tries to tell Frodo he’s leaving, but can’t do it.
Now this is one of the things I immediately loved when I first saw the EE–but then I’m a pervy hobbit fancier, so just about any scenes that give me more hobbits make me happy.
Well, there’s “jaded and tired” and then there’s “reading the script like it was a cereal box”.
A little less narration would have been better.
I couldn’t really put my finger on why I disliked Star Trek Nemesis so much until I watched the deleted scenes and an interview with director Stuart Baird.
Then I realized that they had decided to remove most of the character scenes because the director wanted the film to be “darker” and “edgier”–just the wrong approach for the Next Generation crew. The result is just another dark, violent, sci-fi action film instead of the fond farewell these characters deserved.
Thank you for the confirmation. Memory isn’t what it used to be.
It was just strange because several times before Frodo gets to Rivendell they make a big deal about him missing Bilbo, and wanting to follow Bilbo, then they have the big reunion scene at Rivendell, must be half an hour into the movie…which is their first scene together.
I think it would have made more sense if there had been a short scene earlier in the film that netted out the relationship between the two of them (which I think the omitted EE scenes do nicely).
Oddly, I(and most others, including the Guild) think otherwise. In afct, LotR stands out as the best "added deleted scenes’ DVD I have seen, ad PJ has added back the deleted scenes seamlessly. Usually one had to go to “menu” and watch them out of sequence.
I prefer the original version of Blade Runner. (PS is Decker really supposed to be a replicant himself in the Directors cut?)
Allow me to agree with Stranger about Blade Runner: I’d gladly take the uncertain ending but keep the narrative up to the climactic confrontation. Best o’ both worlds.
As to A.N. Redux, yes sure, what with Kilgore being such a great part in the original it’s good to get some more of him, but really Coppola did not need to throw in the kitchen sink… after a while it’s just rubbing our faces in how insane can things get.
I don’t know where I once read that a piece of creative work (fiction or nonfiction) is finished when there is nothing else you NEED to add and nothing else you can afford to cut and still make your point or create your desired effect – not when there’s nothing else you can think of adding. Creators need to view the limitations of size/running time and of trying to not alienate a large proportion of your target paying audience NOT as cruel shackles on their creative freedom but as challenges to creativity: how can I tell this story efficiently and still create the desired mood? How can I make my point to the people without whooshing it over their heads or pissing them off and turning them against me?
I’ve seen almost all the “director’s cuts” mentioned so far; in every case I thought the “Director’s cut” was a substantially inferior version of the movie than the theatrical release. I’ve NEVER seen a “director’s cut” that was better than the released movie.
I didn’t even like the “Aliens” recut; much of the added footage was unnecessary setup and simply made it take too long to get to the meat of the film. Adding scenes of the colony before the Marines arrive also took away a lot of the tension and mystery of seeing it for the first time through Ripley/the marines’ eyes.
The odd scene could help a movie; the gift-giving scene in “Fellowship of the Ring” helps all three movies just in the sense that the various items and such that get used later don’t just come out of nowhere. Othat than that, the recut version was too long. Especially crappy was the scene added between the moment where they’re suddenly accosted by Galadriel’s soldiers and when they arrive in Lothlorien (the scene of them sitting around and waiting to see what the elves will do with them.) It’s a useless, poorly shot scene.
I always liked Quentin Tarantino’s explanation on the “Pulp Fiction” DVD as to why he cut out the deleted scenes; he liked the scenes individually, but you didn’t actually need them to tell the story.
I liked all the extra scenes in all of the LOTR; i read all the books several times and it was all about seeing the stuff I liked come to life.
I liked the narration in Blade Runner too, but like the Director’s ending better.
I recently sat thru the FIVE HOUR VERSION!! :eek: 
I started watching it, flipped to the kickoff of one of the Bowl games, flipped back and forth, then watched the end AFTER THE FOOTBALL GAME WAS DONE! :eek: Around the time they sink near Gibralter, all I could do was think of that comic who gets kicked out of the Chinese Buffet.
“You here 4 hour! You GO NOW!”
Easily one of my favorite movies, but do we really need a FIVE HOUR VERSION?
As far as deleted scenes go, “This is Spinal Tap” would have been better with all of them except the Bruno Kirby stuff. The herpes and hottub stuff was classic! 
Having seen Blade Runner multiple times (like most others here) I will comment.
On my first viewing, the voice over was helpful and does flesh out the character quite a bit. Decker’s first scene is almost empty without it. The visual spectacle and the storyline make the movie this time.
On repeated viewings, the voice-over starts to stick out like sore-thumb. Its clumsy more often than not, isn’t well-voiced, and just sits wrong. I’m glad it was there to explain things the first time, but it really was not needed if you had some familiarity with the plot and the world Scott had developed.
So, for repeated viewings, I prefer it to be gone. But I don’t deny its usefullness for the first time viewer.