I agree that the colony scenes are a drag. On the other hand, I like the scene where Ripley learns about her daughter and the scene with the sentry guns is just plain cool (“Next time they walk right up and knock” “Yeah, but they don’t know that”).
Dump the Big Wheel/whiny middle-management drone/ship exploration section and leave the rest, in my opinion. As is, I tend to just fast-forawrd through the colony scene.
Let us not forget that there have been two significant revisitations on at least two of the films getting talked about here.
Close Encounters got a “Special Edition” in 1980, which added some nice new effects, rearranged a few scenes, and added that horrible inside-the-mothership ending. It then got a “Collector’s Edition” in 2002, which returned to the original ending.
Blade Runner had the “Director’s Cut” in 1992 without the noir-inspired voiceover and happy ending and with the unicorn dream sequence. It then got a “Final Cut” in 2007, which IMHO is the best of them all, with better pacing and a finer attention to theme. (There were of course, other versions like the 1982 “International Cut,” but I’m going with widely-available-in-the-US versions here).
Exactly what I came in here to say.
The directors cut of Last of the Mohicans is bad, randomly thrown in scenes that do nothing for the story but slow down the action. Yeah, that fact makes it more like the book, but that’s not always a good thing.
It was a few years ago that I saw it and looking around online I find it isn’t available on DVD, only VHS. I do remember it was a VHS movie that I watched. I found the VHS here.
Your spoiler was right on the ending because she never goes to their house at the very end to surprise Anne Archer.
In fact, there is something of a small hint to the director’s ending in the scene where he goes to her apartment and they fight (the scene where she runs at him in the kitchen with the knife).