Idea: for a (Musa) The Warrior 2001 - Extended Cut

Anyone out there like this Korean movie.

Personally I think this film is better than both Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and House of Flying Daggers.

I used to have the 2 disc UK release of the film.

But I got rid of it which I wish I had not, I now have the single disc edition UK release.

I have just purchased the extended cut… a Swedish DVD release which has lots of DVD extras on it (more than the UK release) and the international cut and the theatrical cut which runs about 30 minutes longer but also misses out about a minute or so from the UK Hong kong edit release (without horrible yellow filter mind).

Anyway I am thinking about doing an extended cut of this film that would be a hybrid of the Hong Kong Edit (UK) and the korean cut (Swedish release)

I have heard there is problems with the Swedish release though something about it being 24fps instead of 25fps. and a bit squeezed vertically although it retains aspect ratio of 2:35:1

how would this effect the film. would it be very detrimental to it?

If so I will have to double dip on the korean version but have to use the swedish release for a subtitles guide as the korean version has no english subtitle track. Or again purchase the UK 2 disc edition that apparently contains all the deleted scenes.

You can see how this starts to get a bit complicated.

But I really do believe this film needs a proper ultimate cut made as it was butchered for international release as opposed to it being the film that was originally intended to be. Cut’s were made in a non sensical way.

About the subtitles:
The subtitles were re-done for the UK release the extended cut has a poor translation and timings apparently. I don’t know if this would extend to the deleted scenes though on the UK release.

Anyway anyone interested in this film or Asian cinema in general I would appreciate any thoughts or comments on the film “MUSA -The Warrior” as I have a general idea at the moment of what it needs to bring it up a few notches.

Also has anyone seen the extended cut here.

Thanks

Edit

ok I can confirm that the extended cut is much better what I have seen so far of it but the Swedish release transfer has smearing issues and some subtitle timimng issues the translation is not really bad or anything like that but there are subtle differences in the UK release subtitles.

I think this rules out the swedish release as a video source for the extended cut.

I will have to obtain the korean theatrical version Region 3

I also have a feeling this film was renamed for western audiences as “Musa The Warrior” as the symbol on the title card might resemble the character on the princess hanckerchief which translates as “Save Me”. I need to check this in more detail but It’s an initial observation I have made without knowing Korean language.

The swedish release adds to the title “MUSA The Warrior the princess of the desert”

Ok a small update,

Today I have purchased the Korean 2 disc special edition DVD release of (Musa) the Warrior (Region 3)

The title of the film is “Musa” which translates as “The Warrior”

I have noticed the sound mix was re-done in a few places in the international cut vs the original theatrical Korean release. Have not made up my mind which I prefer but the international release initially seems better choices of music near the end of the film and a music cut smoothed out on one scene.

Apart from that I await the delivery of the DVD. It claims to have English subtitles also so this could only perhaps be for the special edition release which may not have been available initially upon first DVD releases in Korea.

EDIT

The 2 Disc Korean Theatrical version got delivered yesterday. It is a much better quality no smearing and the colors are good. I put it in my old DVD player for which I have unlocked it to be Region free, but the motor is playing up inside of the DVD player so the disc got stuck in there and the buttons are intermittent on the front of it. So after a bit of stress and thinking I would have to open the player up to get the disc back out It some how managed to finally spit the disc out with a bit help from my hand. Thank goodness!

The subtitles are really quite poorly translated on the Korean version so buying the Swedish release was not a waste of money although the picture quality is much worse than the Korean release the subtitles can be used as the main basis for the theatrical cuts subtitles but already I have noticed a few differences in the translation in the Korean version to the Swedish version and the UK version. So 3 separate translations of quite a long film of varying quality.