The Arrow Video / Shout factory un-official preservation thread. — Page 2

47 Ronin (2013)

This film is a bit lost between a first initial version and then a studio salvaged version. At a total budget of $225M dollars money was poured in and keanu Reeves role was increased with reshoots.

The Japanese cut is slightly better which is the deleted scenes on the Blu-Ray. These scenes are small plot extensions but are fine.

There are things to like in this film but it just does not gel together.

Personally I don’t think the Monster battle hunt thing at the start works well at all. I also don’t feel keeanu fighting the Ogre is that good either if it had been against a human then would have been ok I reckon.

Anyway after these two parts are out of the way we get the tattoo skeleton bloke on the poster whom had him shooting and part of the action removed. I am not sure if he was to be killed or not?

The Big Samurai is pretty good fighting Keeanu and this was entertaining but the re-match that was due for the ending scenes was a bad decision to remove it.

It seems like it’s the Story of 47 Ronin but Keeanu battles fantasy creatures whilst the Samurai battle for honour and respect.

I actually quite liked the Bird Monks and getting the sword and Keeanu battling the Luck Dragon. I thought that was well done but sorely missing the re-match with the Big Samurai.

The Actual real plot end fight it seems was shortened too from the Special features via intercutting and losing quite a bit Hiroyuki Sanada fight here.

What is there left to say. Looks like some stuff the Studio did was a good choice but also there seem to be bad choices too. Whilst this may have been a lot to take on for the Ridley Scott Progeny Carl Rinsch Perhaps he did need some help but mabey, just mabey he had the right ideas in some placed.

I reckon it’s a bit of a messy muddle but there could be a middle of the road cut on this one if The Studio might relent on some decisions. It’s not a complete disaster… Far from it. It does have some stuff going for it.

It would be very interesting to see the original Rinsch version which was also shot twice once in english and also in Japanese too.

It’s both easy and hard to tell exactly where the Studio imposed changes start and stop in there entiriety but it does seem there were 2 films duking it out to be the one that would win over the audience. Unless Universal let us see we may never know. There are some other titles from Universal that are worth talking about too but I wil add them later.

Ok Back to Jaws…

https://youtu.be/xW1ByJbFl-A?si=-XDPg55T6FEQK1x_

Even though this is reasonably well done I even feel this goes against the mystery. Once again it all boils down to the autopsy scene which was cut down. It’s an interesting what if. But I am actually not feeling this one. UK theatrical cut all the way to sorting it out.

Also back to the troubled productions re-cut ideas. As I said Universal had some other titles that are worth talking about… Well I just got the Wolfman 2010 on Blu-ray and I want to see the extra stuff and compare both versions. I think it’s a film that deserves perhaps another cut but then again I need to see this one proper befofre commenting. It’s not as bad as critics say but it also never succeeded as well as they hoped. This is also attached to “werewolf the beast among us” originally slated as a sequeal which was poor quality but one wonders if this film contains stuff from the wolfman that was removed. Add to this “Van helsing” with Hugh Jackmsn which was terrible the Wolfman does not look too bad in comparison. It’s on the list I will come to this one. Let me know your thoughts if any.

The Wolfman will require a deep dive and I am lacking time currently for that…

So I will serve up something else for now.

The Saint (1997)

This film was a pretty medicre affair I actually saw it in the cinema and got the CD single of the theme tune by Orbital. The theme tune was pretty good and that band remixed a few Brittish classics aswell as Dr Who theme also.

So as far as the film goes for some bizarre reason the whole climatic action ending sequence was removed. This version of the ending can be found on a Russian VHS release but is dubbed entirely in Rusdian no English or subtitles exist in any release format as far as I know. You can find it on youtube.

The director expressed a wish to see the ending restored but this alternate version in English never materialized. There was some sort of conflict on the heroine of the story that lead to these changes however the Director himself confirmed there was 3 versions the Theatrical this Rusdian VHS version and a version that combines the two but finishes as the theatrical version does. I think it could be worth a restoration this one as it really does change the film and all the money that was spent on this big action scene which is surely the climax of the story whilst the plot is tied up should be re-instated.

Another One for a Special edition would be

Frost / Nixon (2008)

There are some deleted scenes here for the film not entirely sure they should be re-instated in the film or not I would need to watch this again I don’t recall anything bad. It is a very good film as it stands. In terms of a special edition material or featurettes there is a presskit which includes intetesting stuff on it amongst the treasure trove of Historical Documentaries and the Original interview itself could be included regarding watergate. I feel this could make for a decent release anyway with all the history surrounding it and being a very good film to boot.

The Wolfman (2010)

We have a theatrical and Extended cut and deleted scenes from both. The filn is above average and exudes great atmosphere and is a gothic horror. It also has a great music score by Danny Elfman which actually sounds like the Kong theme from Peter Jacksons reboot only much better.

It get’s a lot right this film and it is enjoyable headed up after initial director left by Joe Johnston of Star Wars Storyboard fame and Rick Baker on creature effects. We also get a good cast in Bencio del Toro, Antony Hopkins, Emily Blunt and Hugo Weaving.

So with all that out the way this film should be a total classic but somehow it manages to stumble on plot. It can be marginially improved with what is available but it will only ever be good bordering on great. It will be hard for it to earn classic or cult classic.

The way I see it is that the Extended cut is overall the better version but the theatrical cut is better with the letter that is read by Blunt in Voice over. This means that Blunt should see Lawrence Talbot on stage but remove the dressing room scene. This would suggest the letter was hand delivered not by post a note if you like.
There is not really anything too bad with the deleted scenes that are present of particular note is the extra killing in the opera fancy dress party. That should be included as it is displyed on the newspaper that Inspector Aberline shows to Emily Blunt. I would probably opt for taking out the punch and judy gag though.

I also felt the scene where Del Toro has vision on the lake was poor but him teaching Emily Blunt to skim stones over the lake was good. However it seems they should be back at the house from deleted scene when they come to arrest him. This sort of more time spenr together was needed.

Also of note it seems the Cane or walking stick given to Del Toro from Max Von Sydow would have or should have had more meaning. Especially with the concealed blade that it would seem should have been for a greater purpose. It seems the big werewolf fight, might not have been part of the original and Del Toro may have simply cut off Antony Hopkins Head then he turns into the wolfman when Weaving and Blunt show up. Although the werewolf fight is interesting I wonder how without it if the film would be more grounded and Del Toro kills him as a man and not the beast. I think that was the idea but then the Beast would also kill Blunt at the end.

As far as the ending goes I think they got it right in the released version of the film. Killing Blunt would have been bad but the dialogie here by Del Toro in theatrical version is not good. It would be better he said nothing at all.

Werewolf beast among us has no real connection to the wolfman it seems.

It would be interesting to see this film recut and also go over it’s troubled production. It will stand the test of time better than other films with too much CGI anx it knows it is a horror film and that is a good thing too.

So I just saw the teaser trailer for Nosferatu by Robert Eggers. I enjoyed 'the Witch" and “the Lighthouse” and “the Northman” after having looked over the wolfman innot as deep detail as I would have liked… Nosferatu looks good, very good in fact. I never used to be but I have become quite a fan of gothic horror films. Nosferatu fit’s this bill.

I just picked up a copy of the limehouse Gollum which I intend to watch soon.

But as far as this post is concerned I would like to say this…

Universal Pictures seems like they want to create a dark universe thing arounf their monsters namely.

Dracula
Creature from the black lagoon
Frankenstein
Wolfman
The Mummy

First of all I would like to express a dislike of Universe ideas just make films that stand alone as films in their own right then these films remain untarnished and unconnected from anything else released.

However I think the wolfman could be salvaged. The last voyage of the demeter looks good but also ptetty bad can’t decide but also can not see it on dvd or bluray thanks to entettainment one pulling out from the UK market. No physical release in the UK.

I guess Del Toro with the shape of water did his version of creature from black lagoon which was my favourite film that year when it released not so much gothic but really great.

Gothic horror is great when done correctly however who cares about a dark universe stupidness just make or improve on films like wolfman. That is what nosferatu looks like. Give it time and remake “the mummy” but do it correctly and do it right. Make it a period piece. Make it gothic. Make it horror.

Cheers

A dark universe is a terrible idea that Tom Cruise Mummy from Kurtzman is literally one of the very worst films I have ever seen. I only liked the actress in that Sofia Boutella. The Brendan Fraser Indiana Jones Clones were better, in that I mean film 1 and 2 and but no they weren’t horror or gothic. Some of the cgi hasn’t aged well but I liked Rachel Weisz.

JadedSkywalker said:

A dark universe is a terrible idea that Tom Cruise Mummy from Kurtzman is literally one of the very worst films I have ever seen. I only liked the actress in that Sofia Boutella. The Brendan Fraser Indiana Jones Clones were better, in that I mean film 1 and 2 and but no they weren’t horror or gothic. Some of the cgi hasn’t aged well but I liked Rachel Weisz.

I don’t think I will ever bother watching the new mummy film with Tom Cruise. Stargate is perhaps the best mummy movie but again it’s not horror and extremely untraditional. Like you say with the brandon fraser film it was Indianna jones meets the mummy rather unoriginal.

I would very much like to see a gothic horror mummy movie made but as we are mulling over this it seems nobody wants to make a horror version, let alone a gothic horror version.

I could import a copy of last voyage of the demeter from over seas but at £18.00 it’s a hard sell not confident enough on it looks good and crap the same time.

Dracula (1992)

Upon looking over this film there is a case to be made for an extended cut but also a part that is in the deleted scenes that was part of some theatrical cut’s.(Harker first meets Dracula)

Gary Oldmans performance really shines and it seems this would be the desire for assembling a extended version with his scenes, However Keeanu Reeves gives a reasonable performance but his “English Acent” is very bad… I would go as far to say his vocal performance hurts the film as he really strughled with putting on an English Accent. Making a case for Re-Dubbing his voice. Essentially I would be interested to hear what it would achieve to hear a more convincing vocal performance of his character.

I am not sure if all deleted scenes should be re-instated but there is enough material to make a good and worthy extended version. I think fans of the film would appreciate a longer version. There is some very nice transitions that were left out especially at the opening scenes.

Back to Jaws again.

https://youtu.be/B-SPVMvd8zU?si=N6ZcjDdZCg4y_Vnp

Pretty impressive vfx for the Alex Kitner death. CKVFX has done some good effects work on a few titles now.

Godzilla 2014 deleted scenes have been released. They are all pretty good. You can find them on YouTube. Definitely deserves an extended cut.

I Just watched Mad Max Furiosa…

I thought it was really good. Heard about deleted scene where Furiosa cuts out lord Dementus Toungue. That should be included for sure.

There is little word on anything else that was excised from the film.

It should however revert back to the grading in the trailers was better.

Mad Max the wasteland seems to be now Lurking in the shadows and is set a year before Fury Road, another prequel. The dangling carrot is if Furiosa does not do well then the wasteland won’t happen.

Here is another one of my good ideas. How about make the Wasteland movie and intertwine it with Furiosa making it 3 hours 30 odd minutes long. Have an intermission if needed.

Re-release Furiosa with the wasteland movie intertwined within it. Now you get twice as much for furiosa box office with the rest of the story of Mad Max in a Mad Max movie. Simples. It will make money too. All Too easy

Oh well

A film that could probably do with a proper Updated Release would be the 1990 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Movie.

It seems Germany Got a decent release with Extra’s amd an alternate cut of the movie but there is still a few things hanging over the film which seem like it’s not been given the recognition it deserves for it’s low budget.

From what I can gather there is a desire for a Directors cut or extended cut. But also for the extra;s to be collected together also.

The cut’s seem to be as follows.

Old UK version uses Alternate Fottage which is sometimes better but sometimes worse.
The opening sequence was Shortened.
Shredder Punishing his foot soldiers
Scene with first meeting Casey Jones was cut down as it was meant to end in Alleyway.
April Drawing Michael Angelo was cut and him training on the punch bag
Aprils Apartment Fight Shortened
Training Scenes Removed from the Farm
Post Credit SCene Comic book sales pitch.

One More that I think probably deserves an extended Cut Is First Blood with Sylvester Stallone.

The TV Cut has some good extra dialogue and scenes but then the Flashbacks to the Vietnam dream sequence from the Deleted scenes also. The Initial Cut has been rumoured to be 3 hours and 30 minutes for which Stallone hated it. I can’t help but feel there would be some good stuff in there and although it is a film based on PTSD There is very little about actual Vietnam contained within the film which I feel that is really the root of what is substantially missing.

I think there could be an interesting in depth story to tell about the production on this film.

Here’s a list of 10 links of films I’d enjoy seeing a release on 4K disc via Arrow or Shout/Scream Factory.

https://letterboxd.com/film/major-dundee/
https://letterboxd.com/film/the-duellists/
https://letterboxd.com/film/dreamscape/
https://letterboxd.com/film/a-fish-called-wanda/
https://letterboxd.com/film/manhunter/
https://letterboxd.com/film/a-better-tomorrow/
https://letterboxd.com/film/black-rain/
https://letterboxd.com/film/memoirs-of-an-invisible-man/
https://letterboxd.com/film/alive/
https://letterboxd.com/film/the-fall/

The “Duelists” and “the Fall” are both very good films.

Some Good News!!

Night of the living Dead (1990) remake by Tom Savini is getting a directors cut treatment from apparently 30% to approx 60% of what he intended. It will be coming out from Sony in 2025.

I think it sounds good with new special features to boot. This is why Physical home media is so great well done Sony.

https://www.joblo.com/notld-90-uncut/

Just been looking over the whole “Eaters of the Dead / 13th Warrior” thing. I am not a huge fan of the film but it could be an interesting project for restoration. It would be a very curious to see the original before the Crighton reshoots. Certainly would have an audience.