Impulse

It used to be that when you bought a copy of a movie you loved, you got exactly what you saw in the the­aters. Occasionally, direc­tors would bring out “director’s cuts” of their movies — new edits that present the movie the way the direc­tor had orig­i­nally intended the movie to be. That’s great when the the­atri­cal release was butchered by stu­dio pol­i­tics.
Lucas took it a step fur­ther by updat­ing a much loved film, Star Wars, each time it was issued in a new medium. Spielberg fol­lowed suit with a remixed ver­sion of ET, with a new computer-generated alien. Peter Jackson built his remix into the film­mak­ing process, cre­at­ing a mon­ster 12+ hour ver­sion of the Lord of the Rings tril­ogy in addi­tion to the the­atri­cal ver­sion. These remixes and director’s cuts are inter­est­ing curiosi­ties, but are they really worthwhile?

Directors must make tough deci­sions through­out the process of mak­ing a movie, bal­anc­ing real­i­ties like bud­get, pac­ing, per­for­mance, etc. Spend a ton more money to make the effects bet­ter? Keep that amaz­ingly acted and shot scene you love, even though it’s a bit of a dis­trac­tion? Great movies mate­ri­al­ize when the director’s deci­sions sac­ri­fices in favor of the story. William Faulkner said, “film­mak­ing is the process of mur­der­ing your chil­dren.” By being forced to sac­ri­fice favorite scenes, effects, and per­for­mances in ser­vice of telling a story, the direc­tor grad­u­ally releases their own ego. All that remains is the story. It’s the east­ern ideal of sur­ren­der­ing your own intent to reach a higher state of artistry.
By it’s very name, a director’s cut is the rein­ser­tion of the director’s ego into the pic­ture. They solve their pet peeve prob­lems that nobody else saw (thus draw­ing atten­tion to them). They rein­sert need­less scenes. They make the film for them­selves. In the ET bonus mate­ri­als, Spielberg talks about why he reworked the 20th anniver­sary edi­tion: “Wouldn’t it be great to re-issue it? … To bring it back out again, with a cou­ple of enhance­ments to sort of please the per­fec­tion­ist inside myself.“
Revisiting old work is a great way to mea­sure how you’ve grown and to try new ideas in old sto­ries. Just remem­ber that it’s for your­self, your own study. If you told the story well in the first place, and peo­ple loved it, it doesn’t mat­ter if the crea­ture looked plas­tic. Movies that stay true to the story will always be remem­bered far more than any remix.

Related posts:

1. Incredibly cool movie
2. Motion cap­ture: Acting with balls
3. Video vs still pho­tog­ra­phy, pt 3