Studios really need to stop ruining a director’s vision. Directors like Wes Craven, unfortunately, are victims of interference that causes their films to become inferior products. With Zack Snyder’s Justice League showing how different a studio cut can be from the director’s cut, horror fans are begging for similar treatments.
Movies such as Nightblood and Alien 3 feature much better alternative cuts. However, there are so many other horror movies that suffered from bad cuts. Fans are begging and clamoring for certain horror films to get the director’s cut, with some films becoming quite infamous for it.
A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)
Despite a welcome performance from Jackie Earle Haley as child killer Freddy Krueger and some interesting ideas, the remake of freddie unfortunately did not correspond to it in quality. Part of it may have to do with the many reshot, alternate and cut scenes which made the final product less than stellar.
Most famously, an entirely different final encounter with Freddy Krueger in his human form showed a different side to Krueger’s character. Others include different openings, more scenes of Freddy taking the form of Kris, and an alternate dart ending with Quentin instead of Nancy. If a director’s cut of this remake were made, perhaps Krueger’s Jackie Earle Haley version would be better received.
Disturbing Behavior (1998)
Disturbing behavior was one of many trendy additions to young adult horror. He had an interesting concept of the high school version of The Women of Stepford but sadly, director David Nutter’s original vision was deleted. Due to some negative responses during drug tests, MGM had Disturbing behavior to be shot to be a more streamlined horror movie.
Originally, there was going to be a bit more story and character development and why parents allow their children to undergo the treatment. Instead, it’s been left more ambiguous, and much of the story seems to go nowhere. Even the ending has been changed which can be viewed on YouTube.
Hellraiser: Bloodline (1996)
Even before the filming of the film, Bob Weinstein caused problems for this fourth film of the hellraiser franchise. Nearly all of horror legend Clive Barker and director David Yagher’s vision was destroyed, but the director did his best with what he had, but even that wasn’t enough to please Weinstein and Size Movies.
Hellraiser: Bloodline was then put through post-production torture with more cuts that resulted in a disappointing fourth film that was originally meant to be the grand finale. Fortunately, this is a time when there is really confirmation that the director’s cut exists. While it wouldn’t be exactly what was originally written by Barker and Peter Atkins, it probably would have been an improvement.
The Dungeon (1983)
One of Michael Mann’s first films was a World War II horror film known as The dungeon. To give an idea of what was cut, Michael Mann’s original film was supposed to be three hours long, as reported by DenOfGeek. The dungeon ended up lasting 96 minutes in the final product.
Just like the Justice League movie, that means there were a lot of important storylines left out, leaving a disjointed mess. The monstrous villain Molasar is a highlight and shows Michael Mann’s ambition, but that ambition was sadly squandered due to an excessive budget and poor test screenings.
Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 (2000)
Most will remember 2016 Blair Witch as the official sequel to The Blair Witch Project but it was not the first attempt at a sequel. Many horror fans will attest that Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 is an incoherent mess and it’s due to the studio tampering with the film.
Director John Berlinger wanted more psychological horror but according to BloodyDisgusting, rewrites and reshoots were commissioned. Therefore, book of shadows was revamped further to try and make it a more traditional horror movie, but ended up being a confusing and convoluted experience. Berlinger’s haircut is worth seeing as it looked like he had an interesting idea.
The Invasion (2007)
the invasion suffered from abysmal production. Originally, the invasion was directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel who filmed and delivered his cut of the film. However, the film would become a mixture of the ideas of several directors.
V for Vendetta director James McTeigue was brought in to shoot new scenes written by The Wachowskis. This led to a rushed editing process that left the invasion in a proper attempt to remake a classic at best that lost a lot of money. It’s more than likely that Hirschbiegel’s original cut would have cost the studio less.
The Predator (2018)
Fred Decker has been registered indicating that the final version of The predator was not the original plan. Much of the original film was cut, including an entire subplot featuring humans allying with emissaries of the Yautja Hunter AKA Predators race to hunt the rogue Yautja. Instead, the entire last half of The predator was shot to appeal to all audiences in the form of a popcorn movie. In an ironic twist, he appealed to almost no one.
There were even plans to bring in Arnold Schwarzenegger for that last dart, but that was scrapped and a now famous cameo by Newt from Extraterrestrial The franchise was filmed but never used. In place, The predator ended with an Iron Man-esque costume that showed the studio was capitalizing on superhero movies. Since it was all filmed, Shane Black’s original cut is worth seeing, even if it’s not the best sequel.
The Thing (2011)
For those unaware, originally the 2011 prequel to The thing was filmed using practical monster effects and gore much like John Carpenter’s classic. The plan was to use practical effects with some digital enhancements. Unfortunately, the studio thought the practical effects looked too fake, so they had almost all of the practical effects digitally removed and replaced with CGI.
It has become one of the most famous alternative designs for horror characters. While the final product is lessened by CGI, there’s a solid prequel to be found. It would only be improved by what fans call the practical fit; many fans of the horror series would love to see the original scenes using the practical effects and the prequel would be a welcome first chapter of The thing.
Event Horizon (1998)
Unfortunately, it has been said that all the images that would allow the true vision of Event horizon is lost. That still isn’t stopping fans from hoping that Paul WS Anderson can release his cut of the sci-fi horror movie someday. Even ShoutFactory hopes and wants to bring the Director’s Cut to life.
According to SlashFilm, Event horizon was going to be 130 minutes long and much more graphic than it already was. Audiences were supposed to see more of the hell dimension that turned the Event Horizon ship into a living organism with footage cut out because it disturbed viewers too much.
Cursed (2005)
Studios have never been kind to the late great Wes Craven. The most infamous example is that of 2005 Damn, which was shot and completed only for Bob Weinstein to ruin a movie again. Wes Craven was forced to cut almost everything from his first draft and remake an entirely different film. Then this version was rejected, forcing further changes until Damn was no longer Craven’s product.
Originally, Wes Craven wanted to reinvent the werewolf genre while bringing back the horror legends of Scream and freddie. Sadly, only a tiny percentage of that vision made it into the final product, while the rest was generic werewolf horror-comedy. This led fans to follow in the footsteps of Zack Snyder’s Justice League with #ReleaseTheCravenCut since the original images still exist.
About the Author
