[Movies] When given a movie choice do you...

[Orlong]

When you buy/rent a movie and the disc gives you the choice of the Theatrical cut or directors/extended cut, is there anyone who chooses the theatrical cut? I cant seem to think of any reason whatsoever where someone would want to watch a shorter version of a movie with parts of it cut out.

[SidheKnight]

Ditto that.

The only reason for including the theatrical cut I can think of is for review/analisys/comparison purposes.

But I'd rather watch the extended cut.

[Forfax]

I'd watch them both and make a conclusion by myself witch one is better.

[Immitis]

back in meh day we had vidya tapes and if ya wanted watch some extras had to fast forwad and to does that had to get up press the button on teh vcr'a

[dokilar]

i agree, most of the time i like to watch the directors cut/extended version because some of the extended scenes or deleted scenes are pretty good. the lord of the rings extended versions come to mind, theres literally like an extra hour or two worth of extended and/or cut scenes that tell quite a bit of story.

also, just about any movie i have any interest in i almost always go see it in the theater, so watching the theatrical version again really doesnt do much for me

[whathump]

Well, with some movies the theatrical cut is better. Like Alien. Theatrical cut had better flow than the so called director's cut, and even the director, Ridley Scott, preferred the theatrical cut.

[Forfax]

Well, with some movies the theatrical cut is better. Like Alien. Theatrical cut had better flow than the so called director's cut, and even the director, Ridley Scott, preferred the theatrical cut.

Kingdom of heaven director's cut is much much better than the theatrical one.

[Sky High]

it depends. I'd love to own a copy of a movie I enjoy, I'm a bit of a collector so having a bookshelf of movies/games/books is something I strive for, however since I'm poor I have to settle for renting them until I have some spare cash to straight up buy it.

[draynay]

It depends who did the extended cut, are deleted scenes just jammed in there? A lot of the time they were deleted for a reason.

I'll use Terminator 2 as an example, because that one is a mixed bag.

If you watch the extended edition, you get a couple good scenes, like Kyle Reese appearing before Sarah, and the very good (if you like inventive special effects) extended scene where they remove the Terminator's CPU and adjust the settings.

But you also get the horrendous scene of Dyson planning to go on a trip with his kids. That scene absolutely needed to be cut, it completely breaks the best scene of the movie, when Sarah goes to kill him before realizing that in killing a man for something he hasn't done yet she has become a terminator herself. That scene works because the audience can still accept Dyson as some faceless world destroying villain who needs to be stopped, the same way Sarah Connor sees him, his interaction with his kids serves to humanize him and so the audience is not seeing him in the same light as Sarah and isn't along for the ride, ruining the subsequent scene.

That was a bit of over analysis, but there are definitely movies which are worse off for having deleted scenes re-inserted, particularly since not every extended edition is overseen by the director. I would generally recommend watching a theatrical version of a movie first, for this reason.

[whathump]

Kingdom of heaven director's cut is much much better than the theatrical one.

I meant for Alien specifically. I saw him in an interview saying he preferred the theatrical version of Alien to the director's cut. I can't really speak to what he thinks of his other movies.

[Fuzzzie]

Depends on the movie. Some films featuring a "directors cut" tend to run on and get boring. Good editing and knowing what to cut is what makes a film good. That's why they give awards for it

[Lemons]

rent a "disc"? What year is this? haha jk...but seriously.

I usually want to watch the theatrical cut first, then the director's cut. Then I can see if the directors cut really made the movie better or not.

[Deleted]

I honestly don't know. Most of the time I won't even notice if I'm watching the cut scene or the extended one. Lol.

But I guess I'd have to pick extended most of the time.

[Tribunal]

Most of the time there's not really much of a choice (Netflix tends to have one or the other, for example) but I would say it depends.

Rewatching a favorite movie, or one that is quite cinematic? Prob director's cut, especially if I haven't seen it before.

Just watching a popular/recent movie? Theatrical is fine, plus then I won't be talking about scenes most people haven't seen when discussing it. If it's a really good/enjoyable movie, I can always go back and watch the other, if available.

[Deleted]

Who rents movies these days? But to answer your question.. I only prefer the theatrical cut version when I'm not sure about the movie and just put it on for background noise while doing something else. If it's some B-movie, I see no real reason to make it even longer when the deleted scenes don't advance the plot and just serve to make it longer.

[Nario64]

I find these days, deleted scenes were deleted for a reason.

I have friends that say "Oh the UNRATED version! Let's watch that!" but really... the flow of the theatrical version is most likely better. That's not always the case however, but I like to start with the theatrical versions. If I really like the movie (Like the terminator annalogy above) I'll watch the extended version as well, because then I feel I can get something new out of it.


I own all 3 of the Lord of the Rings Extended versions... Think I saw them all once like that, but never again. Scenes in that were deleted for a reason. Sure it may be slightly more accurate to the books, but for a movie's flow they weren't needed.

[Goadian]

All depends on why the parts were cut out. Gods and Generals comes to mind here. I remember watching that movie in the theatre. We actually had a break through the movie because of how long it was. If the movie was cut to avoid having a intermission break then sometimes it worth watching the extended version, but lot of times you are better off just watching theatrical. There are always exceptions of course, but in general that's how i decide.

[NightZero88]

rent a "disc"? What year is this? haha jk...but seriously.

Who rents movies these days?.

You two have never heard of redbox or netflix? I get 2 discs a week from Netflix and it's great but I don't pirate movies either.

OT: It all depends. I'll typically watch the directors cut if available but sometimes it's not available. If it's not I'll watch the deleted scenes but those generally are really bad and were cut for a reason. Some theatrical versions are better and some directors cut versions are better. Really it's up to the viewer to determine which is better to them.

[Deleted]

I'd watch them both and make a conclusion by myself witch one is better.

Definitely my kind of answer.

One time like this that really sticks in my mind was when I picked up the Blade trilogy, one of the discs had 2 copies, the normal standard cinema version and the extended which had about 45 seconds more footage of scenes where they were differently dialogued or acted. It's always nice to be able to watch both and decide for yourself which you enjoyed more.

Although if you think about films like Blade Runner, then definitely the extended version everytime hehe.