How would you change the end of your favorite movies?

[yaroslav]

There was a simpson quote from Lionel Hutz that said something like

"it is the more clear fraud I've seen since I sued NeverEnding Story"

[Sikander]

I can't understand why everyone seems to be dissing happy endings. I love them. For instance here's my take on how "Deliverance" should have ended. Just before the boys make it back to civilization, they knock Ned Beatty down and jizz on his t!ts.

[Dis]

I like the endings of most movies I have seen. Of all these movies the only way to make them better would be to have an orgy scene at the end with all the attractive actors and actresses.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by JohnT

My memory, though, is that the re-issue was aggressively promoted as Spielberg's version as well; that could have just been studio hype, or I could be mis-remembering, but that was my sense.

Note that the Special Edition was called "special edition" and not "directors cut", which even then was a big deal.

True, but the phrase "director's cut" wasn't a part of Hollywood's advertising lingo back then; they didn't start using it until well into the age of video (at various points in the 80s, for example, the theatrical releases of director's cuts of Brazil, Heaven's Gate,and Once Upon A Time in America were all promoted as the "European Versions"). "Special Edition" was merely a way of saying, "please see it again; it's different from the one you've already seen." As for the question of who authorized it, I'm still not sure (my coniderable library of film books is in storage in the US), but here's the Special Edition's entry in the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (with my bold-facing):

This slightly shorter, re-edited version of Spielberg's huge 1977 success, which contains some new footage, represents a curious piece of cinematic history. Many critics saw it as inferior to the original, though the idea was that Spielberg now had so much commercial clout that he could, at last, release the film exactly as he had always wanted it. New material includes a scene where Neary, the UFO-obsessed power worker, makes his family hysterical; a surrealistic shot of an ocean liner left stranded by puckish aliens in the Gobi Desert; and a sequence inside the mother ship (so-so special effects) with an ill-judged soundtrack of "When You Wish Upon a Star" from Walt Disney's Pinocchio (1940). The new Neary sequences darken the film; the new ending, in contrast, lightens it by emphasizing its fairy-tale aspect. Whatever, the new version,which is the one now normally shown, made a lot of money.

http://www.csie.ntu.edu.tw/~ntucs82/PEOPLE/b2506017/sf/20.html

That conforms to my memory about the original hoopla around its release. Though it does make me wonder how it is that Spielberg had more commercial clout in '80 -- after the disaster of 1941 -- than he did in '77. But then, Hollywood's a strange place.

[Inverse Icarus]

Originally posted by JohnT
Of course they are robots. I didn't like the movie either, but pretty much discount people's opinions when they start complaining about aliens - it shows they weren't paying attention in the first place.

they are not from this world. therefore, they are aliens.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Theben
Terminator 2. End without making T3.

[JohnT]

However, your account goes against that of the actual producer of the movie, and is not even a declarative sentence but rather an assumption:

"the idea was..."

Spielberg had the commercial clout to get the film done the way he wanted to in 1977 - don't forget that he had just directed the (at that time, non-adjusted) all-time box office champion. Spielberg had final cut on the film. Therefore, the 1977 version was exactly as Spielberg wanted it at that time. If he changed his mind, as is possible, then he changed his mind. And, given his and Lucas' prediliction to rewrite the past (and their own movies), I'm sure that if you asked him now he'll tell you that he always wanted the extra footage in.

The fact is, however, that I don't have a copy of Julia Phillips' two books in front of me, so I'm left relying on memory which is something I don't care to do. So you win by default.

Anyway, I agree with you and those who said the ending to the Special Edition sucked.