Donnie Brasco (1997)
The Original: In Mike Newell’s Oscar-nominated crime drama, Johnny Depp struggles to distinguish fact from fiction as his undercover FBI agent gets drawn deeper and deeper into the mafia family he’s infiltrated.
Extended Version: The third release of Donnie Brasco on DVD in 1997 added a further 20 minutes to the film, making it two and a half hours long in total.
Most of the additions are snippets of dialogue, or events that have been referred to in other scenes, but never shown (such as a montage in which Pistone does a bit of housekeeping).
Best Addition: Scenes in which Donnie (Depp) becomes increasingly popular with Sonny Black – fuelling Lefty’s jealousy – add extra tension as they are given the slow build treatment.
Meanwhile, a scene in which Donnie’s wife (Anne Heche) talks to FBI supervisors after they receive an audit notice helps crank the tensions and raises the stakes for the rest of the film.
Almost Famous (2000)
The Original: Cameron Crowe’s semi-autobiographical ‘70s drama about aspiring rock journalist William (Patrick Fugit) who ended up touring with an up-and-coming rock band.
Extended Version: The DVD release of Almost Famous adds 40 minutes of additional footage, none of it massively earth-shattering, but crucial in helping us understand William’s journey from wannabe to wished-he-hadn’t.
Best Addition: Most interesting is a scene towards the end of the film in which William’s new manager (Jimmy Fallon) helps the band figure out a way to accuse William’s article of inaccuracy.
Kingdom Of Heaven (2005)
The Original: Ridley Scott’s epic actioner, set during the 12th Century Crusades.
Orlando Bloom plays blacksmith Balian, who’s mourning the loss of his family when he heads to Jerusalem to help fight against Kurdish Muslim crook Saladin.
Extended Version: 20th Century Fox wanted the film to run at just two and a half hours. When Ridley Scott added 45 minutes back in for the film’s DVD release, it all suddenly made sense.
Entire characters were reinstated, as well as a pivotal backstory for Balian, whose character made little sense in the theatrical cut.
Best Addition: The scenes that explain Balian has fought in numerous battles before and is adept at strategy – which means his fight for Jerusalem is suddenly entirely plausible.
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1992)
The Original: Arnie’s back – and this time he’s had a change in allegiance. With John Connor (Edward Furlong) now 10 years old, the T-1000 (Robert Patrick) is sent back in time to kill him.
But the T-800 (Arnie) also arrives in the role of protector.
Extended Version: Seventeen minutes of additional footage was added to the Special Edition cut of Terminator 2 – including some surprisingly good stuff that should never have been cut.
Best Addition: Like, for example, Michael Biehn’s Kyle Reese returning in a dream sequence.
It’s just a little moment, but it helps link T1 and T2 further still, and shows us he’s still alive for poor, tortured Sarah (Linda Hamilton).
Once Upon A Time In America (1984)
The Original: Sergio Leone’s gangster epic starring Robert De Niro and James Woods.
Leone cut 40 minutes from the film himself when it was given a European theatrical release, while in America the film was hacked down to just 139 minutes, which left it almost incomprehensible.
Extended Version: A 229 minute version of the film (just 40 minutes shy of Leone’s original 269 minute edit) aired at Cannes 2012 and was celebrated as a masterpiece.
Restoration work is still ongoing as Martin Scorsese and Leone’s children attempt to reassemble all of the director’s footage.
Best Addition: The scene that follows Noodles (De Niro) driving his gang’s car off the pier.
In the scene, Max (James Woods) meets with the other gang members, and notices that Noodles is the only one who’s missing. Cue a furious search and a poetic shot of a crane sweeping the sea floor for rubbish.
Aliens (1986)
The Original: Sigourney Weaver goes up against acid-bleeding, jaw-jutting xenomorphs for a second time.
Except now she has a load of Marines on her side.
Extended Version : James Cameron released a special edition of Aliens in 1992, editing 17 minutes of footage back into the film.
The deleted scenes, reasoned 20th Century Fox, amounted to “too much nothing” and took too long cranking up the suspense. We beg to differ.
Best Addition: There are many (sentry guns, extended dialogue scenes), but the most interesting is the scene in which Ripley learns her daughter has since died of old age.
It adds another layer of poignancy to her relationship with young Newt.
Das Boot (1981)
The Original: Wolfgang Petersen’s WW2 drama, set aboard a German U-boat that’s up against the English.
Extended Version: The theatrical release was 145-minutes long.
Petersen’s exceptional Director’s Cut extends that to 210 minutes, adding in a lot of mess-hall chatter and extending the action sequences so that the tension is damned near deadly.
Best Addition: Any of the slow-build attack sequences – with more room to breathe (so to speak), Petersen made them even more heart-stopping than ever.
Touch Of Evil (1958)
The Original: Orson Welles’ planned Hollywood comeback hit the skids with Touch Of Evil , which Universal took off him and gave to director Harry Keller to rechop. Naturally, Welles was incensed.
It didn’t hurt the film, though – it became a film noir classic applauded for its sinister edge and visual design.
Extended Version: During the height of the scandal, Welles wrote a 58-page letter to Universal breaking down how the film should have been assembled.
In 1998, the film was re-edited in accordance with Welles’ notes.
Best Addition: This one’s actually a subtraction.
In the new edit, the opening credits are removed from that three-minute opening shot, allowing them to breathe in all their glory.
The Lord Of The Rings (2001-2003)
The Original: Peter Jackson brings JRR Tolkien’s ‘unfilmable’ trilogy of books to the big screen. Everybody falls in love with Gollum.
Extended Version: All in, two whole hours were shaved off the theatrical running times of the trilogy.
Those vitals hours were restored when the films made their way to DVD, bumping each film up to a nearly four hours a-piece.
Best Addition: Saruman’s death at the start of Return Of The King offers the character the closure that the theatrical cuts denied him.
Blade Runner (1987)
The Original: A futuristic sci-fi based on Philip K. Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?
Harrison Ford is Deckard, the retired police officer charged with tracking down murderous ‘Replicants’ – humanoids who are on the run.
Extended Version: There are currently seven different versions of Blade Runner , but the Scott-sanctioned 117 minute Final Cut, released in 2007, is generally acknowledged as the best.
Best Addition: In the Final Cut, we get the restoration of the unicorn dream sequence and the removal of two key things – the opening voice-over, and the tacked-on happy ending.
