Pretty much all of them have been posted but I don't think I saw Cop Land mentioned in this thread yet.

Alien 3 gets the vote for me. It's the only one that comes to mind where I thought extra footage made a night and day difference in my enjoyment of a film.

even though the deleted scenes are available outside of the frame of the film on dvd - the expanded television cut of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets benefits alot with the scenes reinstated.

What he said.

I'd love to say Warner's release of the director's cut of Ken Russell's 'The Devils' is finally available - but no, they continually drag their feet and keep on promising the complete uncensored version (that no one outside of the UK has seen) yet, no dice ....

I thought the extended version of 'The Lawnmower Man' was amazing, but that remains unreleased on DVD.

'Jason Goes to Hell' - the only F13 film to exist in unrated form, released on region 1 US disc - the chance to get to see one the series gnarliest deaths in uncensored form - the bisection of the naked chick in the tent is a rare treat for gorehounds.

I'll toss in another vote for Kingdom of Heaven. The theatrical cut was mediocre, but the DC was fantastic.

and for the record Universal are supreme assholes for never releasing the unrated/dc version of John Woo's 'Hard Target' (which I've seen in work print version).

Kingdom of Heaven hands down.

now if only Ridley Scott can get around to re-editing/restoring 1492: Conquest of Paradise - the slightly longer international cut is but a tease to what's been promised.

Agreed.

a few i like are:

gladiator
kingdom of heaven
troy

Léon

[/thread]

I'm a big fan of 1941, and I like the longer DC version. Whenever it's reissued, it needs both versions (current R1 DVD is the long version only), although I know it's not popular so I'm not holding my breath.

i did too...

good one...

I enjoyed the recent DC of Troy.

Alexander Revisited

Kingdom of Heaven

Some good choices listed ...

I'd go with Brazil

Copland

I have never seen the non-international cut of Léon, but I can't imagine any other version (I don't even want to see it for curiosities sake). One of my favorite movies of all time.

As for Terminator 2, that is right up there too. Almost every scene they added really contributed to the movie. Especially the T-800 re-programming scene and my favorite addition, where the T-1000 "glitches" after touching the railing and when the feet get melded to the floor. Great stuff.

I don't think diirector's cuts are always an improvement by any standard. In many cases its just padding. OK...for the films most IMPROVED by the "director/extended" cut that come to mind, I'd say

THE NATURAL...a film that I always loved but seemed uneven. The new recut film is terrific.
LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy...great films made even better.
Original STAR WARS films...I agree with the other guy. I like the new ones better.
STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE...a pretty lousy film made into a not bad one.
GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD....the "roadshow" restoration adds alot.

All I can think of at the moment....

my votes have already been mentioned - the abyss, brazil, and alien3.

Are the extended cuts of Fantastic Four and The Punisher worth buying? I skimmed over reviews of both awhile back, and from what I recall, the Fantastic Four extended cut was just the deleted scenes put back in (which I didn't find all that interesting. As a matter of fact, I didn't think the movie itself was very good either). I seem to recall reading that the only addition to The Punisher was a subplot that didn't really add anything to the movie itself.

Fantastic Four Extended Edition makes a lot more sense to me compared to the theatrical cut.

KINGDOM OF HEAVEN: theatrical sucked, while director's cut was a masterpiece
TROY: theatrical was entertaining, while director's cut was almost a masterpiece

FF extended edition wasn't that great for me. it actually bothered me that they just reinsert scenes in instead of actually recutting/re-editing. there's the one scene where reed has his "i thought you wanted a different kind of man" speech (or something like that) with sue, and the extended cut adds in ANOTHER version of the scene only a couple of minutes later which uses a few of the same lines of dialogue. so it just made it redundant. since i don't have the first single-disc release, i don't know if the deleted scenes on that disc are the same scenes put into the extended cut.

i did like the opening credit sequence that was added back instead of just the "fantastic four" title card though. nice to see that it follows the style of pretty much all other marvel films.