Foreign films Miramax and other studios have mangled
 

I was thinking that it might be a good idea to start a thread about the movies Miramax has done a disservice to, whether it be by dubbing, changing subtitles, re-editing scenes, what have you.

I know they have messed many up, but some people (like myself) may not know just which ones or to what extent.

We can even list other films that other studios have messed up upon their DVD releases. Any contributions would be greatly appreciated.

The ones that instantly come to mind are The Horseman on the Roof and Queen Margot. Miramax cut about 20 minutes from the original French versions of both films.

Miramax owns Dimension Films don't they? They have cut and dubbed the following films (to name but a few):

Fist of Legend
Drunken Master II
First Strike
Rumble in the Bronx
Police Story 3 - Supercop
Twin Warriors (aka The Tai Chi Master)
The Accidental Spy

B no means is this scene complete... add, please...

FOREIGN FILMS AMENDED IN AMERICA BY THE AMERICAN DISTRIBUTORS


The Accidental Spy - Cut considerably, redubbed, names and plotlines changed, retitled

Amelie - Subtitles altered to make it sound more "American"

Bend It Like Beckham - Most profanity redubbed to ensure a "friendlier" rating

Beyond Silence - Cut

Brassed Off! - Scenes cut, new opening and closing text

The Castle - Redubbed for American audiences, new soundtrack added

A Chinese Ghost Story - Cut by six minutes

Chungking Express - Reedited so that some scenes are in different places with different music

Crime Story - Cut and redubbed

The Double Life Of Veronique - Redone ending (at Kieslowski's behest)

Dust Devil - Redubbed, Voice Over added

The Englishman Who Went Up A Hill But Came Down A Mountain - Cut and redubbed to ensure a PG

The Enforcer - Cut, redubbed and rescored

Especially On Sunday - an entire episode is cut from the anthology film

Farewell My Concubine - Cut considerably

Fist Of Legend - Dialogue changed considerably, altering the story; Retitled

Heavenly Creatures - Cut by nine minutes (though this may have been Peter Jackson's decision) (since released in its original form)

The Heroic Trio - Cut and dubbed

Heroic Trio 2: Executioners - Cut by four minutes, retitled

Hidden Assassin - Cut by nearly fifteen minutes

The Horseman On The Roof - Cut by nearly eighteen minutes

Human Traffic - Cut severely, ommitting whole characters and altering the story; Redubbed to make the film tamer and less obscure

Iron Monkey - Cut heavily, rescored, story changed in subtitles, redubbed

Italian For Beginners - Cut by over twenty minutes

Jackie Chan's First Strike - Cut by over twenty minutes, redubbed

The Legend - Redubbed, and Cut to remove animal cruelty!

The Legend Of Drunken Master - Retitled, redubbed, rescored, ending changed

Legend Of The Swordsman - Redubbed, retitled, details ommitted, simplified

Life Is Beautiful - Cut by nine minuites and a new voiceover added (at Benigni's behest)

Malèna - Cut by nearly eighteen minutes, considerably altering the film

Martha, Meet Frank, Daniel and Laurence - Retitled "The Very Thought Of You", all profanity removed to ensure a PG-13

Mr. Nice Guy - Cut by twenty minutes, story altered

Operation Condor - Cut considerably, redubbed, new soundtrack, retitled

Operation Condor 2 - Cut considerably, redubbed, new soundtrack, retitled - and is now a sequel instead of a prequel

Priest - cut by seven minutes

Princess Mononoke - Redubbed, extra dialogue added

Project A - Cut, redubbed, rescored

Queen Margot - Cut severely, altering the story

Rumble In The Bronx - Cut by over fifteen minutes, new soundtrack, redubbed

Shall We Dance? - Cut to run under two hours; text changed to be less obscure

Shaolin Soccer - Cut by 22 minutes, rescored (Since restored to original form)

Spaced Out - Redubbed, nudity added

Supercop - Retitled, cut, dubbed, new score, new soundtrack, names and details changed

Supercop 2 - Rescored, retitled, cut by eight minutes

The Thief & The Cobbler - retitled "Arabian Knight", new soundtrack added, redubbed and rewritten, cut, songs added

Trainspotting - Cut and redubbed to ensure an R rating, and to make the beginning more understandable (since released in its original form)

Twin Dragons - Cut by 11 minutes, redubbed, retitled

Twin Warriors - A coupel of scenes cut

Who Am I? - Cut by nine minutes


FOREIGN FILMS AS YET UNRELEASED IN AMERICA

A Fighter's Blues
Easy Money
Flying Dragon, Leaping Tiger
God Of Gamblers II
The Legend Of The God Of Gamblers
The Legend Of Zu
Purple Storm
Tiger Cage II


FOREIGN FILMS NO LONGER AVAILABLE IN AMERICA (OOP or OOS)

God Of Gamblers
God Of Gamblers III: Back To Shanghai
God Of Gamblers' Return
Hard Boiled
The Killer
Peking Opera Blues
Prison On Fire II
The Swordsman
Tiger Cage
Tiger On Beat
Triads: The Inside Story

First Strike & Rumble In The Bronx were both released by New Line here, not Dimension.

The Double Life of Veronique?

That and Il Conformista are the two films I very very much wish were available on DVD anywhere. I'd even be willing to accept a cut DVD, I think, rather than not see the movies at all.

Cook, Thief, Wife, Lover was NC17 when it hit theaters here.

Don't forget about Zu Warriors (Legend of Zu) and Hero

How were they mangled? Or do you mean the 1983 Zu Warriors? It wasn't Miramax so I didn't include it... I did put a couple of other studios' releases on there though.

Hero hasn't been touched, as far as I know.

I don't think this should just be for Miramax/Dimension films, at any rate; after all, other studios are just as bad... they just aren't as notorious.

You could add a whole new category:

"Owned by Miramax, denied access to North America by Miramax..."

...you would be stunned to see how many foreign productions actually never made it to the States....

Pro-B

I don't think I would be, pro... look at the people that visit here.

Zu Warriors still hasn't been fucking released here. Hell, I saw Miramax's trailer for it when I saw Brotherhood of the Wolf when it was released theatrically in the states.

And I thought Hero was uncut?

No, Miramax mangled Legend of Zu and changed the title to Zu Warriors. Surprised you hadn't heard of that before.

My last comment was a reply to Donnachaone's reply to my comment about zu. ;) Your use of the word "fucking" kinda threw me off - thought you were yelling at me. :( Anyway, yeah Miramax dumped the release of Zu (as well as Kung Fu Soccer but at least shaolin soccer made it to dvd), but not before plenty of angry viewers got to see their cut of the film. Be glad it wasn't released here, their version was reportedly so awful, it made baby jesus cry. As for Hero - Tarantino fought to keep it "uncut" (they wanted to cut more out of it and score and dub it for us), but from what I understand the film has an extra 20 minutes that has yet to be seen by most people because (as I understand) Miramax had control over it even in international markets. I could be wrong about that, but many of us are still waiting for the director's cut.

Disney-Miramax Inc

Film company or unofficial censor?

I'm stunned at that massive list above. I guess Miramax imagine Americans can't take the whole truth. I really mean that. Maybe there's some truth in it.

Let's not forget about the watered down version in the USA and Europe of Kill Bill Vol1.

I would like to add to that the extraoridinary cut they made to Beyond Silence (AKA Jenseits der Stille). They removed a scene where a bumble bee hovers around a girls naked chest. Important? Yes, considering she was deaf and could sense the the moment (like the blind girl with the tiger in Manhunter).

Very sad.


There's a lot of censorship in most English-speaking countries (the UK is no exception), but I find the biggest problem in the USA is the constant dumbing down of content to get a lower rating = more sales in big stores (who like to censor too). The fact that most of the newspaper industry essentially bans films that don't have a rating they like (or no rating) is part of the problem.

I suppose we can all look forward to American Pie 8:The Return. Which will be available in several versions in Walmart.

Avalon (Mamoru Oshii, 2001) has a very nasty case of DUBTITLES. There's many instances where these is no dialog in the original Polish soundtrack but English subtitles appear.

Trigger's right about Hero. Miramax told Zhang to cut the movie to under 100 or they'd do it themselves. Mr. Zhang delivered the 98-minute version seen everywhere around the world until the extended edition was released a few weeks ago. Now, the extended edition is only 107 minutes. I don't really know if it's the director's cut Zhang Yimou wanted in theatres or what, because the 2 hours is only a rumored running time (as I understand it, anyaway). Miramax had control over the length everywhere over the world. Look, more people dealing with Miramax means more people pissed off at Miramax, which in turn means less business for Miramax, and I certainly won't cry over that. They've just laid off a quarter of their workforce, so that should tell them people aren't happy with them. Zhang Yimou certainly won't be dealing with them ever again, and I'm sure Stephen Chow won't talk to them either.

Daniel, that's one of the reasons I decided to go regionless. I figured there had to be an uncut version of the movies I love somewhere out there. With North American companies' track records, I realized I'd rather pay more to get what I want than to give them more money.

To add to the list:
The Defender (aka Bodyguard from Beijing) - retitled, dubbed and I think cut (luckily I've never seen the Miramax version)
The Enforcer (akd My Father is a Hero) - retitled, dubbed and I think rescored and cut (ditto)

well, here's a link, you can go check it out yourself, although this guy concentrates on the Asian flicks. Updates are also few and far between:
http://alliance.hellninjacommando.net/movies.htm

Lest we forget about Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 that Disney-Miramax (let's not split them, since it's pretty obvious they're joined at the hip) deemed it couldn't be released due to its political stance (freedom of speech?) and the present political situation (ie it would draw Americans' attention to a disastrous illegal war in Iraq and George Bush's re-election and his brother's control over Florida (land of Disney) -of course banning the film from Miramax has just made all of the above all the more obvious for people who question these things).

OK, it's been picked up by IFC Films and Lions Gate in North America and Optimum Releasing in the UK, but for the love of god, Disney-Miramax should be proud to release such a film which deals with all our freedoms. Especially since it comes from a recent Oscar winning director.

I note also that Disney removed their 'Touchstone Pictures' label from distribution in coutries outside the USA for Scorsese's Kundun. Their excuse at the time was they didn't want to offend the Chinese dictators (with their Weapons of Mass Destruction).

Shame on Disney.

I just read this from another forum:

The opening text of "Hero" was changed to better explain the history background of the film.

The theme song sung by Faye Wong at the end credits is replaced by music.

Can anyone please confirm this?

I'm very surprised at how many of the films listed above that I didn't know were changed or altered. It makes me happy to be region free.

And, like DonnachaOne said, other studios can be just as bad as Miramax but Miramax is just more notorious at the moment.

I do think this thread should be for all films mangled by their distributors.

Doberman
Prozac Nation

Are two that pop to mind. What else?

Mangle? Miramax's worst offense is not RELEASING films.

Because of Miramax, the rights to certain films are locked up, with no possibility for us to EVER see them.

THROUGH THE OLIVE TREES
TEARS OF THE BLACK TIGER
...and many others will never see the light of day. Sad.

What about John Woo's films... The Killer & Hard Boiled? Weren't they supposed to be released years ago?

Okay, okay... I added new categories to reflect the different forms of "mangling"...

I added most of the suggestions. I still have a ton to add, but it's Saturday and I'm going out now!

Will add more later... I found a couple of helpful sites.

Miramax/Disney have at least 35 Hong Kong movies they own but never released. Personally, when it comes to movies made outside the US, I won't even consider buying a Miramax DVD.

Well, there are so many I would need a month to compile all of them...

For example Miramax bought the rights to the old Celentano films in Italy...NEVER released them in the States.

Dobermann, as you very well pointed out above has been denied access to America due to the fact that the film "sends a wrong message" to its viewers...etc.

One of the biggest Eastern European sagas...the Bulgarian film (3 part...nearly 500 min production The King-HAN ASPARUH). A film as massive and impressive as HERO....

and so on and so on....

I have simply given up on them, Miramax is the worst thing that ever happend to International cinema EVER. What's even more sad is that they consistently attempt to censor films as well.

Pro-B

Precisely.

Pro-B

For the record, I don't believe the Dimension version of "The Defender" is cut at all, as I've seen both versions and don't remember any differences. I got the HK copy as I was sure a scene was cut. They all sit down at the dinner table and... boom, a cut to the next (completely unrelated) scene. Turned out this was in the HK version as well... just shoddy filmmaking I guess.

I read an article today that Donnie Yen was displeased with the version of Hero that's being shown in theaters in the US this weekend, as some of his fight scene with Jet Li was cut from the movie. I'd heard that this version was "uncut". The theater just down the street is playing it... maybe I'll go see it just because I'm curious how much they've mangled it, if at all.

Most of the US reviews I've read stated or implied that it was emotionally unengaging... makes me wonder if they cut out the end part with Tony and Maggie. Still, the funniest Hero reviewers are the ones that think Ang Lee invented the wuxia genre.

Since I couldn't find evidence of this, I didn't include it.

When I said that I was just guessing. I knew it was changed, but now I remember.

It's not cut, the dubbing takes away all political reference. That's the thing... sorry about hte confusion... :D

The version of Hero currently playing in US theaters is the same 98-minute cut of the film that was released on DVD last year. It has new subtitles, though, that rename the character "Sky" as "Long Sky" and make some other minor changes that dumb down the political aspect of the film for American audiences.

The 108-minute Extended Version released on DVD a few weeks ago has next to no new plot, just small extensions to a number of scenes, including the fight scenes. Frankly, I think the short version works a lot better. Some scenes in the extended cut just drag on and on forever without any point.

"Long Sky"?


Donnie must be a hit with the ladies...

I saw Dobermann in the theatre in LA (at the NuARt), where I also saw Last Life In The Universe... foregin films do released, but not outside of LA and NY that much.

Of course the US audience can't handle mature subject matter of foreign cinema, George Bush is in the White House, freedom of speech has been underattack since Newt Gingrinch's laughable Contract with America.

Miramax has a virtual monopoly on acquiring foreign films and selling them well in the US. Other companies don't really exist, sure Focus Features is making headways with films like Motorcycle Diaires and La Vida Nicotina, but until companies HBO Films (which release Elephant and Maria Full of Grace) get more support for their corporate boards Miramax will continue to buy up properties and make money.

For Harvey and Bob, making money is king, and if they own the international rights to a film they're looking to recoup their investment - if that means altering it to get better ratings and quicken the pacing, then that's what they'll do to line their pockets -- at the filmmaker's and the audience's expense.

Amelie's subtitles were altered? Can anyone who has seen the US and other releases give a comparison. I got the US Release before I was region-free.

I expect the alterations in Amelie all reside in the scene where the delivery boy is talking to the painter. Maybe I'm giving Miramax more credit than they deserve, but I don't have a problem with things being altered to cover up jokes that just plain don't translate.

I understand that sometimes a line of dialogue doesn't translate very effectively and something needs to be done to make it more clear for a different audience, but the problem is that where is that line between making something clearer to an audience and changing the meaning of the line.

Making things understood for an American audience is one thing, but changing or eliminating plot points is something else. I know it is a slippery slope, but in the end, I think studios just need to trust the intelligence of their audience.

This isn't the place for fighting. If you have an issue that does not pertain to the thread subject, use another thread. That simple.

I need help; there's a lot of films that Miramax, et al have the rights to but won't release for this or that reason; for instance, Dreamworks have the rights to the Ring series, but won't release those movies while they mine the material for remakes. Some foreign movies aren't being "hel back"; they just don't have an American distributor. So, can anyone point me out to a place that mentions "held back" releases? If not, tell me which ones you know have an American distributor, but still remain unseen.

DonnachaOne...here are a few quick ones for you....*

GIRL ON THE BRIDGE....Paramount wont release it.
http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P...8.LZZZZZZZ.jpg


...the brilliant L'appartement....which was just re-hashed as Wicker Park

http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P...8.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

obviously...La Haine....

http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P...8.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

the HIGHLY controversial...
http://www.dvdasian.com/images/6/12558.3.jpg


Franka's most recent....

http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P...3.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

the original director's cut of The Legend of 1900

http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P...3.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

http://www.dvd.it/img_big/27869.jpg

Medem's Brilliant...Lovers on the Arctic Circle (owned by New Line)

http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P...3.LZZZZZZZ.gif

*ALL films do have an American distro-deal yet they are not released as they should be (or at all).

....and so on....

Pro-B

Ring had a limited theatrical release prior to the US remake even started filming. They also released the first film on DVD. As for the second, I don't know - but be thankful that they don't release Ring 0 which was complete shit.

The Miramax disc's subtitles aren't terrible, but they have a couple of blatant typos that have gotten some people really riled up. Their translation is also a little on the bland side, simplifying sentences but not necessarily changing the meaning.

The UK R2 release contains the original theatrical subtitles, which are a better translation and don't have the typos.