I don't think you quite understand the impact that word can have on people when it's used as it is in this film. It's not "a little offensive language" to millions of people.

Way too complicated. I'll bow out of this thread and see what happens.

I don't believe in censorship. I'd rather they just transition to being more self-conscious about new films.

I hope Scorsese and WB doesn't decide to remove all the racial insensitivities from Goodfellas. So many movies I can think of. Thinking about how much would need to be censored. I don't foresee this being a trend, beyond possibly transitioning to streaming having "edited for TV" type edits to satisfy advertisers.

The unwritten process of political correctness will always randomly target certain elements and bypass others. Is the French Connection any more offensive than the homophobic and racist dialogue on display in the Best Picture winner of 2006 "The Departed"?

Again, apparently not Disney's doing. And not a trend. One powerful and probably mentally fading director's wishes. That's it (at least for now). Let's not call out the company that owns the studio, let's not bemoan a trend and look hypothetically into a dystopian and intolerant future. It's one guy, one movie. At least for now.

I agree we shouldn't careen down a doomsday slippery slope argument here. However, I don't think Disney/Fox are absolved of all culpability. The studio owns the film. Unless Friedken had an absurdly director-friendly contract that gave him revisionist edit rights in perpetuity (incredibly unlikely), then the studio likely had every tight to tell him, "Feel free to make a director's cut, but we're going to continue making the theatrical cut available on all platforms as well." That would have been the right move IMO for the sake of film preservation. It does not appear that Disney/Fox chose that path.

So you're saying Banksy owned that piece after he sold it? Did he sell it to himself?

With Banksy, you never know ...

But yes, the issue of visual artists messing with work after it has been sold to others has been going on in small degree for quite some time. And they don't really have the right to, since they no longer own it.

So this isn't Disney/Fox either, but rather a simple edit from Friedkin's Director's Cut? That's just surprising, given his filmography. If that's all that's to it, there's not much to talk about.

So all we have on this is Jeffrey Wells saying that a connection of his has opined that Friedkin requested this cut. Look at the actual quote (underlined by me, for emphasis):
Sorry for being skeptical, and I could see this being true, but it's not exactly confirmed with that kind of ambiguity. There's literally nothing there but someone's opinion on what Friedkin may or may not have asked for.

I'm going to need something more meaty than that if I'm going to believe this version of the story.

Wow, so Friedkin went on record saying he changed it?

Link?

no. No such confirmation exists. Just Jeffrey Wells posting on his blog, claiming that an "industry veteran" friend of his said Friedkin was entitled to make the cut, not that he actually made the decision.

edit: and yet we have dozens of posts taking it as gospel truth.

Don't quote me but with photography, isn't it true that the original photographer (who pressed the shutter-release button) is always the rights-holder in perpetuity of that image regardless of who they sold the image to? For instance, school photographers take a headshot of your son or daughter and sell you the photos but doesn't the photographer still hold the rights to the image? I suppose it depends on how the fine-print is worded.

I'm no copyright attorney, or no attorney at all, so take this with a grain of salt: the photographer holds the rights to the image for life plus 70 years (per google) but that doesn't mean they have the right to alter a print you bought. At least I don't think so. I guess if you buy an image that is digitally streamed into your frame on the wall, they could edit the shot and it would change the stream. The same goes for the image of a painting, that image is copyrighted, (you couldn't take a hi-res shot of your Monet and start selling prints) but I don't think a painter could bust into your house and make changes to the actual original object without your permission, because that is a physical object that you own.

If William Friedkin wants to come to my house and edit my vhs tape and scratch my Blu-ray, I’ll allow it as long as he brings a lone UHD copy of Sorcerer and watches it with me.

I haven't seen Sorcerer in many years, but I think it pulled off the signature sequence better than The Wages of Fear.

I like Wages Of Fear a lot, but Sorcerer is one of my favorite films.
I love showing it to people and watching them get very slowly sucked in until that scene hits.

I saw The Wages of Fear first, in theaters, in a blind view (despite having blind blight it years earlier) and it was an amazing experience. Probably a top ten movie for me. For me, it’ll always be vastly superior to Sorceror.

I saw the movie Violent Road on the afternoon matinee movie on tv in the 60s. Went to see Sorcerer went it first came out and thought it was a remake of that old movie I saw on tv as a kid. Didn't know Wages of Fear existed at the time.

I'll admit I saw Sorcerer first, so that influences my opinion. Wages of Fear is the better overall movie, for sure. I'll have to revisit Sorcerer to see how that scene feels now.

You're okay with removing the casual racism in Pulp Fiction. What if the next generation of movie studios wants to remove the drug use in Pulp Fiction because in that era drug use is considered highly offensive? You must have a point at which you say, "This edit was wrong!"

If anyone is looking for the Blu-ray it’s being sold on eBay by Deep Discount for $8.99 plus $1.99 shipping. I grabbed it.

Deep Discount. Haven't used that in so long. Any of you all still participate in that annual sale (if it's still ongoing)?

DD has always been reliable. At least with me they have been.

Deep Discount is fine. I don’t use them a lot but they’re reliable enough. I bought a Simpsons figure from them just a couple months ago.

Good to know that if someone makes a movie about the KKK, they won't say anything racist but we get to see them naked.