The landmark discovery of previously-assumed lost reels from the German Expressionist masterpiece “Metropolis” by monocled noir maestro Fritz Lang has had us reminiscing over other classic films that at one point in time suffered the loss of reels, the humiliation of being shelved and or endured the indignity of being cut for being too esoteric and longwinded for everyone except of course, the “misunderstood” auteurs precious about every living frame of film (ah, the blessing and curse of “director’s cut”). The “Metropolis” holy-grail discovery prompted us to look back at a few classic touchstones that were and are famously considered as “Lost Classics,” at one time or another (as some have been restored over the years).
The Magnificent Ambersons
Orson Welles’ second feature about a family aristocracy’s fall from grace – the first being the mildly popular “Citizen Kane” – carried on in true Welles tradition by being over-budget, behind schedule and self-indulgent. Having acquired final cut from RKO on the condition he direct a free picture for the studio, Welles forfeit that right when he failed to deliver, so RKO didn’t hesitate to take Ambersons – which already wasn’t testing well – to the chopping block and even deigned to re-shoot a more upbeat ending without his participation (cinematic heresy of course). The re-shot scenes were worked into the film in the theatrical release and the original negatives were destroyed to make room in the studio’s vaults for their gold bullion. The original scenes are lost to the cinematic world forever but even the film’s editor, Robert Wise essentially said Welles’ overlong cut was too slow and artsy fartsy, arguments of which are friendship dealbreakers among film snobs, but is probably very true.
Brazil
Just vaguely reminiscent of Orwell’s novel “1984,” Terry Gilliam’s satirical look at the dysfunctional postindustrial world was also abetted by English playwright legend Tom Stoppard. A member of the Monty Python Comedy troupe most notable for his animation in between sketches, Gilliam’s “Brazil,” had a notoriously difficult birth. The film tested poorly and Universal, afraid that Americans fragile little minds couldn’t handle the Orwellian-greyness, black British humor and fey dream sequences, decided to water the film down and re-shoot the ending, giving it a warmer, safe as milk, feel. Through Gilliam’s infamously apoplectic public outcries (to which his difficult reputation was firmly established upon) and private screenings, a comprised version was finally released in theaters, and now (thanks to our friends at Criterion, both the official directors cut and the emasculated version are available on DVD.
Once Upon a Time in America
Sergio Leone’s sprawling New York set gangster epic was originally supposed to be released as two separate movies, each running close to three hours but instead was reduced to one lowly, sorry-ass massive masterpiece (how dare they). The extolled cut shown at Cannes to Europeans already predisposed to enduring such overwrought marathons had already been “trimmed” down to a easygoing running time of just under four hours. The studio then neutered the film down to 2 hours and twenty minutes for American audiences, which eliminated the flashback structure of the film and destroyed the narrative flow, but at least left them less confused (Though critic doyenne Pauline Kael said of the hackjob, “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a worse case of mutilation.”) Thankfully today the exhausting 229 minute version is available on DVD, so the next time you have 3 hours and 49 minutes laying around along with some crystal meth, red bull and Ritalin, have at it. As if that wasn’t enough Leone for one film, a 2007 interview with Leone’s daughter suggested plans to release a 289 minute directors cut sometime in the near future as an anthropological experiment to test the limits of patience and masochism for so-called film snobs everywhere.
Ace In The Hole
The superb look at the darker side of humanities thirst for publicity was auteur Billy Wilder’s follow up to the popular “Sunset Boulevard.” Thankfully jettisoning the bland working title of “The Human Interest Story,” the film chronicled a sleazy, self-serving down on his luck newspaper man who bribed a local lawman to slow the rescue procedure of a two-time loser trapped in a collapsed cave. The studio then changed Wilder’s title to “The Big Carnival” after the release of the film and presumptuously nixed the subplot of the corrupt sheriff, fearing Americans couldn’t fathom such marshal ignominy. The film was a box-office flop, opened to mixed reviews and then slunk away into the shadows to be forgotten. But after years in film school obscurity, “Ace in the Hole” reemerged as a retroactive classic (with the addition of the crooked sheriff subplot) and it’s hard-to-find availability was finally rectified by the Criterion Collection just last year.
The Wild Bunch
Directed by bibulous and surly loose cannon Sam Peckinpah, this seminal late ’60s anti-western’s overt and romanticized approach to violence in this story of outlaw gangs prowling the ever-modernizing West scandalized the genre and ruined it for idealists who preferred the Old West as a more innocent time where high noon showdowns were more of a gentlemanly affair (why did that close range gunshot to the cranium have to be so messy?). The violence in the film was panned by the critics and the MPAA refused to give it anything less than a NC-17 rating without the removal of certain hemorrhaging scenes. The result was the film being cut from 148 minutes to 134 (14 whole minutes!). But thanks lowering of standards in violence and morals in the modern day, the original cut has been restored on DVD much to the delight of slow-motion bloodletting fetishists the world round.
Fear and Desire
Having viewed Stanley Kubrick’s debut commands immediate respect from even the most superciliously pretentious film snob, as it had an extremely limited release, only opening at the Guild theater in New York and a few theaters in Los Angeles in 1955. Chronicling a team of soldiers trapped behind enemy lines in a fictional war, the film was never released on video or DVD as Kubrick disavowed the picture almost immediately and then grew almost pathologically unfond of the film, essentially wishing it erased from memory and existence. In his raging monomania, he attempted to buy up every print available, intent on destroying the film forever as he considered it to be a “bumbling, amateur exercise.” Evidently the allure of a lost classic was too powerful for unloved-puppy fawning cinema curators as the director’s attempts to destroy the film and to legally block an ultra-rare New York Film Forum screening in 1994 failed despite his best efforts. There are surviving prints, which reside at the George Eastman House in Rochester, New York (and by dint of modern technology the movie also resides at the much less obscure location of YouTube).
Spartacus
Kubrick also directed this epic story about a slave revolt in ancient Rome, yet he would later deny its authorship, claiming it was more screenwriter Dalton Trumbo and star Kurt Douglas’ vision than his, since it sports a uncharacteristically grotesque amount of sentimentalism (seriously, would the “I am Spartacus!” scene have gotten by Kubrick in any other manner?) and the claim doesn’t seem too far fetched. The original film was deemed unfit for virtuous audiences at the time and the studio was forced to reedit the film to downplay the violent battle scenes. But what really rubbed the censors the wrong way was a scene in which Lawrence Olivier’s closeted Crassus character attempts to seduce a male slave via hilariously delicious and unsubtle sexual metaphors involving slimy mollusks (“My taste includes both snails and oysters”). The scenes were cut from the release, but in 1991 the lost 37 minutes were made available on the revised DVD edition.
There’s lot of “lost classics” out there. More to come…