Director's cut and Reediting films

Directors can reedit their films to express their original thoughts, or they can create different versions of the same film to give the audience a more interactive experience, since the development of database cinema.

Database technology allows the directors to reedit their films in a more convenient way. The earliest director’s cut might be Charlie Chaplin’s 1942 re-edit of his 1925 silent feature The Gold Rush. However, without the support of technology, it was hard for people to make changes to existing films, so the practice really took off as a trend after the home video boom in the 80s(Weisfogel, “Cinema as Database: An Art Form Between Old and New”).

(The Gold Rush, 1925).

In addition, directors usually do not have the power of decision-making when producing a film, so reediting through database makes it possible for them to express their own thoughts of the films without considering the money that produces the film. Elana states in her journal that “unless the director has been expressly granted final cut, the studio can alter the film through reedits or reshoots over the director’s objections”(Harris, 21). Directors are sometimes forced by the studio to change some scenes or the ending, even though they do not want to. For example, the film Blade Runner exists in three versions: the original, The Director’s Cut, and The Final Cut, in which the director’s cut removes the studio-enforced happy ending. As Manovich asserts, “editing involves working from a database of existing footage, and the final product, though it takes the form of a set-in-stone narrative, is just one of many that might have been created from said database”(Weisfogel). With the rise of database, the directors have access to all the footages of their films so that they can reedit and produce their own versions.

Meanwhile, filmmakers also can edit many versions of the film if they have multiple ideas, as they can choose the best version of the film. For instance, the original ending of Jordan Peele’s film Get Out was the main character Chris being caught by the police even though he was the victim. However, Peele re-edited the ending so that Chris escaped successfully. The ending that Peele eventually chose was powerful because he knows that the viewers think and guess what will happen next while they are watching films.

(Sherlock, 2020).

Desta states that “The prevalence of police brutality toward unarmed black people is an unspoken terror that hangs in the air in those final moments—before Rod steps out of the car and crushes the tension.” Lil Rel Howery, who acted as Chris’ friend, also likes how the audience react in the ending scene. He said in the interview, “it is a gratifying feeling, seeing the audience lose their minds in that last scene”(Desta, “Jordan Peele's Get Out Almost Had an Impossibly Bleak Ending”). The viewer’s film experience has a close connection with the creators’ choice of a film. Selecting and combining elements in the database allows the creators to try different possibilities in order to find the best version that the audience will empathy the most with. If filmmakers know how to control the audiences’ feelings, they will make the viewers interact with the film in a successful way.

(“Alternate Ending Get Out”, 2018).