Zodiac: 2-Disc Director's Cut - missing features... what's the story? (1 Viewer)

I searched for "Zodiac" in this forum, and only came up with a thread about the theatrical release hitting bare-bones DVD, and the editing choice appearing like a defect on the 2 disc. Apologies if I've missed the appropriate thread.

Okay, so initially, this was announced as having (according to The Digital Bits);

* audio commentary by director David Fincher
* audio commentary by Jake Gyllenhall, Robert Downey Jr., producer Brad Fischer, James Vanderbilt and James Ellroy

* 3 The Film featurettes (Zødiac Deciphered, The Visual Effects of Zødiac and Digital Workflow)
* 3 Sequence Breakdowns (Blue Rock Springs, Lake Berryessa and San Francisco)
* 5 The Facts featurettes (This is the Zødiac Speaking, Lake Herman Road, Blue Rock Springs, Lake Berryessa and San Francisco)
* 4 Prime Suspect featurettes (His Name Was Arthur Leigh Allen, Linguistic Analysis, Jeopardy Surface: Geographic Profiling and The Psychology of Aggression: Behavioral Profiling)
* 2 text-based features (Special Agent Sharon Pagaling-Hagan's Behavioral Profile of the Zødiac and Dr. Kim Rossmo's Geographic Profile of the Zødiac)
* theatrical trailer

The bolded features are the ones I can't find any reference to online. Looking over to Rewind @ www.dvdcompare.net - The Home of DVD Comparisons, it seems that The Facts featurettes are all within "This Is Zodiac Speaking", a full length documentary, so it appears to be a screw-up by Paramount's press division, but what happened to the other featurettes?

Three of them ended up online over at the movie's official website, but that still leaves the two text based features and the Digital Workflow featurette (which I was really looking forward to!) missing.

Does anyone have any info on what happened? Mr. Prior, if you're floating around on the board and happen to check in on this thread, are you able (or rather allowed?) to shed any light on this?

So far, I'm really enjoying the set (it only arrived last night), but I was just curious as to what happened...

Very, very good point Jonathon - thanks for posting. I was thinking about querying this in one of the other threads but figured it would get lost.

I too was particularly looking forward to the digital workflow featurette and was disappointed to find it was missing, especially considering the poor ratio of film to fact special feature content on the disc. I'm glad I picked up the R2 disc which has a very good making of featurette. A little EPKish but certainly worth having. I have little interest in the story behind the film but maximum interest in the film itself.

I've got the R4 of the theatrical, with the same featurette, and it was better than I thought it would be. I kept an eye on the viewcount of the thread since i started it and figured nobody was going to reply, so thanks for doing so - glad I'm not the only one who had this question.

I was quite happy with the factual docos, but would have preferred a little more detail on the research that was required for the film's production. that said, the visual fx doco was magnificent, very enlightening.

there are features online that are not included on the SE DVD..maybe what's missing is included there?

Actually, in my post, you'll note that I mentioned that three of the featurettes ended up online, but that still doesn't leave us with the Digital Workflow featurette, or the Profiling articles, nor does it explain what happened for these features to be cut from the DVD...

By the way: Here's a comparison between both versions with pictures:
Movie-Censorship.com

That's great - thanks for the link, Marcel.

I conceived it as a 3 disc set -- movie on disc 1, making-of on disc 2, true crime on disc 3. Alas, this was not a scenario Paramount embraced. That left over 50 minutes of completed material that had to be dropped to fit it on two discs.

Had the box office been higher, perhaps things would have gone differently. It always seemed to me that the films which don't find their audience right away are the ones we should devote extra attention to on DVD, to help them along. The mavens of movie marketing do not share my view. In fact, they maintain the exact opposite.

Mr. Prior,

Thanks very much for the definitive answer; I actually assumed something like this was the case. Since Paramount released the three true crime featurettes online, is there any chance the digital workflow featurette might get something similar?

Also, I must also commend you for the wonderful features that did survive the... adjustment to 2 DVDs. The full length making-of and the FX doco are both fantastic pieces of behind the scenes work, with the FX doco certainly being eye opening!

Mr. Prior,

Thank you so much for a wonderful presentation of a truly remarkable film. The HD DVD version is indeed a reference title. One question, was the digital workflow featurette the same as the one that turned up on apple.com around the release of the film?

Thank you for replying Mr Prior. A three-disc set? Figures. Over 50 minutes of completed material not included?! What a waste.

Darcy, I assume the video you are referring to was the FCP promo that showed Fincher and Angus Wall cutting Zodiac. This was online several months before the film's release and completely different in style and tone to what (remained) on the dvd. I very much doubt it was the workflow featurette.

I think it would be an excellent idea to have this featurette and anything else left off the project put online if Paramount and Mr Prior were willing.

Is it possible this omitted material can be put back if/when the film is released on Blu-Ray?

Does anyone have a link to a copy of the Apple FCP featurette, or can upload it somewhere for me? I'd be very interested in checking it out.

Here you go:

Apple - Final Cut Studio 2 - Final Cut Studio in Action

Use the left/right buttons until you get to the Fincher...

Thanks Tim! I searched Google for it, but only found a dead link, so I guess it got moved at some point along the line. Thanks again!

You're welcome.

Thank you indeed, and I'm glad you and others here enjoyed the disc. Despite the compromises, I'm most proud of the work on Zodiac, so it does me good to hear responses like that.

We did try to place the Digital Workflow piece on line (yes, it is different than the one posted on Apple.com). If memory serves it was offered to Ain't It Cool News, but I can't be sure if they ever posted it or not. I hold out hope that we may be able to use it in the future, perhaps on Blu-Ray, but that's just me hoping. Nothing certain, alas.

You really should be proud of this release because it is excellent. Hopefully we'll get to see those other features some day.

Here's my thoughts on the disc from another thread: "The documentaries are very well done. The participants face directly into camera during their interviews which is a cool way of throwing things off kilter. They give both sides of arguments (people say things that completely contradict each other) without telling you who is right or wrong. It's respectful to those involved and it doesn't wallow in gore or murder. And it lets you make up your own mind if you agree with Robert Greysmith's assessment of who the Zodiac was.

Thumbs up to Fincher, Prior and all others involved in this great release."

Does anyone know when we will get the director's cut in Europe / region two from Warners - maybe including the missing features ?