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Confirmed: Spielberg alters "E.T." (1 Viewer)

RicP

Screenwriter
Joined
Feb 29, 2000
Messages
1,126
If you want the original scene it, you're only saying that you like seeing guns being pointed at un-armed children.
rolleyes.gif
What an intelligent statement. Who can argue with flawless logic like that?
Maybe some of us just want to see the damn film we saw 20 years ago, and not some over PC-ed revisionist history version. I guess Orwell wasn't too far off.
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John C

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Mar 3, 2000
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If a real alien was hanging out with some kids and the Government found out about it and sent biohazard teams to quarantine the area you can damned well bet that every agent coming to the kid's home would be armed. As a matter of fact, I'd bet my life on it! Paranoid Government agents drawing weapons on kids trying to escape with an alien? You damned right!! I hate revisionism.
 

Peter Kim

Screenwriter
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Jun 18, 2001
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Patrick McCart:
"If you want the original scene it, you're only saying that you like seeing guns being pointed at un-armed children.
This isn't about censorship, this is about people wanting control over a director's film instead of the director.
I'll enjoy the 16x9, DTS DVD with extras while those who want a cop pointing a gun at a child get the old laserdisc."
Patrick,
Constructive criticism...please reconsider what you said above. I rarely, if ever, harangue other members about their opinions. I respect everyone's right to state theirs, and generally, I can at least understand, if I don't agree, the root of their argument.
I can usually 'see' valid points to each side of an argument. However...
I can unequivocally say that your comments are wrong. Additionally, they are egregiously insulting. I am against the alteration of ET. Subsequently, based on your argument, do I have an appetite for violence against children?
Please review your own movie library and find any movie that depicts a horrible act. Since you own the movie, are you a proponent of such act?
 

RobertR

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If you want the original scene it, you're only saying that you like seeing guns being pointed at un-armed children.
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That is hands-down the funniest thing I have ever read on the forum. It's the kind of straw man characterization of an opposing argument that is usually the forte of talk radio.
I have to agree with the posts properly ridiculing this ludicrous "argument".
To continue the analogy, this would be like saying that anyone who opposes the deletion of the scene in Star Wars showing the destruction of Alderran likes seeing millions of people annihilated.
Or anyone who wants the shower scene in Psycho left intact likes seeing an unarmed woman butchered.
Ad nauseum.
 

MickeS

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I think it makes PERFECT sense for the feds to threaten the kids with guns. Even if they never intended to use them, it'd scare the crap out of them

A little OT, but if you are not prepared or intending to use the gun, you don't point it at someone. That's one of the most basic rules of handling a gun.
I don't even remember the scene, and I don't know how much of an impact the change will make. I just hope it's well made, not like the crappy Greedo scene. I would have been fine with the Greedo edit had it not been for the clumsy way it was done. Most people seem to object to the very idea of changing the scene, even if it was done flawlessly.
There wasn't a whole lot of complaints about the addition of more stormtroopers in Star Wars (I have never seen a single complaint about it), which makes me think there are a lot of hypocrites out there; if the change is done the way YOU want it, it's OK, otherwise it's "revisionism".
/Mike
 

Jeff Ashforth

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Dec 20, 2000
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209
I'm kinda on the fence with this one; I understand that its the director's right to make changes if he/she wants, but I also agree that films are windows into the time that they were made and should be left alone for historical reasons.
A good example of this is at the beginning of Die Hard. When Willis gets off the plane and starts walking to baggage claim he lights up a cigarette.....inside the airport!!! How long has it been since you could do that??!!
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Should that have been edited out for it's lack of PC-ness?? Most certainly not. Its not a big deal and it paints a picture of the time in which the film takes place. I'm sure most would feel the same about the changes Spielberg has made.
I don't think Spielberg is bowing to PC outcries. Its been made clear in earlier posts that people have not been vocally opposed to the scenes in question in the first place. I think he is just making a change that HE wants, for better or worse (in this case, probably worse
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Julie K

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A little OT, but if you are not prepared or intending to use the gun, you don't point it at someone. That's one of the most basic rules of handling a gun.
That's a rule of safe gun handling. Are federal agents going to be instantly struck down if they violate it? I think it's almost unimaginable that the agents wouldn't be pulling out every single gun and weapon they had at hand if a bunch of kids were making off with an escaping alien.
A bunch of people are bringing up Star Wars as a comparison and saying the word 'hypocrite' a lot. Well, guess what? I'm not buying any of those movies either if we are not offered the original version. I am sick and tired of directors who endlessly fiddle with finished films. They can do so if they must, but I'll only buy the original version. This is especially true if such revisions are made to suit some perceived delicate sensibilities.
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Rain

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...why the hell would a cop point a gun at a CHILD?
Let's pretend for a moment that the situation actually occurred in real life--a child trying to flee with the first ever live sample of an extra-terrestrial life form. If you think that federal agents would not be out there with swat teams pointing guns, I think that's a bit naive.
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Ricky Hustle

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May 29, 2000
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Who cares about the question of whether or not cops would point a gun at children? They probably would, as this world is fucked up.
This is a children's movie, and I for one could care less if Steven Spielberg wants to edit his own movie. My kid will enjoy it either way, and the director feels better about his own product. This is not a PC issue anyway, he simply didnt think that the guns belonged in a childrens movie. That is his right. It is certainly your right not to purchase it, but I think the statement you all make will go unheard. This DVD will sell millions regardless.
If I as an artist put out an album and ten years from now when a re-issue of some sort was released removed a song that I thought stunk and was embarrassed of, I'd do it. I think it's the same thing. It's the artists work to do with what he pleases.
I will buy E.T.
 

Mitty

Supporting Actor
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Jan 13, 1999
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886
Alright, I'll buy but by God I plan on pissing and moaning about it!
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Mark E J

Second Unit
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Oct 26, 2000
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283
I would like to point out that at no time in the movie does a fedral agent point a gun at a child. You see 2 scenes where guns are present: First when the agents first surround the empty van, (no children are present in this scene) then right before ET and the kids fly over the road block. (guns are being pointed in the air away from the children)
I think people should also remember that the guns are not the only changes that will be made to this film. It will have new scenes added in, it will have "enhanced SFX", and it will have a completely remixed soundtrack. This WILL NOT be the film we all know and love it'll be ET The Redux Version You've Never Seen.
Now I support a director if he wants to make an alternate cut of a film. In fact I have always been a great supporter of director's or extended cuts and I actually wish there were more of them. But replacing a classic with a "new improved version" is in my opinion a bad practice that actually stifles art not promotes it.
All I ask is that the original version of a film (wether it be edits, FX, or sound mixes) be kept avalible in addition to the modfied version.
 

Conroy Tesa

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Jun 26, 2001
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167
I hear Spielberg is re editing Schindler's List so that no Jews are killed but instead the Nazi's are just real mean to them.
Look, if Spielberg wasn't happy with the way he made it in the first place he should have taken it out in the first place.
This is like when they put movies on TV, and change f***ing to freaking. I would rather here the beep.
Why doen't he just put a big black x over the guns so you can't see them like in dirty magazines where the x is over the noughty parts.
[Edited last by Conroy Tesa on October 18, 2001 at 01:22 PM]
 

Yohan Pamudji

Supporting Actor
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Apr 3, 2001
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500
I don't think I'm going out on a limb when I utter this blanket statement: we all think films/movies/whatever-you-wanna-call-them are works of art, within the admittedly very loose definition of art. I think we all agree that music, paintings, sculptures, and literature are also art forms.
What is the cutoff point? When do we say a certain work of art is "finished" and should never be tampered with? Some media are more condusive to continuous tweaking while others are not. Take music, for example. I can't confirm this, but I think it's reasonable to believe that many of the classical (genre, not era) music pieces we have today were altered after their first performances. How about literature? Some novels/poems/what-have-you were probably tweaked and adjusted after their first printings. On the other hand paintings and sculptures are not as easy to modify, and probably have not undergone revision after revision like novels, sonatas, and films.
So what changes are ok to make, and what is not? If it turns out Vivaldi altered his Four Seasons 2 or 3 times after the first performance, does that make it less of a masterpiece? I would have to say 'no'. It is still as much a masterpiece as it is without the knowledge of the revisions. Likewise with movies. Directors are artists, and have the right to modify their works of art.
Having said all that, I won't be buying this DVD. I enjoyed the original when I was a kid, but I wasn't obsessed with it. Now with these changes, the nature of which I am opposed to (the apparent political correctness of it, that is. Spielberg has the right to his views, and I have the right to dislike them.), I am completely turned off. I have the right to reject a movie because of the director's changes, just as much as the director has the right to alter his movie.
No sale.
 

Bob McLaughlin

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Mr. Spielberg:
This is just wimpiness on your part.
Can't you stand behind your own work? If these images/words were acceptable to put into your movie 20 years ago, then doesn't that tell us something about what the world was like 20 years ago, or at the very least what YOU, the director, found acceptable 20 years ago? What's wrong with that?
Of course, some might say, this is mere entertainment, and not history. But if you want to use the movie medium to remind people never to forget the Holocaust, such as in "Schindler's List", then don't you have the same responsibility not to cover over history, regardless of how minor and recent and inconsequential it might seem to you?
Like I said, I think you're just wimpy. Avoiding ANY possibility of controversy, or so at least you thought. Taking this out of the movie is probably offending more people than if you had just left it in. What, do you want us to forget that there are such things as terrorists?
Shame on you.
 

Lyle_JP

Screenwriter
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Oct 5, 2000
Messages
1,009
If you want the original scene it, you're only saying that you like seeing guns being pointed at un-armed children.
"Ooooh baby, point that gun at the kid. Ooooh, I'm loving this! It's getting me hot just thinking about it!"
rolleyes.gif

Could it just be possible that I want the film in it's unaltered form because the original version as seen in 1982 is indisputably a classic and worthy of preservation? Or perhaps because I do believe that federal agents would brandish weapons in order to stop the theft of the only proof of life on other planets, and that the guns appropriately heighten the tension of the scene and make the boys escape on the flying bikes that much more effective? Is it just possible that just because Speiberg has had knee-jerk reactions to incidents like Columbine and has steeped himself in anti-gun rhetoric to the point that he now believes children shouldn't even be able to see a law enforcement officer holding a gun that I should just lie down, be happy with it, and pony up my $26.95?
Hell no! NO SALE, STEVEN! NOT EVER!
-Lyle J.P.
 

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