The 12 Greatest Director’s Cuts Ever Made—and Why ‘Manhunter: Final Cut’ Isn’t One of Them

I agree with Variety‘s Owen Gleiberman that the so-called “Final Cut” of “Manhunter,” just released, is actually an inferior version of the film. It only reinforces my skepticism toward director’s cuts.

Great films have a fixed artistic identity that should not be altered, much like classic novels or paintings. Restoring deleted scenes rarely improves them.

In the case of “Manhunter,” the film has never looked better, but the added dialogue—and especially the new closing scene with Will Graham—weaken its impact by overexplaining and diminishing the power of the original ending. These changes are a mistake.

The truth is that, nine times out of ten, a movie that a studio heavily interferes with probably wasn’t that impressive to begin with. Of course, there are always exceptions. As far as I’m concerned, there have never been finer examples than these 12 “Director’s Cuts,” which may have started out as good movies but became grand, sometimes masterful, personal statements once their original visions were fully restored:

• “Touch of Evil” (Orson Welles)

• “Blade Runner” (Ridley Scott)

• “Once Upon A Time in America” (Sergio Leone)

• “Kingdom of Heaven” (Ridley Scott)

• “Margaret” (Kenneth Lonergan)

• “Superman II” (Richard Donner)

• “The New World” (Terrence Malick)

• “Heaven’s Gate” (Michael Cimino)

• “Aliens” (James Cameron)

• “The Big Red One” (Sam Fuller)

• “Das Boot” (Wolfgang Peterson)

• “The Abyss” (James Cameron)

There is an undeniable fascination with director’s cuts. They carry a certain redemptive quality, especially in the rare instances where they genuinely improve upon the theatrical version. Whether it’s Sergio Leone finally unveiling his once-butchered “Once Upon a Time in America” in its intended structure or, more famously, Zack Snyder spearheading an online movement to release his version of “Justice League,” they offer directors the chance to show audiences what they truly intended.

There may be no finer example of a richly improved director’s cut than Orson Welles’ “Touch of Evil.” The definitive version of Welles’ masterpiece did not arrive until two decades after his death. When the film was originally released in 1958, Welles discovered that Universal had reshot several scenes with another director and ignored nearly all of the detailed editing notes he had submitted.

Even the iconic opening shot—one of the greatest long takes ever filmed—was compromised in the original release by opening credits superimposed over the image, undermining its breathtaking effect. In 1998, four decades after the film’s original release, editor Walter Murch, working alongside producer Rick Schmidlin and based on Welles’ famous 58-page memo, reconstructed a version that came as close as possible to the director’s intended vision.

No filmmaker has mastered the director’s cut better than Ridley Scott. We all know about the multiple versions of “Blade Runner” that exist. That film truly became a sci-fi classic only years after its original release, when audiences finally discovered Scott’s intended vision.

Furthermore, Scott’s Crusades epic, “Kingdom of Heaven,” originally released in the summer of 2005 to negative reviews, was given a new lease on life with the release of its director’s cut on DVD, which restored more than an hour of deleted footage. The result was a 210-minute version with richer character development, fewer plot holes, and a far more satisfying story. A great film.

One of the more recent 21st-century examples of a film dramatically improved by a director’s cut is Kenneth Lonergan’s “Margaret.” Originally slated for release in 2005, the film became mired in post-production as Lonergan (“Manchester by the Sea”) spent years refining what would become his magnum opus. The prolonged editing process led to multiple lawsuits between Lonergan and Fox Searchlight. The studio ultimately released a truncated 150-minute version in 2011.

Yet in the case of “Manhunter,” and many others, the opposite is true. Francis Ford Coppola’s “Apocalypse Now Redux” disrupted the relentless momentum of the 1979 classic with nearly 50 minutes of additional footage. Richard Kelly’s “Donnie Darko: Director’s Cut” similarly weakens the film by overexplaining, and stripping away much of the mystery that made the original so compelling.

Revisiting and expanding a completed work — especially that was already deemed great — does not necessarily deepen it. More often than not, it dilutes the precision, mystery, and rhythm that made the original so enduring. Some films are simply meant to remain exactly as they were first released, their artistic identity fixed in time.