| Author | Message | ||
     John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.203.130.170 |
I know I'm way behind here, but a friend of mine has just loaned me the DVD of 1408 (which was rather good, actually). As she's a John Cusack fan she initially had a 'ahem' US 'copy' but when the UK DVD came out she bought that as well. The ending of each film version is completely different. And there's no 'alternative ending' extra on the UK DVD so you would never know unless you had a copy of the US theater print. Did anyone else know this? And does this sort of thing happen more often than I thought? | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 12.165.240.116 |
Wow. I had no idea. They really should publicize these things, no? How were the endings different, John? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.2.133.184 |
Well, speaking as an expert on these matters, I haven't a friggin clue. | ||
| John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.203.130.170 |
********WARNING - SPOILERS COMING********* UK version - Cusack's character dies in the fire, cut to his funeral. Samuel L Jackson appears with some of his belongings which his wife refuses to take. Jackson goes back to car, plays dictaphone, sees burned ghost in mirror, cut back to 1408 where Cusack is now a resident ghost with his daughter. Film ends US Version: Cusack lives! Survives fire. Cut to hospital where he gets all better and gets to go home with his wife, where he eventually plays dictaphone, hears voice of his daughter. Films ends. Anyone else think this is a bit of an odd way of doing things? | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 12.165.240.116 |
The UK version is the version I saw on (US) DVD. | ||
| John_l_probert (John_l_probert) Username: John_l_probert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 90.203.130.170 |
Chris - I got it wrong. Ending one is actually the director's cut available on DVD. Ending two is the reshot ending seen in cinemas after US test audiences didn't like the 'downer' of Cusack dying. | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 98.220.108.241 |
A-ha. Okey-doke. Seems to me the director's cut version is much better than the test-audience version, but I spose that's usually the case, no? | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.240.83 |
I really anjoyed this film, and thought the ending was a lot more downbeat than it sounds here. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.44.101.203 |
Er, him being with his daughter's ghost is actually happier than what happened in the other one, surely! | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.240.83 |
I'd agree with Tony here. | ||
| Lincoln_brown (Lincoln_brown) Username: Lincoln_brown Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 124.181.112.40 |
Didn't 'The Descent' have a US and a UK ending? From memory, the US version stops about 5 minutes short of the UK one. Here in Aus. we have the UK version on DVD - can't remember if you can choose to view the US release. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
Just seen this. I never knew about the director's ending for 1408. Well, knowing my talent for arriving late to the party so to speak, that's no surprise. But I wished they let the director keep the original ending. I'm sure it would have met with more success. Commercial horror films don't seem to suffer as badly with mainstream audiences as the executives might think. | ||
| Skip (Wolfnoma) Username: Wolfnoma Registered: 07-2010 Posted From: 72.218.208.106 |
It's Hollywood, they suck. All they want to do is make people happy, that is why most author's refuse to have their films made by them. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.68 |
I recommend Make Way for Tomorrow (now on DVD from Criterion) for an exemplary ending... | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 93.186.23.169 |
The UK ending of The Descent is also superior, IMHO. Wasn't there two different endings for Paranormal Activity, too? | ||
| Ian Alexander Martin (Iam) Username: Iam Registered: 10-2009 Posted From: 207.6.255.47 |
There was a film Jennifer & I saw on DVD about three years ago that starred Bruce Willis (I think it was him) as a CIA or FBI agent. It was a dark story to begin with, with much implication of things happening without actually being show. Not that the camera cut away - a la Hitchcock - but implied that they might take place at any moment, making the potential the pint of tension. Anyway, the point I'm leading up to is this, regarding the "typical Hollywood ending" being happy, and that's all they make. ******** WARNING!!! SPOILERS COMING!!! ********* ******** ALTHOUGH THE TITLE ESCAPES ME ********* So our hero escapes the presumed assassination of him, and drives his car into the basement of the CIA/FBI headquarters where he will be safe. Except the assembled crowd of "do-gooders" who have been working to save him suddenly realize the threat to his life has been in the trunk of the car all along and - kerblam! - everyone dies. The end. AWESOME! I mean it's hardly the ending you thought it would be, is it? So, Skip, while I whole-heartedly agree with you about Hollywood having only one way to make a film come to an end (the same way they have since D.W.Griffiths was in charge), there are a few times that people have made mainstream films that didn't have to be released several times in order to get a 'downer' at the end. Thank Christ! | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.31.194.128 |
SPOILERS FOR FOLK WHO HAVE ALMOST CERTAINLY SEEN FEWER FILMS THAN I HAVE, YOU SADDOS Pet Sematary and Thelma and Louise. They have grim, everyone dies endings. | ||
| Steve Bacon (Stevebacon) Username: Stevebacon Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 90.204.111.238 |
You can't beat Se7en for that. | ||
| Jamie Rosen (Jamie) Username: Jamie Registered: 11-2008 Posted From: 99.241.48.210 |
The Mist and the Prestige were both adaptations with grim endings. Unbreakable was an original film with a rather bleak ending; Silent Hill a video game adaptation (and rather good one) that also fit the bill. Heck, the Dark Knight has a fairly grim ending, and it was a blockbuster. | ||
| Jamie Rosen (Jamie) Username: Jamie Registered: 11-2008 Posted From: 99.241.48.210 |
As far as 1408 goes, I think it's a rather mixed ending, rather than upbeat or downbeat. It kind of reminded me of White Noise (the Michael Keaton film, not the Don Delillo novel.) | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.17.252.126 |
Ian, I suspect the film you may have been thinking of was 'Arlington Road' (1999) - starring Jeff Bridges & Tim Robbins - which, in my view, was one of the greatest disguised horror films of the 90s. 'The Parallax View' meets 'Invasion Of The Body Snatchers' imo, and it's every bit as AWESOME as you suggest. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 82.210.188.215 |
Steve - that was one hell of an ending. The director was also responsible for the criminally overlooked/forgotten, and one of my fave films of the decade, The Mothman Prophecies. Mark? | ||
| Ian Alexander Martin (Iam) Username: Iam Registered: 10-2009 Posted From: 207.6.255.47 |
Stevie, I think you're right. Although how Willis and Tim Robbins got swapped is anyone's guess. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
Mark Pellington, that's it. |