A question about movies on streaming services

Submitted by Griezz t3_11baqu0 in movies

I have a question, but I'm not sure if this is the most app forum for my query. Still, here goes...

Why is it that, when you see movies broadcast on TV or streamed over internet services such as Netflix, you only ever see the "theatrical cut"; you never see the "director's cut" or "expanded edition" of a film.

As an example, I think that the expanded edition of James Cameron's Avatar is better, due to the added scenes. (Not by much, but a little bit better is still better.) Similarly, Peter Jackson's LOTR trilogy is improved by the expanded edition of the movies, but they are never streamed.

Now, on broadcast television, I get it. Time is very limited and therefore expensive, so no expanded versions of movies. However, streaming services don't share those restrictions, so how come they don't show the full versions?

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TokeyMcTokeFace t1_j9wx568 wrote

Money.

These types of cuts of films are usually only available on physical media. To keep them rarer.

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ValCruise t1_j9wznka wrote

I have seen some films on HBO max having director cuts alongside their standard version.

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TeamStark31 t1_j9wxivy wrote

It depends which version the streaming service gets the rights to

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WeDriftEternal t1_j9wy834 wrote

If you want to negotiate for the new film cut you can. It takes a lot of effort to deal with this type of stuff, so most distributors on both sides don't wanna re-tread over it as the extended editions and other cuts usually come out much later than the theatrical cuts, plus its gonna be expensive. You can include them in the original deal, but like again, its gonna be expensive.

The value of alternate cuts to streaming services is likely minimal. You might see it more likely as a PPV (aka TVOD), since thats a rev share instead of a purchase

Theres also a lot of contractual issues and MFNs to deal with

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BluThunderboltz t1_j9x4qwo wrote

I’ve seen extended editions on streaming services before.

Edit: Yeah, the extended editions or LotR is on HBO Max right now.

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Mobile-Nature-6970 t1_j9wx36r wrote

Your local library is likely to have the movies that you want on DVD for free.

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Griezz OP t1_j9wx99z wrote

Actually, for the films I mention, I do own the special edition; I just wondered why the streamers never carry them.

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Mobile-Nature-6970 t1_ja0lbsc wrote

I'd argue that the most probable reason is that the streamer doesn't want to pay for a second set of streaming rights to the other editions. I can imagine a situation where people complain about getting the director's cut because it wasn't what they remembered if the streaming service chose to show the director's cut rather than the version shown in theaters.

I like the commentary tracks on DVDs. A drawback of having DVDs be available not long after the movie leaves the theaters or even while the movie is still in the theaters, as was the case with "Tàr", is that those features are not available or are less available.

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Griezz OP t1_ja5bj6b wrote

Sounds fairly reasonable.

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WatchMoreMovies t1_j9x8ux4 wrote

It just kind of depends how thorough the streamer wants to be with their licensing purchase. Generally they just lease out huge chunks of a distributors library in bulk, not individually. So they'll get the cheapest, default cut of the title. More recently I've seen services going out of their way a bit more and having separate listings for subtitled and dubbed versions of non English films, which is cool. But rarely do they get unrated vs rated because if they do they see it as getting charged for the same title twice and don't bother.

Sometimes the cut they get is actually rarer. I had never seen the PG-13 cut of 2002's Rollerball before, because it was a disaster and all Home video releases bumped it up to an R rating to try and help promote it. So if you really want to see the PG-13 cut for...whatever reason, streaming is essentially the only way to do it.

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kiwi-66 t1_j9xptpb wrote

There are various reasons:

  1. Money/Cost and time.
  2. Sometimes longer doesn't mean better, especially if the theatrical cut is what the director prefers.
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HardSteelRain t1_j9yh0fj wrote

The old non streaming Fox Movies used to show extended cuts..I recorded the extended version of The Abyss and Aliens there

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Griezz OP t1_ja5bemx wrote

I remember those. In ALIENS, we saw a clip of Newt's family, right? As for the Abyss, we saw that there were significant threats to humanity going on, including an alien-controlled tsunami just... standing off-shore someplace. Admittedly, the cut scenes aren't absolutely essential to the plot, but they make it better.

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