Battle of the Re-Edits

I just caught part of Battle of the Planets: The Movie, a spin off from the late seventies animated series I remember seeing episodes of on childrens' TV.  Actually, it was a re-edit of several of those episodes to create a new plot line.  It also re-instated several sequences originally cut from the US version of series.  Because Battle of the Planets was actually a Japanese anime series re-edited to make it more suitable for western kids, (or rather western TV executives and regulators), by removing a lot of the more extreme violence and killings, not to mention profanity.  Interestingly, this version also removed all references to the fact that the main villain, Zoltar, was, in the original, trans gender.  Although his female alter ego did appear in one episode, she was presented as a separate character - his sister - rather than simply his female self.  To cover all the gaps left by these excisions, the US producers inserted new sequences featuring a mildly camp robot called 7-Zark-7, who directed and commented upon, the missions of the heroes of 'G-Force'.  (In the 'movie' I just saw, he had a different voice, which made him sound camper than ever).  You could tell these weren't original as the style and animation quality were noticeably cruder than that of the original Japanese footage.  

Apparently, there have been subsequent re-edits and re-dubs both of the original series and its Japanese sequels, to create English-language versions that are closer to the original, with much of the violence left in.  (These have included G-Force and Eagle Riders, both of which give the characters new names, neither of which I recall being shown on terrestrial TV in the UK).  As I've mentioned many times before, I'm always fascinated by the process of transforming one film or TV episode into something quite different by adding, subtracting and re-ordering footage.  It is quite common in low budget exploitation cinema, especially when it came to releasing English-language versions of foreign films. Sometimes these transformations could be quite radical, as when Roger Corman re-edited the soviet film Planeta Bur into Voyage of the Planet of Prehistoric Women, which involved inserting much US-shot footage of US actors and re-dubbing the original footage to create a completely new plot line.  By contrast, the other film he created from Planeta Bur - Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet - was a somewhat more straightforward re-bub of the original and the replacement of some scenes with new footage featuring Basil Rathbone, to create a framing narrative.  Most of the Japanese monster films from the fifties, sixties and seventies were also re-edited to varying degrees for their English-language versions.  The second Godzilla film, for instance, removed Godzilla's name completely (for legal reasons), re-christening him 'Gigantis' and the re-dubbing relocated the action to the US.  (The original film also had a radical re-edit, inserting Raymond Burr as a US reporter for the benefit of English language audiences).

But it isn't just foreign-language films that get this treatment.  Let's not forget that They Saved Hitler's Brain is effectively two films edited together - most of it comes from Madmen of Mandoras, but this was padded out with (poorly matched) newly shot footage for its later sale to TV.  Al Adamson was, of course, the master of the art of re-working existing material into new films, creating at least three films from the footage he originally shot for 1965's Psycho-a-Go-Go, (the others were Fiend With the Electronic Brain (1969) and 1971's Blood of Ghastly Horror), all with different plot lines.  Similarly, his 1971 Dracula vs Frankenstein started life as as an unfinished project called The Blood Seekers, which featured neither monster.  Every so often, even a bigger budget film might be 'rescued' by being subjected to post-production re-fashioning, often because of problems during production, such as the production running out of money.  Incense For the Damned (1970), springs to mind.  Although not a big-budget studio production, it was clearly an attempt by its producers (Titan) to produce a more 'upmarket' horror film.  Unfortunately they ran out of money and shooting was never completed.  The footage was subsequently bought by someone else, who spent several years piecing together the existing footage, (with added narration to bridge gaps), into some kind of coherent film in order to release it.  The Richard Harris starring Canadian thriller Highpoint was another film which suffered radical re-edits by its US distributor in order to simplify its convoluted plot and remove comedic elements.  Shot in 1979, it finally limped into cinemas in its new form in 1982.