Fight Club's censored Chinese ending has to be seen to be believed.
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00:00After several decades of Zack Snyder, we humble viewers understand the sheer number of different
00:05cuts there can be of pretty much any movie that hits our eye holes. Now, most of the
00:10time when a film's being prepared for presentation outside its original country of release, it's
00:15subject to scrutiny by that country's censors, but sometimes it also gets into the hands
00:20of another editor. Movies may be altered to either align with a given nation's social
00:25values, spice things up, or shift narratives so they match up with what distributors think
00:30their target audience wants. So with that being said, I'm Jen from WhatCulture.com,
00:35and these are 10 more movies that have different endings in different countries.
00:3910. The Notebook
00:41Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling made romantic movie history with The Notebook, creating
00:46a modern classic that has since become a permanent part of the genre canon. The time-honored
00:51story sees Noah, played by Gosling, fall for uptown girl Allie, played by McAdams,
00:56and details the people, continents, and years that separates them. The narrative alternates
01:01between past and present to craft a rough ride towards an ultimately satisfying love
01:05story. And of course, we all know and love the ending where this star-crossed couple
01:10die in each other's arms.
01:12Strange, then, that Netflix published a different cut of the US hit in the UK and Ireland. The
01:18ending of this edition features a far less literal and more thematic shot of birds soaring
01:23over the lake with a pair fell in love, leaving it ambiguous whether Noah and Allie pass on
01:28or not, versus the original ending, which was certainly more clear-cut.
01:32Netflix has offered no concrete answer for why they used this ending in the UK, but needless
01:37to say, longtime fans of the movie remain far from impressed. Just another reason why
01:42it's better to stick with physical media.
01:449. The Thief
01:46The all-but-forgotten 1997 Venice Film Festival multi-prize winner and 1998 Academy Award
01:54nominee The Thief tells the story of Katya, who falls for Soviet soldier Tolian. He turns
01:59out to be a career criminal, and Katya is torn between the dual realities of his violent
02:04nature and his new position as a father figure to her six-year-old son, Sanya.
02:09Now, changing cultural artifacts to accommodate different political and cultural learnings
02:13has a long, storied history in Russia. Altering the conclusions of Hollywood films to align
02:19with the tastes of the Russian people was common practice before, during and after the
02:23Soviet Union, and often meant forgoing happy endings altogether. On the flip side, however,
02:28the U.S. distributors of The Thief made the direct-to-change his original epic.
02:32The mood of the national community towards Russia was far from positive in the late 90s
02:36for how the country was conducting itself in the Chechen Wars. Thus, the decision was
02:40made that non-Russian audiences wouldn't appreciate a Russian director going anywhere
02:45near this subject.
02:468. Lord of War
02:48Long before the Nicolas Cage renaissance, before he nearly went bankrupt from buying
02:52mansions and dinosaurs and whatnot, and before he started putting his name to any production
02:57with a camera and a paycheck, he was a big Hollywood star. And back in his days of being
03:02a big bankable star, there was Lord of War, an underrated and overlooked film in Cage's
03:08career.
03:09His original ending for Lord of War sees Cage's arms dealer, Yuri Olov, imprisoned before
03:14he escapes and ultimately returns to his far-from-savory precious engagements, despite having lost
03:19almost everything in his life. In China, however, Yuri never again sees the light of day.
03:25Censors cut the final 30 minutes of the film in their entirety and replaced this sequence
03:29with text stating that Yuri confessed to his crimes and he was sent away for life.
03:34The thing is, social conditioning is kind of a big thing in China. The state relies
03:38on its ability to control the population, and so the China Film Administration censors
03:43all entertainment media in an effort to ensure nobody gets any revolutionary, law-breaking
03:48ideas from Nicolas Cage, or anyone else for that matter.
03:517. The Grandmaster
03:53Wong Kar-wai is widely regarded as one of the greatest writer-directors of past four
03:58decades, and his much-sought-after movies are made all the more valuable by relative
04:03difficulty of obtaining them, with most of his titles not receiving any cinematic releases
04:08in Western countries and physical media being historically hard to come by. Thus, the arrival
04:13of his martial arts drama The Grandmaster to U.S. screens in 2013 was something of an
04:18event. Unfortunately, the film's release saw drastic changes made to the original cut,
04:24led by Harvey Weinstein.
04:26Unlike many of his other massacres, however, Weinstein dissected Wong's kung fu drama with
04:30not only the director's permission, but his assistance in the editing suite. Among the
04:35many additions, removals, and edits is a refocusing of the film's ending, clearly in the hope
04:40that a more direct and extended helping of a cultural icon, Bruce Lee, would get America's
04:45audiences on side.
04:46This ending focuses more on a young Lee, the most famous student of the film's subject,
04:51the Grandmaster, and includes, amongst other things, additional shots of the young martial
04:55artist and a dramatic title card announcing who he is. This did not go down well, and
05:01the U.S. version of Grandmaster is regarded as considerably inferior to the original.
05:06Number 6. Pride and Prejudice
05:08Regarded by many as the definitive film version of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, despite
05:13Pride and Prejudice and zombies being right there, Joe Wright's 2005 adaptation greatly
05:18expanded the profile of stars Keira Knightley as Elizabeth Bennet and Matthew McFadden as
05:23Mr. Darcy and introduced Austen's work to a whole new generation.
05:27And while the die-hard Austen fans throughout the world agree that the UK version of the
05:31film handles the source material with reverence and tact, the same cannot be said of the American
05:36version.
05:37Prior to its North American release, Pride and Prejudice was altered to include a scene
05:41that was scrapped from the first cut, and which goes beyond the ending of the novel.
05:46This shows a married Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy at Pemberley, kissing and being soppy and
05:50such like, replacing the ending where Mr. Bennet, who is a truly wonderful Donald Sutherland,
05:56gives the couple his blessing and chuckles away to himself.
05:58Well, the aim was obviously to try and appeal to those U.S. audiences who prefer sentimentality
06:04over nuance, but it did not work. It became a matter of some distress and urgency for
06:09the Jane Austen Society of North America, who reprimanded the scenes in consistency
06:14with the film's established tone and narrative thrust. Gosh.
06:18Number 5. Minions
06:19The Rise of Gru
06:20It will come as no surprise that the aforementioned China Film Administration has had its hands
06:25all over a large number of popular Western movies whose narratives go against their established
06:30rules and values. What may come as a surprise, though, is that one of the movies in question
06:35is Despicable Me spin-off sequel Minions The Rise of Gru.
06:39We know that the Chinese censors like to see any film involving renegades, rogues, rebels,
06:44or rapscallions end in a serious helping of justice in order to uphold a society based
06:49on the strict implementation of law and order. And while the banana-wielding minions aren't
06:54exactly the James Younger gang, they are the antithesis of order and sensibility, accidentally
07:00causing the wreck and ruin of almost everything they come into contact with, yet somehow successfully
07:05piloting a commercial flight to San Francisco, may I add.
07:08Whilst the original ending of Minions The Rise of Gru, which sees a miniature Gru, his
07:12minions and his mentor escape any kind of punishment for the chaos they have overseen
07:17and drive off into the sunset, was nixed for the Chinese market. Instead, the gang fails
07:22in their escape and Gru's mentor, a master criminal and ex-member of the Vicious Six,
07:27is locked up for good.
07:28Let us know in the comments what you think of these endings being changed, and while
07:32you're there, drop us a cheeky like, share, and subscribe too.
07:354. King Kong vs. Godzilla
07:37Long before Godzilla and Kong romped around Hong Kong and came away pals in their CGI-laden
07:432021 hit, they went toe-to-toe at the summit of Mount Fuji, in King Kong vs. Godzilla.
07:49The film's ending sees this clash of titans end underwater, with Kong emerging victorious
07:54and Godzilla presumed dead. And while there was a change to this ending for the US market,
08:00it's not what everyone thinks. There are in fact two small differences in the endings
08:04of the Western and Asian releases of King Kong vs. Godzilla. In the US release, Kong
08:09roars on his own during the film's pre-credits fade to black, while in the Japanese release,
08:14both Godzilla and King Kong's roars are heard. A marginal difference, maybe, but it really
08:21has made waves in the years since.
08:233. The Sound of Music
08:25Receiving critical acclaim on both sides of the pond, The Sound of Music rapidly entered
08:30the halls of cinema as a stone-cold classic, except in Germany. Part of Germany's rather
08:36effective, decades-long strategy following the atrocities of WWII has been to ban Nazi
08:41iconography wherever possible. Unfortunately for The Sound of Music, which focuses on how
08:46Julie Andrews helps the troupe of all-singing, all-dancing children she cares for escape
08:51the Third Reich, this meant heavy editing. 20th Century Fox's Munich branch led a massive
08:56re-edit of the ending for German audiences, removing the bulk of the film's third act
09:01for this niche market, despite not being authorised by Fox in the US. Needless to say, it did
09:07not pay off, and the film was rendered thematically nonsensical, but even after the studio reinstated
09:13the original ending, the film still bombed at the box office.
09:162. Fatal Attraction
09:18Adrian Lin's classic psychological thriller Fatal Attraction is not always an easy watch.
09:24It follows happily married man Dan, played by Michael Douglas, whose one-night stand
09:29Alex, played by Glenn Close, comes back to haunt him. She menaces, blackmails and stalks
09:34him, greening towards an ending that sees Alex shot and killed by Dan's wife Beth, played
09:39by Ann Archer. But Japanese audiences were not privy to this ending. Instead, they were
09:45treated to a dark, depressing climax, which has Alex take her own life with a knife while
09:50listening to Madame Butterfly. This was actually designed by Lin to be the film's original
09:54ending and was intended for general release before being nixed by the studio after test
09:59screenings did not go as planned. They insisted audiences would want Alex to pay in more direct
10:04terms for what she'd done.
10:06Japanese distributors had been interested in the original ending from the very start,
10:10which linked up thematically with Madame Butterfly, a play adapted from the original short story,
10:15which was first produced in Japan, and was perhaps why they chose to include this in
10:19the country's initial release of Fatal Attraction.
10:221. Fight Club
10:24Fincher's film takes aim at consumerism, corporate culture and individualism, and so was not
10:30necessarily a sure target for the China Film Association, as arguably represents many of
10:35the values that created the People's Republic in the first place. However, the film's dalliance
10:40with a new kind of anarchic collectivism was bound to rankle with the country's typically
10:44overbearing government. The people can have their communism, just not like that.
10:48Championing civil disobedience at every turn, Fight Club offers viewers an alternative to
10:53the neoliberal world that the West pioneered, with the ending seeing Tyler Durden, played
10:58by Pitt, and the narrator, Norton, bring the entire system to a grinding halt, raising
11:04L.A. scrapers, destroying the nation's digital capital, and sending everyone back to zero.
11:10The Chinese government, of course, could not let this go unchallenged.
11:13Vast, they recut the ending to remove the onset of total societal reset, and replaced
11:18it with a black title stating that the police rapidly figured out the whole plan, and a
11:23arrested all criminals, successfully preventing the bomb from exploding.
11:27Monty Python could not have done better himself.