Nope it's just stealing. If I go steal all the DVDs in Walmart claiming it's for preservation, I'm gonna be arrested. Why does it make it different when it's online? You're still robbing a company. Ppl who pirate are no better than shoplifters
100% agree. We cannot erase things from history we don't like. It's a self-obsessed sickness we have picked up from social media, where you can mute, block or unfollow things you don't want to see. But that's not reality. We need to learn from the past, otherwise we end up making the same mistakes over and over. Cancellation and censorship is not a liberal value, it's a fascist value.
I had never seen The French Connection but always wanted to. I heard about this controversy and found the dvd at a used media shop. It's really good and the censorship makes no sense for a 52 year old R rated movie that only Adults would watch anyway. It shouldn't be censored as it reflects the reality of the time.
I agree. Besides i think its narratively important. The movie is well aware of how it comes across and the character that Gene Hackman plays in the movie is a complete asshole. Its not done insensitively. Depiction does not mean endorsement.
Instead of censoring, we should just have conversations about why we don’t deem it as okay anymore, not that that’s how I feel entirely, but what I mean is how do we learn from history if we erase history. we should tell people about certain things like the scene they cut out from the film, otherwise people will just hear about how great the film was despite having a scene that everyone used to be okay with having in a movie if the goal is to change things for the better, but with all these changes to film, it feels like the goal is much more to pretend it never happen and sweep mistakes under the rug.
Agree with you completely Dan - this is setting a bad precedent for future movies being erased/"scrubbed" for things that people in charge of the rights deem "questionable" or "offensive." Even if I think some movies have too much sex, for instance, doesn't mean I have the right to strike it from the copies of movies other people have.
@@thedarkemissary That's the unfortunate painful part yeah. Streaming services and film companies/distributors will continue to have the rights to have their films removed at any point in time, since they still own the distributed streaming video and is not for the subscribers themselves to archive.
"The road to hell is covered with good intentions". If people back then finally saw for the first time in art what until then was real but hidden from public view, how can hiding it now be anything other than reverting back to the notions of that era? That is exactly what they were doing back then.
I find it funny how so many people want to censor the past, yet at every moment we bring up our racist past at every single moment. So which is it? Do we acknowledge the past or are we pretending it didn't happen?
I agree with you Dan . As a historian, art shows a snapshot in time - that comes with the good and bad. We need to understand our past to learn grow from it . Not repeat it . What we find acceptable today could be deemed offensive tomorrow ( and it will ).
While Gene Hackman is still with us, I would love for him voice a forward or commentary explaining the context of this film and decisions behind the film, script and his memories of making the film. This is history that needs to be preserved.
@@mustafachoudhury3368 That is a totally ridiculous comment. I think that he would if he was in the health to do so. You are clearly not well educated as who democrats are and what they stand for in this era.
Hackman has stated that he didn't like many aspects of Popeye's personality but the logic behind at least as far as Friedkin Is concerned Is that this Is the whole point of the charácter. He Is a Man consumed by His pursue, in many ways Is like captain Ahab from Moby dick
Thank you for posting this very informative video! I'm a brutha who is about as left as they come. And I was offended by the language -- but guess what? I was supposed to be offended by it. That was the whole point! And given what we know about policing in America, that language and racist attitude is typical of many police. The fact that Disney removed the scene is way more disturbing and offensive to me than its inclusion. The weak minds behind this decision to cut the scene should be ashamed of themselves. Final point: this is an R-rated movie for adults, not a kid's film. This censorship is sad and pathetic.
Dan, you are 100 percent right. This is the reason I refuse to get rid of my physical media. I want physical media to continue. I am glad to see many of these streaming companies in trouble, so they will be forced to keep producing physical media to make money.
This is one of the reasons why I love and collect physical media when it comes to movies. It hopefully keeps all the OG content from the movie and I don’t have to worry about it potentially leaving a streaming service permanently.
great video as always dan. i agree, censoring content sets a bad precedent for everyone and everything. history is history, regardless of how it makes people feel. hope william friedkin says something about this.
Excellent video. This type of action is dangerous. Companies stamp warning labels on everything. Cigarettes cause cancer but the ingredients stay the same the only change is a warning label.
I've gotta say, when you announced you'd do streaming news every other week I was kind of skeptical about there being much material or hot topics to discuss. But every episode since then has been straight fire, and it seems there's always spicy things to talk about so far. Love it
Warner Brothers handles this issue really well with its old looney tunes cartoons, where they present a cartoon in its original form but has disclaimers saying the content reflected views of the time and those views do not reflect the views of the company or society today, but they warn that the content could be offensive to some viewers.
Again, I really enjoy how in depth you go in your research for all of your content. I have never seen The French Connection, but now I'm gonna be on the look out for an uncensored version whenever I go thirfting.
SUCH AN IMPORTANT VIDEO. You couldn't have underscored the paramount importance of film preservation any better (or any media for that matter) to ensure it be free from censorship. If this was indeed an intentional move by Disney we should ALL be concerned. 😮
Legitimately strong and persuasive editorial. This underlines the dangers of having art/information concentrated and mediated by a few corporations. Whatever the motives were, it is unconscionable that any piece of art should be edited. Discussions around a controversial work, of course, need to happen but altering a piece of art without comment (or worse, lying about it) smacks of totalitarianism. We should never take for granted the freedom of expression achieved for us, as it can be too easily revoked. Thank you for highlighting this issue, Dan.
Dan's perpetual tone of mild surprise about Bluey's success is so funny to me, bc anyone who even *knows* someone with a young kid knows that just how much parents and children adore (and depend on) that show
Thanks for making the censorship lot clearer - lot of noise about this scene cut. Nice to see Spider Verse getting lot of love on streaming/ downloads services Look forward to next show
You have confirmed all my concerns I had when streaming first started. I will say, I have seen The French Connection and yes, that scene confirms what black people already knew white people thought about us. They just pretend they don’t say it when they totally do. (I am black. It’s nice not being gaslighted about racism in pop culture.) EDIT: I was waiting to buy some blu-rays after buying a new blu-Ray player, but i will start buying blu-rays now. Additional thought, if this edit stands, people can always claim that that character was never racist. Which…goes back to the racism gaslighting.
There's a lot of generalizations and assumptions in your comment. I can say I personally don't think that about black people at all. Black people are not a monolith and neither are white people. I am not sure if that is how you meant it to come across but for some reason I felt I wanted to say how I felt about it and how it affected me. I definitely agree with the idea that if we don't acknowledge racism in history we are just going to stay stuck without growing past it.
@@Nawx7 Dude, your white fragility is showing. If you were confident in your self-proclaimed anti-racist beliefs, you wouldn't have felt the need to respond at all.
@@Nawx7 if you think I am saying white people are a monolith… maybe you need to do more research. Saying white people did not mean all white people. I can’t believe in 2023 this still has to be explained. (“Not all men, amitrite?”/s) My family has worked with people with developmental disabilities. Most of them have communication challenges. But even then, some of the white ones know who to direct racial slurs to. Where do you think they learned it from? Many of them aren’t able to watch and listen to TV, movies, and music lyrics so it’s not coming from there. Also many of my non-POC (aka white people) friends tell me what they hear from white people themselves. I live in a predominantly white town.
Hi Dan! Your segment reminded me of comments Neil Gaiman made in response to people pirating his work, and how particularly in the streaming era digital media preservation is crucial because many shows and movies don't even get physical releases now.
Oh and BTW, am totally behind physical media. Just on a technical level, you get a pure video and audio output from a 4k disc without any compression from streaming.
it's weird that they only censored the film on US and not any other regions, if they really thought they needed to edit that scene that the edit would propagate across their own streaming service first rather than the licensees
You're right. A huge problem with 'commercial censorship' is that the license holders or distributors should be forced to state that the version in format ABC being shown in country XYZ on posters, physical media artwork and streaming details has been modified. However, this would require a global licensing rule be applied across countries and states. But such MPAA censorship has been happening for DECADES. Catch up.
I'm only 9 minutes in but I have to say that I have, as of so far, refused to repurchase the Star Wars original trilogy. I despise what has been done to them, even since I first saw them on UK TV which probably had some edits of their own. My original VHS releases and (imagine a tear, please) my definitive collection I once had on laserdisc were probably altered in some slight way as well. I hate not being able to see what I once paid to see and what caught my attention. Drew me in and made me love it. I'm always grateful for alternate versions. Gives a great reason to re-watch a film just to see what has been changed but, that original print must remain. It was the original vision of the writer/director, or at least the best they could do to present it at that time, making it a time capsule, if you prefer. And it is likely to have been the origins of the viewers delight for the film. If I paid to see a film and then paid to buy a re-playable copy of that film, I want the film I saw! If I purchased the Mona Lisa but before it was set on my walls Leonardo decided to intercept it and turn it into a mountain landscape filled with CGI, IT IS NOT WHAT I PAID FOR!!! If, however, Leonardo added/included their new "vision" to the order then I'd be extremely happy to see what they had done at the time and what they had truly envisioned. I want to have the opportunity to see the films as they were AND as they are. No artist/director should wish anything else. If they have improved on the original vision, then surely they'd be happy for people to see those improvements, for the paying public to witness the journey? There is no adventure if you are forced to start at the destination. And so the same should be said of any film; French Connection included. The choice to see or not see should be ours: the viewers. If there are two, three or four versions of the same film then we should be responsible when choosing which we see. If the director has a preference then great! Everything should lead towards it. We would benefit knowing which was their preference, their vision. But they should not take from us what it was that made us care and want to know in the first place.
This is why I watch you Dan! Thanks for all the excellent work. I have many issues with this type of censorship, but most of all: if we whitewash history too much, people will lose an understanding of just how open and accepted prejudices used to be.
This type of censorship is regressive and divisive not to mention it muddies the historical record. A simple message/warning/apology if needed before the film is enough.
In 2005, the French Connection was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". With that, each title named to the Registry, the Library of Congress works to ensure that the film is preserved for all time, either through the Library's massive motion picture preservation program at Dayton, Ohio, or through collaborative ventures with other archives, motion pictures studios, and independent film makers. You would think that it could NOT be edited after being added to the film registry and "preserved for all time".
The French Connection is a on-off amazing movie. Deserves to remain as it was not to hide its uncomfortable scene that are honest to American (World) history.
The character of Popeye Doyle is not a hero, he’s an flawed, racist policeman, but one who goes beyond sanity to catch an international drug supplier, not simply arrest street dealers, to defend the victims of drug abuse. The film still has a lot to say today & you deserve to be uneasy about the ruthlessness of its main protagonist, when thinking about that debate.
Out of curiosity (and to the best of your knowledge), does Peacock separate viewing hours for The Office versus The Office: Superfan episodes? I wonder if it's statistically competing with itself by splitting the viewership (I'm currently on a rewatch of the series, but I'm watching the Superfan episodes as they contain deleted scenes).
As someone with a modest classic movie channel myself - and just as a movie fan - I am very glad I have my own physical copies (dvds) of classic movies - and very disturbed (but not surprised) that this kind of cleansing witch hunt is taking place today. It started with Hans Solo firing his blaster a second later - but this is getting much more serious.
That is disgusting censorship. What is next? Censor everything that has racist language from the past? That is absurd. That is a disservice to the art.
I know it wouldn't happen but I just pictured 12 years a Slave without slurs. You'd probably have to cut out half the film 😂 In all seriousness though a simple warning before the film or tv episode is sufficient in my opinion, rather than editing them, or removing them all together.
@@TrappyJenkins Art can have racism in it. Many great movies and songs and shows have racial slurs in them. They would be less if they were subtracted.
Dan I consider myself a cinefile and I have a list of movies I have to watch The French Connection is one I had on that list, but to watch it uncut I am going to have to watch it on a piracy site...THAT is what censorship does! This is disgusting behaviour from whoever censored it. But Hey! Thanks for reminding me of this classic flick!
What’s next? Will the rights owner of Taxi Driver edit out language that they feel is offensive? Will they edit out portions of Jodi Foster’s character? This is all just so absurd.
Never in my dreams did I think, that we would live in a world, where we would one day talk about censorship again and some art from decades ago would be actually censored... It just shows how radical things have become and how dangerous this new "movement" or whatever we want to call it is... It makes me sick.
No it just shows how far we've come as a human race where we won't allow another race of ppl to get away with what they have done in the past. And you're obviously mad at it. Go outside and take a walk. Get some fresh air.
Great stuff Dan, really enjoyed the discussion! I just have one question about the new streaming charts: Wouldn't Bluey count as a broadcast/library show because Australia broadcasts the episodes first and then Disney+ streams (and censors btw) the episodes a year or so later?
It's possible this movie and Gone with the Wind were singled out because of their awards. Other movies on Disney+ only had a disclaimer shown. There's a contingent who demand "better" of its winners, that they're supposed to be more than quality filmmaking. Also thanks Dan as always for bringing this up.
Thank you Dan! Totally agree on everything you said about the French Connection situation. And yeah, it sucks a bit to be on the same "side" as certain people but there is a bigger censorship issue that is pretty clear cut on this one. And also I am a total fan of physical media. I am constantly badgering for a physical media version of "Hamilton" because what happens is Disney+ decided to vault it tomorrow. Streaming is nice and convenient, but for anything I love I want it on physical.
Interesting. They just showed this movie on (I think) the Movies channel via Antenna. I watched a little bit of it and have no idea if they showed the complete movie. Gene Hackman is a great actor and enjoy watching his acting in his movies. Take care.
I fully support the rights of directors (and technically whoever actually owns it) to provide versions of a film/show they deem suitable for whatever audience they are targetting , having TV and Plane versions make sense to me. However, I strongly feel that the original release version needs to be preserved and available for those who want to view that. Intermediate versions muddy the waters even more, especially in cases when a film was revised while still in release, but in my opinion that inital release is the point where the product intersected with the wider culture andneeds to be preserved.
This situation reminds me of a plot point on "Thank You For Smoking" (great movie BTW). The antagonist is a senator with a crusade against tobacco, and one of his ideas is to sign a law to mandate editing golden-age Hollywood films replacing all instances of smoking with lollipops, flutes, etc. When asked if that's not erasing history, he replies "No, I think it's *improving* history". Obviously it's satire and that ridiculousness is played for laughs but... here we are.
Drew McWeeny: "I doubt profoundly that Friedkin went in just to cut nine seconds of language out of the movie." Darrin Navarro, ACE (who edited Friedkin's Bug and Killer Joe): "I can assure you he did not."
Another instance of a director making a change, causing difficulty in finding the original version, are with some of Charlie Chaplin's films, specifically The Kid and Modern Times. It's difficult to find the original theatrical versions, only showing the director's cut, even though the theatrical ones are superior.
I have noticed that the streaming versions of JOHN WICK 1 2 3 have cut out some of the blood splatter also the new physical versions seem to have less blood. Part of the fantasy of John Wick is that he is deadly. Cutting down the blood is like taking Dracula’s fangs.
This should be incredibly distressing news to every film fan out there. Removing scenes from past movies just because they might offended people of today is a disgusting form of censorship that will inevitably destroy the preservation of classic films for future generations. Film fans need band together and be vocal about this. Thank you for talking about this Dan.
This is why I automatically download all my iTunes purchases. They can change the streaming version but they can’t alter the version you already have downloaded on your hard disk. Eg I still have the old version of Toy Story 2 with the original Buena Vista logo and the Stinky Pete / Harvey Weinstein joke in the credits.
Dan, I completely agree with you about the stealth editing of The French Connection. But I am curious how you feel about Disney's refusal to make certain films available at all. My late mother was 5 years old when she first watched Song of the South and she absolutely loved the music. A few weeks before she passed, she was in the hospital and asked if she could watch the movie. She couldn't. I completely understand why that film is controversial, but is it really any more offensive than Gone With The Wind? It's been many years since I watched either film, but it seems to me the biggest difference is that Gone With The Wind is much more beloved. But wouldn't an introduction similar to the one in front of Gone With The Wind be sufficient for Song of the South? The other film it seems Disney is determined to bury is The Devil and Max Devlin because Elliot Gould is just that controversial. Seriously though, I completely understand why they don't want to have a Bill Cosby movie on Disney+, but I still think it should be possible to watch it somewhere. What is your opinion?
Song of the South is a tricky situation because it’s aimed at kids. I don’t think it should be completely inaccessible. But I also think the intended audience should be able to understand the disclaimers that come with it and its historical context. So how do you do that with a kids film? I don’t think Disney has ever figured that out, which is why they just stuck it in the vault. There are other movies equally as problematic that are available (certainly many parts of Gone with the Wind and others) and I wish there was some effort to try figuring out how it could be available, if only for historical context and how stereotypes endured and were spread systematically. But I doubt that will be figured out any time soon.
@@DanMurrellMovies I had a social studies teacher in high school show us Birth Of A Nation, both the original "problematic" film and the original full-length film. That film has a disgusting message but is important to the study of film history and (I believe) an understanding of the attitudes of some people in the early 20th Century, including Woodrow Wilson. That film is easy to find though since it's in the public domain. But it didn't have any songs that my mother loved. But Song of the South will pass into the public domain on January 1, 1941. Coincidently, January 1st is my birthday. That will be a bittersweet 73rd birthday present for me. But if I am still around then, I think I'll watch it in her honor.
Friedkin was known to go back and recut some of his movies (notably The Exorcist) but I have a hard time believing that this truly is a “director’s edit”. It’s too bad that nobody was able to reach him in his final months to clarify. Maybe when the time is right, somebody should ask Sherry Lansing if she knows anything about this issue. RIP Mr. Friedkin.
“What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.” What kills me about this is Friedkin’s whole position about making this film was to ingrain himself with real cops of that time to get the most realistic portrayal of that life. So what he made was essentially the truth of that time. Now, of course, people continue to try to erase reality.
Hey Dan, with you enjoy doing it I’ll always enjoy watching it, but I wanted to let you know that you can feel free to skip the charts recap for weeks where we didn’t have shows. I love these shows but I don’t see the delayed charts adding much to it.
I am really surprised at how well Black Panther has done on streaming. While there weren't cumulative numbers in Dan's charts last year, I don't remember Thor making much of a dent at all on movie streaming charts. Both did very similar box office numbers. I will be interested to see how well The Mother holds in the Nielson charts because Netflix seems to acknowledge it doing well. I also think extraction could be huge. Lastly, the numbers for the library shows are just astonishing to look at. Advertisers have to be looking at those in disbelief as Netflix continues its ad-tier. I don't have Netflix, but I wonder how they handle ads on cocomelon. Do they target the kid or the parent?
I know there was contention between Friedkin and the Cinematographer on this film, which is why there is a director's version in physical media, but I believe the issue was mostly about color temperature.
Indeed. Friedkin had it in his mind to drain the color out of this film (and was going to do the same in his other films) and redid the color with horrible pastels. That was the first Blu-ray release. The DP was appalled as were film fans. The next Blu-ray was a total redo with Friedkin and the DP working together. The original color timing and the theatrical mono mix is on this Blu-ray. Friedkin changed his mind about recoloring his other films
There must be something more to this. Disney has plenty of movies that come with those warnings of offensive dated content, why would this be different? But also speaking on criterion, 15-20 years ago they sold me a “widescreen” DVD of Hard Boiled that was in a 4x5 letterbox format so on a 16x9 TV it plays as a tiny picture with massive empty black space taking up most of the screen. That was the last time I bought anything from criterion.
I can't imagine Friedkin cut a scene - especially if the scene no longer makes sense. I'd like to hear Friedkin confirm that he did "edit" the film. Maybe in a tweet.
Its getting to the point that Piracy is also becoming a form of preservation--especially for titles that never got a physical release.
Nope it's just stealing. If I go steal all the DVDs in Walmart claiming it's for preservation, I'm gonna be arrested. Why does it make it different when it's online? You're still robbing a company. Ppl who pirate are no better than shoplifters
So much is going to get lost as we move farther into better quality cause they don’t make a lot of say DVD’s into Blu-ray, same with 4k.
yeah well thats the only way you can watch the cut disney content as far as i know
This is exactly what I had to do with the 1971 British horror movie The Devils. The directors cut has never been released even 52 years later
Piracy has always been preservation funnily enough, the original Nosferatu wouldn't have survived to today without illegal copies
100% agree. We cannot erase things from history we don't like. It's a self-obsessed sickness we have picked up from social media, where you can mute, block or unfollow things you don't want to see. But that's not reality. We need to learn from the past, otherwise we end up making the same mistakes over and over. Cancellation and censorship is not a liberal value, it's a fascist value.
👏
I had never seen The French Connection but always wanted to. I heard about this controversy and found the dvd at a used media shop. It's really good and the censorship makes no sense for a 52 year old R rated movie that only Adults would watch anyway. It shouldn't be censored as it reflects the reality of the time.
I agree. Besides i think its narratively important. The movie is well aware of how it comes across and the character that Gene Hackman plays in the movie is a complete asshole. Its not done insensitively. Depiction does not mean endorsement.
Instead of censoring, we should just have conversations about why we don’t deem it as okay anymore, not that that’s how I feel entirely, but what I mean is how do we learn from history if we erase history. we should tell people about certain things like the scene they cut out from the film, otherwise people will just hear about how great the film was despite having a scene that everyone used to be okay with having in a movie if the goal is to change things for the better, but with all these changes to film, it feels like the goal is much more to pretend it never happen and sweep mistakes under the rug.
It reflects today's reality. Nothing has changed.
Yeah I agree with this
Agree with you completely Dan - this is setting a bad precedent for future movies being erased/"scrubbed" for things that people in charge of the rights deem "questionable" or "offensive." Even if I think some movies have too much sex, for instance, doesn't mean I have the right to strike it from the copies of movies other people have.
Except... you don't HAVE streaming content. You have ACCESS to streaming content. Big difference.
@@thedarkemissary That's the unfortunate painful part yeah. Streaming services and film companies/distributors will continue to have the rights to have their films removed at any point in time, since they still own the distributed streaming video and is not for the subscribers themselves to archive.
"The road to hell is covered with good intentions".
If people back then finally saw for the first time in art what until then was real but hidden from public view, how can hiding it now be anything other than reverting back to the notions of that era? That is exactly what they were doing back then.
The road to hell is “PAVED” with good intentions. I hate to be that person, but….
I find it funny how so many people want to censor the past, yet at every moment we bring up our racist past at every single moment. So which is it? Do we acknowledge the past or are we pretending it didn't happen?
@@MrDexter337 the racist present is key.
@@MrDexter337 It's not that simple, racism is in the US is a complex and layered issue. A isn't the same as B.
@@ZachBobBob You really didn't address anything other than make a word salad.
I agree with you Dan . As a historian, art shows a snapshot in time - that comes with the good and bad. We need to understand our past to learn grow from it . Not repeat it . What we find acceptable today could be deemed offensive tomorrow ( and it will ).
While Gene Hackman is still with us, I would love for him voice a forward or commentary explaining the context of this film and decisions behind the film, script and his memories of making the film. This is history that needs to be preserved.
Gene is big on Democratic party politics so very unlikely to differ from party approved tow line on social/sexual issues
@@mustafachoudhury3368 That is a totally ridiculous comment. I think that he would if he was in the health to do so. You are clearly not well educated as who democrats are and what they stand for in this era.
Hackman has stated that he didn't like many aspects of Popeye's personality but the logic behind at least as far as Friedkin Is concerned Is that this Is the whole point of the charácter. He Is a Man consumed by His pursue, in many ways Is like captain Ahab from Moby dick
@@lamecasuelas2 And maybe a complication of those interviews might be a good addition to the end of the movie.
@@mustafachoudhury3368 you'd think he doesn't have opinion of his own?
Thank you for posting this very informative video! I'm a brutha who is about as left as they come. And I was offended by the language -- but guess what? I was supposed to be offended by it. That was the whole point! And given what we know about policing in America, that language and racist attitude is typical of many police. The fact that Disney removed the scene is way more disturbing and offensive to me than its inclusion. The weak minds behind this decision to cut the scene should be ashamed of themselves. Final point: this is an R-rated movie for adults, not a kid's film. This censorship is sad and pathetic.
Dan, you are 100 percent right. This is the reason I refuse to get rid of my physical media. I want physical media to continue. I am glad to see many of these streaming companies in trouble, so they will be forced to keep producing physical media to make money.
This is one of the reasons why I love and collect physical media when it comes to movies. It hopefully keeps all the OG content from the movie and I don’t have to worry about it potentially leaving a streaming service permanently.
great video as always dan. i agree, censoring content sets a bad precedent for everyone and everything. history is history, regardless of how it makes people feel. hope william friedkin says something about this.
Excellent video. This type of action is dangerous. Companies stamp warning labels on everything. Cigarettes cause cancer but the ingredients stay the same the only change is a warning label.
I've gotta say, when you announced you'd do streaming news every other week I was kind of skeptical about there being much material or hot topics to discuss. But every episode since then has been straight fire, and it seems there's always spicy things to talk about so far. Love it
It's mostly cause streaming is a mess and bad for the film industry.
You have an amazing channel- huge respect 👍🏻
You’re our voice, Dan. Thanks a lot!
Completely agree, when art is censored based on what might be offensive, who decides where it stops
Censorship is never the answer. Thank you for bringing this to our attention.
Appreciate you fighting the good fight for physical media.
Complete agreement Dan. Censorship is a slippery slope. Another very well done video.
Its been obvious for forever that downloading/physical media would be the only way to truly preserve movies
Warner Brothers handles this issue really well with its old looney tunes cartoons, where they present a cartoon in its original form but has disclaimers saying the content reflected views of the time and those views do not reflect the views of the company or society today, but they warn that the content could be offensive to some viewers.
Again, I really enjoy how in depth you go in your research for all of your content. I have never seen The French Connection, but now I'm gonna be on the look out for an uncensored version whenever I go thirfting.
SUCH AN IMPORTANT VIDEO. You couldn't have underscored the paramount importance of film preservation any better (or any media for that matter) to ensure it be free from censorship. If this was indeed an intentional move by Disney we should ALL be concerned. 😮
Legitimately strong and persuasive editorial.
This underlines the dangers of having art/information concentrated and mediated by a few corporations. Whatever the motives were, it is unconscionable that any piece of art should be edited. Discussions around a controversial work, of course, need to happen but altering a piece of art without comment (or worse, lying about it) smacks of totalitarianism. We should never take for granted the freedom of expression achieved for us, as it can be too easily revoked.
Thank you for highlighting this issue, Dan.
Dan's perpetual tone of mild surprise about Bluey's success is so funny to me, bc anyone who even *knows* someone with a young kid knows that just how much parents and children adore (and depend on) that show
That show also had a scene deleted, because some people were offended.
@@miz4535 MANY deleted scenes, unfortunately.
Brilliant video as always Dan. I enjoyed the new library titles chart and the censorship discussion, it could definitely be a slippery slope.
Thanks for making the censorship lot clearer - lot of noise about this scene cut.
Nice to see Spider Verse getting lot of love on streaming/ downloads services
Look forward to next show
With Indiana Jones coming out could you imagine them trying to censor Temple of Doom?!
Awful. He is being sexist, but please keep the film as it is.
Just you wait, it'll be coming...
Thanks for speaking out Dan.
Great job. Thanks for speaking on this topic. And importance of owning physical media.
You have confirmed all my concerns I had when streaming first started.
I will say, I have seen The French Connection and yes, that scene confirms what black people already knew white people thought about us. They just pretend they don’t say it when they totally do.
(I am black. It’s nice not being gaslighted about racism in pop culture.)
EDIT: I was waiting to buy some blu-rays after buying a new blu-Ray player, but i will start buying blu-rays now.
Additional thought, if this edit stands, people can always claim that that character was never racist. Which…goes back to the racism gaslighting.
There's a lot of generalizations and assumptions in your comment. I can say I personally don't think that about black people at all. Black people are not a monolith and neither are white people. I am not sure if that is how you meant it to come across but for some reason I felt I wanted to say how I felt about it and how it affected me.
I definitely agree with the idea that if we don't acknowledge racism in history we are just going to stay stuck without growing past it.
@@Nawx7 Dude, your white fragility is showing. If you were confident in your self-proclaimed anti-racist beliefs, you wouldn't have felt the need to respond at all.
@@Nawx7 if you think I am saying white people are a monolith… maybe you need to do more research. Saying white people did not mean all white people. I can’t believe in 2023 this still has to be explained. (“Not all men, amitrite?”/s)
My family has worked with people with developmental disabilities. Most of them have communication challenges. But even then, some of the white ones know who to direct racial slurs to. Where do you think they learned it from? Many of them aren’t able to watch and listen to TV, movies, and music lyrics so it’s not coming from there.
Also many of my non-POC (aka white people) friends tell me what they hear from white people themselves. I live in a predominantly white town.
I just got a new computer and now that its fully setup I just wanted to say your intro/outro sounds amazing on the speaker that I got for it :D
Great job Dan thanks for bringing this to people's attention
Hi Dan! Your segment reminded me of comments Neil Gaiman made in response to people pirating his work, and how particularly in the streaming era digital media preservation is crucial because many shows and movies don't even get physical releases now.
Oh and BTW, am totally behind physical media. Just on a technical level, you get a pure video and audio output from a 4k disc without any compression from streaming.
Love that you made a whole video on this topic 👍
it's weird that they only censored the film on US and not any other regions, if they really thought they needed to edit that scene that the edit would propagate across their own streaming service first rather than the licensees
In US we’ve become so polarized and divided that it’s hypersensitivity. No one wants to light the match to blow up the proverbial powder keg.
Lol.. I just so this on Max today and watched just to see if it was edited. Came here right away to tell Dan but you beat me to it.
Agree with you dan 100% over the censorship issue
Disclaimers before running an older film are fine. Actually editing them is a problem.
Incredibly well-argued point of view. Thanks for bringing the discussion to light.
As a European I have to say: That's the most USA thing I could imagine
Just change it and tell no one, because it's our product.
You're right. A huge problem with 'commercial censorship' is that the license holders or distributors should be forced to state that the version in format ABC being shown in country XYZ on posters, physical media artwork and streaming details has been modified. However, this would require a global licensing rule be applied across countries and states. But such MPAA censorship has been happening for DECADES. Catch up.
Loved your [passsion in the first segment of this video! And also very well spoken!
I'm only 9 minutes in but I have to say that I have, as of so far, refused to repurchase the Star Wars original trilogy. I despise what has been done to them, even since I first saw them on UK TV which probably had some edits of their own. My original VHS releases and (imagine a tear, please) my definitive collection I once had on laserdisc were probably altered in some slight way as well. I hate not being able to see what I once paid to see and what caught my attention. Drew me in and made me love it.
I'm always grateful for alternate versions. Gives a great reason to re-watch a film just to see what has been changed but, that original print must remain. It was the original vision of the writer/director, or at least the best they could do to present it at that time, making it a time capsule, if you prefer. And it is likely to have been the origins of the viewers delight for the film.
If I paid to see a film and then paid to buy a re-playable copy of that film, I want the film I saw!
If I purchased the Mona Lisa but before it was set on my walls Leonardo decided to intercept it and turn it into a mountain landscape filled with CGI, IT IS NOT WHAT I PAID FOR!!! If, however, Leonardo added/included their new "vision" to the order then I'd be extremely happy to see what they had done at the time and what they had truly envisioned.
I want to have the opportunity to see the films as they were AND as they are. No artist/director should wish anything else. If they have improved on the original vision, then surely they'd be happy for people to see those improvements, for the paying public to witness the journey? There is no adventure if you are forced to start at the destination.
And so the same should be said of any film; French Connection included. The choice to see or not see should be ours: the viewers. If there are two, three or four versions of the same film then we should be responsible when choosing which we see. If the director has a preference then great! Everything should lead towards it. We would benefit knowing which was their preference, their vision. But they should not take from us what it was that made us care and want to know in the first place.
This is why I watch you Dan! Thanks for all the excellent work. I have many issues with this type of censorship, but most of all: if we whitewash history too much, people will lose an understanding of just how open and accepted prejudices used to be.
This type of censorship is regressive and divisive not to mention it muddies the historical record. A simple message/warning/apology if needed before the film is enough.
In 2005, the French Connection was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". With that, each title named to the Registry, the Library of Congress works to ensure that the film is preserved for all time, either through the Library's massive motion picture preservation program at Dayton, Ohio, or through collaborative ventures with other archives, motion pictures studios, and independent film makers.
You would think that it could NOT be edited after being added to the film registry and "preserved for all time".
Damn love when Dan gets passionately talking about something like this.
The French Connection is a on-off amazing movie. Deserves to remain as it was not to hide its uncomfortable scene that are honest to American (World) history.
The character of Popeye Doyle is not a hero, he’s an flawed, racist policeman, but one who goes beyond sanity to catch an international drug supplier, not simply arrest street dealers, to defend the victims of drug abuse. The film still has a lot to say today & you deserve to be uneasy about the ruthlessness of its main protagonist, when thinking about that debate.
Out of curiosity (and to the best of your knowledge), does Peacock separate viewing hours for The Office versus The Office: Superfan episodes? I wonder if it's statistically competing with itself by splitting the viewership (I'm currently on a rewatch of the series, but I'm watching the Superfan episodes as they contain deleted scenes).
This is insane. This is why they have movie ratings. So that adults can watch whatever movies they choose.
As someone with a modest classic movie channel myself - and just as a movie fan - I am very glad I have my own physical copies (dvds) of classic movies - and very disturbed (but not surprised) that this kind of cleansing witch hunt is taking place today. It started with Hans Solo firing his blaster a second later - but this is getting much more serious.
That is disgusting censorship. What is next? Censor everything that has racist language from the past? That is absurd. That is a disservice to the art.
So you're saying racism is art?
I know it wouldn't happen but I just pictured 12 years a Slave without slurs. You'd probably have to cut out half the film 😂
In all seriousness though a simple warning before the film or tv episode is sufficient in my opinion, rather than editing them, or removing them all together.
@@TrappyJenkins
Yes.
Racism exists and erasing traces of that is nothing more than denying history
@@TrappyJenkins Art can have racism in it. Many great movies and songs and shows have racial slurs in them. They would be less if they were subtracted.
@@rajangrewal7423 Same with every Quentin Taratino film.
Dan I consider myself a cinefile and I have a list of movies I have to watch The French Connection is one I had on that list, but to watch it uncut I am going to have to watch it on a piracy site...THAT is what censorship does! This is disgusting behaviour from whoever censored it. But Hey! Thanks for reminding me of this classic flick!
WTF that editing was a hatchet job. They at the very least could've made it seamless.
Buy Blurays people, before Disney takes the hatchet to them too.
*furiously starts to google what shirt Dan is wearing*
What’s next? Will the rights owner of Taxi Driver edit out language that they feel is offensive? Will they edit out portions of Jodi Foster’s character?
This is all just so absurd.
Thankfully no because it's owned by Sony.
@@MrBlue3rdyou never know these days. Sony might arbitrarily make a censorship decision.
By that logic, we should censor Django Unchained....how pathetic has society has become?
I have to believe you spend even MORE time and effort doing your content about streaming. Much appreciated!!
I've been looking forward to streaming charts😊
Never in my dreams did I think, that we would live in a world, where we would one day talk about censorship again and some art from decades ago would be actually censored... It just shows how radical things have become and how dangerous this new "movement" or whatever we want to call it is... It makes me sick.
it's not a movement. It's corporations wanting to make as much money as possible.
No it just shows how far we've come as a human race where we won't allow another race of ppl to get away with what they have done in the past. And you're obviously mad at it. Go outside and take a walk. Get some fresh air.
@@mania4270 oh look, another troll who obviously doesnt understand a thing 🙄😂
@@flow2333 projecting a bit
love your essays i think they are so important
Great stuff Dan, really enjoyed the discussion! I just have one question about the new streaming charts: Wouldn't Bluey count as a broadcast/library show because Australia broadcasts the episodes first and then Disney+ streams (and censors btw) the episodes a year or so later?
Loved the “Entourage” reference.
It's possible this movie and Gone with the Wind were singled out because of their awards. Other movies on Disney+ only had a disclaimer shown. There's a contingent who demand "better" of its winners, that they're supposed to be more than quality filmmaking. Also thanks Dan as always for bringing this up.
Thank you Dan! Totally agree on everything you said about the French Connection situation. And yeah, it sucks a bit to be on the same "side" as certain people but there is a bigger censorship issue that is pretty clear cut on this one.
And also I am a total fan of physical media. I am constantly badgering for a physical media version of "Hamilton" because what happens is Disney+ decided to vault it tomorrow. Streaming is nice and convenient, but for anything I love I want it on physical.
You are doing something very important here Dan, thank you.
Interesting. They just showed this movie on (I think) the Movies channel via Antenna. I watched a little bit of it and have no idea if they showed the complete movie. Gene Hackman is a great actor and enjoy watching his acting in his movies.
Take care.
So we get to see the Director's cut now? Wow, how cool!
I fully support the rights of directors (and technically whoever actually owns it) to provide versions of a film/show they deem suitable for whatever audience they are targetting , having TV and Plane versions make sense to me. However, I strongly feel that the original release version needs to be preserved and available for those who want to view that. Intermediate versions muddy the waters even more, especially in cases when a film was revised while still in release, but in my opinion that inital release is the point where the product intersected with the wider culture andneeds to be preserved.
This situation reminds me of a plot point on "Thank You For Smoking" (great movie BTW). The antagonist is a senator with a crusade against tobacco, and one of his ideas is to sign a law to mandate editing golden-age Hollywood films replacing all instances of smoking with lollipops, flutes, etc. When asked if that's not erasing history, he replies "No, I think it's *improving* history". Obviously it's satire and that ridiculousness is played for laughs but... here we are.
Just got back from my local thrift shop, and guess what I found in the DVD section... The French Connection!
Made sure to put it right in my basket.
Just last week I found and bought a copy of the French Connection at a used bookstore and it is still wrapped in the original plastic.
Another reminder that physical media is essential
Drew McWeeny: "I doubt profoundly that Friedkin went in just to cut nine seconds of language out of the movie."
Darrin Navarro, ACE (who edited Friedkin's Bug and Killer Joe): "I can assure you he did not."
Another instance of a director making a change, causing difficulty in finding the original version, are with some of Charlie Chaplin's films, specifically The Kid and Modern Times. It's difficult to find the original theatrical versions, only showing the director's cut, even though the theatrical ones are superior.
Nice to see Dan take a stand on this.
I couldn't agree more about changing films of the past
I have noticed that the streaming versions of JOHN WICK 1 2 3 have cut out some of the blood splatter also the new physical versions seem to have less blood. Part of the fantasy of John Wick is that he is deadly. Cutting down the blood is like taking Dracula’s fangs.
This should be incredibly distressing news to every film fan out there. Removing scenes from past movies just because they might offended people of today is a disgusting form of censorship that will inevitably destroy the preservation of classic films for future generations. Film fans need band together and be vocal about this. Thank you for talking about this Dan.
This is why I’ve started to buy more physical releases, this is insane.
This is why I automatically download all my iTunes purchases. They can change the streaming version but they can’t alter the version you already have downloaded on your hard disk. Eg I still have the old version of Toy Story 2 with the original Buena Vista logo and the Stinky Pete / Harvey Weinstein joke in the credits.
A movie about cops suggesting some cops are racist? We can't have that.
If it was a director’s cut, it would be on all Disney+ streaming services everywhere
Dan, I completely agree with you about the stealth editing of The French Connection. But I am curious how you feel about Disney's refusal to make certain films available at all. My late mother was 5 years old when she first watched Song of the South and she absolutely loved the music. A few weeks before she passed, she was in the hospital and asked if she could watch the movie. She couldn't. I completely understand why that film is controversial, but is it really any more offensive than Gone With The Wind? It's been many years since I watched either film, but it seems to me the biggest difference is that Gone With The Wind is much more beloved. But wouldn't an introduction similar to the one in front of Gone With The Wind be sufficient for Song of the South? The other film it seems Disney is determined to bury is The Devil and Max Devlin because Elliot Gould is just that controversial. Seriously though, I completely understand why they don't want to have a Bill Cosby movie on Disney+, but I still think it should be possible to watch it somewhere. What is your opinion?
Song of the South is a tricky situation because it’s aimed at kids. I don’t think it should be completely inaccessible. But I also think the intended audience should be able to understand the disclaimers that come with it and its historical context. So how do you do that with a kids film? I don’t think Disney has ever figured that out, which is why they just stuck it in the vault. There are other movies equally as problematic that are available (certainly many parts of Gone with the Wind and others) and I wish there was some effort to try figuring out how it could be available, if only for historical context and how stereotypes endured and were spread systematically. But I doubt that will be figured out any time soon.
@@DanMurrellMovies I had a social studies teacher in high school show us Birth Of A Nation, both the original "problematic" film and the original full-length film. That film has a disgusting message but is important to the study of film history and (I believe) an understanding of the attitudes of some people in the early 20th Century, including Woodrow Wilson. That film is easy to find though since it's in the public domain. But it didn't have any songs that my mother loved. But Song of the South will pass into the public domain on January 1, 1941. Coincidently, January 1st is my birthday. That will be a bittersweet 73rd birthday present for me. But if I am still around then, I think I'll watch it in her honor.
Dan..Thanks Much!.
Hope William Friedkin will issue response. Can’t imagine he would censor his own work. Especially such an important one. His legacy.
Well put.
"back" is a good synonym for "returned", and at 4 letters, might fit on a badge without abbreviation
Dan, do you get a cut of UA-cam Premium subscriptions from subscribers? Or is it better for you if viewers keep the regular ad version of UA-cam?
I get compensated for Premium subs who watch my videos, so whatever works best for you!
@@DanMurrellMovies OK, great! Thanks!
Friedkin was known to go back and recut some of his movies (notably The Exorcist) but I have a hard time believing that this truly is a “director’s edit”. It’s too bad that nobody was able to reach him in his final months to clarify. Maybe when the time is right, somebody should ask Sherry Lansing if she knows anything about this issue. RIP Mr. Friedkin.
“What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.”
What kills me about this is Friedkin’s whole position about making this film was to ingrain himself with real cops of that time to get the most realistic portrayal of that life. So what he made was essentially the truth of that time. Now, of course, people continue to try to erase reality.
Hey Dan, with you enjoy doing it I’ll always enjoy watching it, but I wanted to let you know that you can feel free to skip the charts recap for weeks where we didn’t have shows. I love these shows but I don’t see the delayed charts adding much to it.
I am really surprised at how well Black Panther has done on streaming. While there weren't cumulative numbers in Dan's charts last year, I don't remember Thor making much of a dent at all on movie streaming charts. Both did very similar box office numbers.
I will be interested to see how well The Mother holds in the Nielson charts because Netflix seems to acknowledge it doing well. I also think extraction could be huge.
Lastly, the numbers for the library shows are just astonishing to look at. Advertisers have to be looking at those in disbelief as Netflix continues its ad-tier. I don't have Netflix, but I wonder how they handle ads on cocomelon. Do they target the kid or the parent?
On the Hot Mic, Jeff Sneider said he dmed Friedkin about it but hadnt heard anything back.
I know there was contention between Friedkin and the Cinematographer on this film, which is why there is a director's version in physical media, but I believe the issue was mostly about color temperature.
Indeed. Friedkin had it in his mind to drain the color out of this film (and was going to do the same in his other films) and redid the color with horrible pastels. That was the first Blu-ray release. The DP was appalled as were film fans. The next Blu-ray was a total redo with Friedkin and the DP working together. The original color timing and the theatrical mono mix is on this Blu-ray. Friedkin changed his mind about recoloring his other films
There must be something more to this. Disney has plenty of movies that come with those warnings of offensive dated content, why would this be different?
But also speaking on criterion, 15-20 years ago they sold me a “widescreen” DVD of Hard Boiled that was in a 4x5 letterbox format so on a 16x9 TV it plays as a tiny picture with massive empty black space taking up most of the screen. That was the last time I bought anything from criterion.
I can't imagine Friedkin cut a scene - especially if the scene no longer makes sense. I'd like to hear Friedkin confirm that he did "edit" the film. Maybe in a tweet.
Loved the reference to Entourage!