Fans of the 1984 romantic comedy Splash can stream the movie right now on Disney Plus. But many were shocked to discover upon watching it that the Mouse House has edited a scene in the film.
The scene in question features stars Tom Hanks and Daryl Hannah on a beach. Hannah walks up to Hanks, kisses him and then runs into the ocean. The shot is from Hanks’ perspective and shows Hannah’s backside as she dives into the water.
But if you watch the scene closely, you’ll notice her hair is unusually long and that it covers her entire butt. Yes, Disney went ahead and added CGI hair to the scene to cover up the nudity and many fans took to Twitter to complain about the edited version.
i remember seeing that movie as a kid in the theater with my family and i turned into a junkie and burglar and murderer after seeing that butt. good on them to protect america's children with an anal mirkin
— Doktor Ross Sewage MD (@sewage666) April 13, 2020
https://twitter.com/empire_of_dust_/status/1249809272357163008
Also, despite @disneyplus giving “Splash” the higher rating (PG-13), they still censored the female nudity. pic.twitter.com/H7FqhO7UeB
— Rachel (@rlisakowitz) April 13, 2020
So Disney+ went through the effort to digitally cover nudity in Splash, but left Bart’s junk uncensored on the Simpsons movie, despite a censored version already existing.
— weirdotzero.bsky.social (@WeirdoTZero) April 13, 2020
https://twitter.com/IconWitch/status/1249890315986747395
It's minor, but I hate when things like that are censored in movies after the fact. At least they didn't change "My life's a living–" "Hello, little buddy!"
It's not as bad as how they censored Splash. They did some heavy reframing and VFXing on some scenes in that.
— Mixed Nuts Mikey (@MixedNutsMikey) April 8, 2020
Disney is king right now when it comes to movies. They own Marvel, Pixar and also an entire library of Fox films. And they aren’t afraid to edit some of their content. A post-credits scene from Toy Story 2 featuring Stinky Pete ogling two Barbie dolls is nowhere to be found, and the 1946 film, Song of the South, isn’t available at all on the streaming service due to it featuring scenes perpetuating racial stereotypes.
That example makes sense. But editing that moment from Splash is completely unnecessary. After all, if you watch the original version, her hair still covers up her backside and you have to look really closely to see anything.
Disney wants to project an image of wholesomeness and family and that’s fine. They’re obviously doing something right being the most powerful movie studio on the planet. But this is taking things a bit too far. This scene in Splash isn’t sexual in any way and if anything, it’ll probably just drive kids to seek out the original shot.
While it’s true that if you watch a movie on cable it’s edited for content, in the world of streaming, there really isn’t any of that going on. It’s up to parents to utilize parental locks. Disney is going one step further though by altering or censoring scenes themselves and this is really where the anger and frustration comes from. Not giving their customers the ability to make the decision on their own.