Depending on who you ask, Event Horizon is either a minor cult classic or B-movie garbage. Us? Well, we certainly won’t say it’s a shining gem in the horror genre, but it is a bloody good time and a wholly enjoyable watch with some excellent visuals, despite its shortcomings. Paul W.S. Anderson’s space horror flick has a pretty passionate fanbase and no matter where you stand in regards to how it holds up all these years later, or even how it played upon release, it’s hard not to wonder how the fabled Director’s Cut would have turned out.
Yes, as most people know, there’s a longer and far more bloody cut of the film floating around somewhere, one that when it was screened for test audiences back in the day, some people fainted from all the gruesome gore and violence. Obviously, the studio ordered that most of the bloody footage be removed for the theatrical release and while the version we got is far from kid-friendly, it’s also not how Anderson originally envisioned things. As such, fans have been wondering for years now when we’ll get to see the original cut. And the answer, unfortunately, is never.
While speaking with Crave Online, the director explained that the reason you haven’t seen the extra footage yet is simply because it doesn’t exist anymore.
There was a lot more that was shot that isn’t in the movie. But you’ll never see the messed up version because we made Event before the kind of DVD revolution. You know, DVD ushered in this era when you had to have additional footage, deleted scenes, things like that. There was no call for that back when we were just doing VHS cassettes and LaserDiscs. So the material just wasn’t archived very well, and since the movie became a big cult classic, Paramount have asked us to come back in and do different versions and we looked for the material, and it just doesn’t exist.
So, there you have it. Don’t hold your breath to see that Director’s Cut because, as Anderson says, it’s not there. That’s definitely a shame, as this is probably the filmmaker’s best effort behind the camera and it would have been great to be able to see what Event Horizon looked like originally, before the studio and censors stepped in.
According to Wikipedia, the deleted footage contained a number of extra scenes, including a longer version of the “bloody orgy,” where “real-life amputees were used for special effects scenes in which crew members on the ship were mutilated, and porn actors were hired to make the sex and rape scenes more realistic and graphic.” Sounds pretty gruesome, but definitely something that fans would have liked to have seen.
Alas, it just wasn’t meant to be, and it seems like we’ll always be left to wonder what could have been had Paul W.S. Anderson been able to release Event Horizon in its original cut.