Today in the "I Shoulda Known" Department, we have this: Last night after watching the great Blake Edwards documentary on PBS, I noted how one of his films I'd never seen — Wild Rovers (1971) — was reportedly ruined by studio interference. Studio Head (though not for long) James Aubrey severely hacked down its length, enraging Mr. Edwards such that he packed up his family and moved to Switzerland to get away from H*O*L*L*Y*W*O*O*D. I asked which home video release restored the film to the way its maker wanted it…and here comes the "I Shoulda Known" part…
This morning, I received this message from my real good friend, Mike Schlesinger. Mike used to work for Sony where his job basically came down to knowing which great old movies they owned and telling them how to market them for current moviegoers. Here's what Mike wrote me…
As the person who actually did "restore" it, I can tell you that the Aubrey version runs 109 minutes and Blake's version runs 137 minutes. That's the surest way to know which one you're watching. AFAIK, all releases from Laserdisc forward have been Blake's.
I put "restore" in quotes because it turns out there was one "international" negative that somehow escaped Aubrey's slimy hands, and I simply made the new prints from that. It was later used to preserve his cut.
Fun fact: This is also how I rescued Ken Russell's The Boy Friend.
And Mike didn't mention it but he also did the same thing with another Blake Edwards film, Darling Lili. I'd long thought that Edwards' later film, S.O.B. — which is about a director fighting back when his movie is destroyed by a studio head — was mostly about Darling Lili. Turns out, it was more of an amalgam of the two experiences…and Mike was also involved with Edwards getting to recut Darling Lili for home videos years after its butchering for general release. Amazingly, the Director' Cut in this case was shorter.
Amazon is offering a Blu-Ray of Wild Rovers and they say it's two hours and 17 minutes…so that would be the Edwards restoration. I just ordered a copy of it and while I may not get around to watching it right away, I will. You can click that link and get your own copy and if we both enjoy it, we'll have Mike Schlesinger to thank. Oh — and maybe Blake Edwards, too.