10 Director's Cuts That Changed Your Mind About Bad Movies
4. Brazil
As with Blade Runner, the studio-approved cut of Terry Gilliam's cult classic Brazil is so awful that it's all but been forgotten in favour of his 142-minute final cut.
Gilliam argued extensively with Universal chairman Sid Sheinberg on the edit, resulting in Sheinberg assembling a 94-minute "Love Conquers All" cut. In this version, the adult content is toned down, Gilliam's trademark surrealism is largely stripped away, and the bleak original ending is removed in favour of a recontexualised, happy coda sequence.
Ultimately Gilliam did win out against Sheinberg, with his 142-minute version being released in Europe while America received an abridged 132-minute cut. The Love Conquers All version aired periodically on U.S. TV thereafter, though, and has since become available on home video.
If that's the first version of the movie you were unlucky enough to see, the differences between it and Gilliam's final cut are absolutely astonishing.
The 142-minute film is a bravura, beautiful dystopian fable, while Sheinberg's ultra-broad version feels like a long-form parody of studio-mandated interference.