original version in theater
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Murder by Death
appleimacdude — 13 years ago(September 23, 2012 09:05 PM)
I saw a reference to deleted scenes that were found on you tube - I was thinking the same thing - that the scenes that were listed as "deleted" were shown in the theater originally if I remember correctly.
I remember seeing Dr Watson and Holmes for example, in the theater version at the end of the movie, and the scene with Dick Charles leaving Miss Skeffington to continue walking 5 miles to get gasoline - -
warren_houghton — 13 years ago(September 28, 2012 11:18 PM)
I'm almost positive I saw the movie in the theater when it was released, and I never saw the Sherlock Holmes bit or other little scenes I've since seen on Youtube. Of course I've owned the movie for YEARS on VHS then DVD, so it's possible I just forgot about them. But something I read somewhere recently on the net said that the cast felt upstaged by Sherlock Holmes coming in at the end and solving it so it was dropped. I think these scenes just got edited out of the finished product before release.
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ghostfan — 12 years ago(July 30, 2013 11:29 PM)
Nope Holmes and Watson definitely weren't in the theatrical release, which is too bad, because I've been a Holmes nut since I was ten. I liked the movie, but I had read that they were going to be in it, and I was very disappointed when they weren't!
Further complicating things, one of the first times I saw it on TV there they were again. I taped the movie that time around, and lost the Sherlock Ending again because I recorded it on Beta, and we know how long that lasted!
really wish I knew how to splice the missing scenes into the version I have now!
How sad, that you were not born in my time, nor I, in yours. -
VinnieRattolle — 12 years ago(September 17, 2013 01:35 AM)
I'm a tad too young to have caught it in theaters so I don't know how big of a release it got, but theatrical runs were different in that era movies didn't open on 10,000 screens on the same day. A number of prints were struck and they circulated to theaters from region to region. That's why you don't see "Starting March 22 at a theater near you" on old trailers on DVD; a local TV announcer would say that at the end when the movie played in your area. Holmes and Watson were copyrighted characters, so it's plausible that their footage was cut partway into it's theatrical run. This would explain why some remember the scene and others don't. Another example would be the 1978 flop "Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," which had to be altered after its release because Peter Frampton was contracted to have billing above the Bee Gees and it was issued reversed. Frampton sued, it was corrected then he blamed the film for ruining his entire career.
As for the TV version, it was common practice in those days for alternate TV versions to be prepared which omitted sex/nudity/profanity, and deleted footage often compensated for the censored scenes and/or padded the running time. This practice was still in place through the late 90s when TV ratings were finally established (Carrie, The Private Eyes, Halloween 2, The Breakfast Club, Mallrats and both big-screen Brady Bunch movies are a few examples of films with extra TV footage) but sadly those additional bits seldom surface on home video. If there really was some initial debate over the Holmes characters, chances are good that the editor of the TV cut didn't know anything about it. -
bloody-3 — 10 years ago(August 26, 2015 09:49 AM)
I saw this at the cinema when it came out in 1976 but I honestly couldn't remember the ending. Then in 2000 I rented it on vhs from a video store and the Sherlock Holmes/Dr Watson ending was included. Now 2 days ago I watched the dvd and that ending is not included. If its a copyright thing then why was it allowed on video but not dvd?