Editing Heaven's Gate (film) (section)

==Versions of the film==
There are several different versions of the film:

# Workprint cut: 325 minutes
#* Print for studio executives, early 1980
# Initial "Premiere" Release: 219 minutes
#* Cinema release, November 1980, aborted after 1 week
#* Shown on Z Channel cable, 1982, as "The Director's cut"
#* Released on VHS and LaserDisc by MGM as "The Legendary Uncut Version," later released on DVD in 2000
# Director's Second edit: 149 minutes<ref>{{cite web|title=''HEAVEN'S GATE'' (X)|url=https://www.bbfc.co.uk/releases/heavens-gate-1970-1|archive-url=https://archive.today/20130504223143/http://www.bbfc.co.uk/releases/heavens-gate-1970-1|url-status=dead|archive-date=May 4, 2013|work=[[British Board of Film Classification]]|date=July 3, 1981|access-date=April 7, 2014}}</ref>
#* Wide cinema release, April 1981
#* Released on DVD in France and the Netherlands
# Radical Cut: 219 minutes<ref>{{cite web|title=''Heaven's Gate'' (15) (!)|url=https://www.bbfc.co.uk/releases/heavens-gate|work=[[British Board of Film Classification]]|date=March 27, 2013|access-date=April 7, 2013|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130331033025/http://www.bbfc.co.uk/releases/heavens-gate|archive-date=March 31, 2013}}</ref>
#* 2005 special screening in Paris and New York
#* Reassembled by MGM with available high-quality footage (using alternative footage where required)
# Digitally restored Director's Cut: 216 minutes
#* Restored in 2012 for the 69th Venice Film Festival, followed by a BD & DVD release.
#* Based on the initial release with the intermission removed and slightly shortened.
#* This cut removes the cinematography's sepia tint which is present on all previous versions.

===Workprint cut, premiere cut and an alternative cut===
Notwithstanding the 325-minute "workprint" cut shown to executives in June 1980, Cimino had rushed through post-production and editing to meet his contractual requirements to United Artists, and to qualify for the 1980 [[Academy Awards]].<ref name = Doc/> The version screened at the November 1980 premiere ran three hours and 39 minutes. Bridges joked that Cimino had worked on the film so close to the premiere that the print screened was still wet from the lab.<ref name=Doc/>

After the aborted one-week premiere run in New York, Cimino and United Artists pulled the film; Cimino wrote an open letter to the studio that was printed in several trade papers blaming unrealistic deadline pressures for the film's failure.<ref name="Egan">{{cite news|last=Egan|first=Jack|title=Bombs Away|access-date= March 13, 2012 |date=December 8, 1980|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_eQCAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA16|page=16}}</ref> United Artists reportedly also hired its own editor to try to edit Cimino's footage into a releasable film with no real success.<ref name=Egan/>

Ultimately, Cimino's second edited version, a 149-minute version, premiered in April 1981 and was the only cut of the film screened in wide release. The original negative for the longer version no longer exists because it was directly edited for the 149-minute version ([[Separation masters|YCM separation masters]] of the longer version were used as the source for the Criterion Collection release).  This cut of the film is not just shorter but differs radically in the placement of scenes and selection of takes.<ref name=Wood/> This version, after leaving theaters, was not released on home video of any kind in the United States but was later released on DVD in France ("la Porte du Paradis"). This version has also aired on the MGM HD cable channel and was available free-with-ads on US streaming provider [[Tubi]] from March to November 2017.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://blog.tubi.tv/2017/03/07/tubi-tvs-march-free-movie-arrivals/|title=Watch Free Movies at Tubi TV: What's New for March 2017|website=blog.tubi.tv}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.cordcuttersnews.com/everything-free-tubi-tv-november-2017/|title=Here is Everything FREE on Tubi TV in November 2017|website=cordcuttersnews.com|date=November 3, 2017 }}</ref>

In 1982, [[Z Channel]] aired the 219-minute 1980 premiere version of the film on cable television – the first time that the longer version was widely exhibited – and which Z Channel dubbed the "director's cut." As critic [[F.X. Feeney]] noted in the documentary ''[[Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession]]'', Z Channel's broadcast of ''Heaven's Gate'' first popularized the concept of a "director's cut."<ref>Cassavetes, Xan (director), Feeney, F.X. (critic). (2004). ''Z: A Magnificent Obsession''. [Film]. [[Independent Film Channel|IFC]].</ref>

When MGM (which acquired the rights to United Artists's catalog after its demise) released the film on [[VHS]] and [[videodisc]] in the 1980s, it released Cimino's 219-minute cut with the tagline "''Heaven's Gate'' ... The Legendary Uncut Version." Subsequent releases on [[LaserDisc]] and [[DVD]] have contained only the 219-minute cut.

Due to the wide availability of the 219-minute 1980 premiere version of ''Heaven's Gate'' and its frequent labeling as either "uncut" or the "director's cut," Cimino insisted that the so-called "original version" did not fully correspond to his intentions and that he was under pressure to bring it out for the predetermined date and did not consider the film ready, making even the 219-minute version essentially an "unfinished" film.<ref name=Wood/>

The 216-minute version shown in Venice is quite similar to the 219-minute version, but with no intermission. Some shots in the second part are slightly shorter and a shot with a single line has been cut (just after John Hurt is beaten by Sam Waterston).

===149-minute cut===
In the 149-minute version of ''Heaven's Gate'' released in 1981, the following scenes are cut:<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.indiewire.com/2014/04/directors-cut-10-theatrical-versions-vs-the-filmmakers-final-vision-87520/|title=Director's Cut: 10 Theatrical Versions Vs. The Filmmaker's Final Vision|first1=The Playlist|last1=Staff|date=April 2, 2014|access-date=March 21, 2019|archive-date=March 21, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190321194510/https://www.indiewire.com/2014/04/directors-cut-10-theatrical-versions-vs-the-filmmakers-final-vision-87520/|url-status=dead}}</ref>
* Irvine's speech at the Harvard graduation
* The co-ed circle dancing immediately following graduation
* Averill beating up the brute enforcer (who beats up the immigrant in front of his wife and children)
* Averill passing the beaten man's widow in the carriage, asking her how she's doing
* The spitting fight between the two immigrant landowners in the cockfight scene
* The entire roller skating dance scene
* A shot of female immigrants carrying a load up the hill
* Champion almost shooting the stock grower that insults Ella Watson
* The scene where Ella Watson first leaves Champion to return to Averill
* The introductory part of the scene where Averill reads the names on the "death list" (the edited version starts with John Bridges firing the gun in the air, to restore order)
* Averill weeping to Bridges that he "hates getting old," while looking at the old photo of himself and his girlfriend
* The immigrants being informed that Averill quit his post, and Watson warning them the stock growers have arrived
* The last five or so minutes of the second battle scene, including the footage of the character crushed under the wagon and the woman killing him in mercy
* That same woman killing herself after the battle, and Bridges and Averill surveying the carnage
* Any reference to the woman on the boat, presumably Averill's girlfriend or wife, from the end of the film

===2005 radical cut===
In 2005, MGM released the film in selected cinemas in the United States and Europe.<ref name="Macnab">{{cite news|last=Macnab|first=Geoffrey|title=Heaven Can Wait|url=https://www.theguardian.com/film/2005/feb/23/1|access-date= March 13, 2012| work = [[The Guardian]] |date= February 23, 2005}}</ref> The 219-minute cut was reassembled by MGM archivist John Kirk, who reported that large portions of the original negative had been discarded, making this an all-new radical version using whatever alternative available scenes that could be found.<ref name=Macnab/> The restored print was screened in [[Paris]] and presented to a sold-out audience at New York's [[Museum of Modern Art]] with a live introduction by Isabelle Huppert.<ref>[http://www.ecranlarge.com/article-details_c-interview-167.php "Michael Cimino – Paris ''Heaven's Gate'' Master class"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110614094557/http://www.ecranlarge.com/article-details_c-interview-167.php |date=June 14, 2011 }}. ecranlarge.com. Retrieved November 18, 2010.</ref> Because the project was commissioned by then-MGM executive [[Bingham Ray]], who was ousted shortly thereafter, the budget for the project was cut and a planned wider release and DVD never materialized, with the project since being abandoned altogether.<ref name=Macnab/>

===2012 digitally restored Director's Cut===
In 2012, MGM released yet another version, digitally restored and 216 minutes long. It premiered at the [[2012 Venice Film Festival]] as part of the Venice Classics series.<ref>Drees, Rich (August 31, 2012). [http://www.filmbuffonline.com/FBOLNewsreel/wordpress/2012/08/31/cimino-premiers-216-minute-cut-of-heavens-gate-at-venice-film-festival/ "Cimino Premiers 216-Minute Cut of Heaven's Gate at Venice Film Festival"]. FilmBuffOnline. Retrieved September 6, 2012.</ref><ref>Lang, Brett (July 26, 2012). [https://www.thewrap.com/movies/article/venice-film-festival-unveils-line-films-malick-de-palma-and-demme-49411 "Venice Film Festival Unveils Line-Up with Films from Malick, De Palma and Demme"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181208140834/https://www.thewrap.com/movies/article/venice-film-festival-unveils-line-films-malick-de-palma-and-demme-49411/ |date=December 8, 2018 }}. The Wrap. Retrieved July 27, 2012.</ref>

[[The Criterion Collection]] released the restored 216-minute version on [[Blu-ray Disc]] and DVD on November 20, 2012. This "Director's Cut" was personally supervised by Michael Cimino and Joann Carelli. Cimino explains in the special features portion of the DVD that this is his preferred version of the film, and he feels it is the complete version that he intended to make.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Andrews |first1=Nigel |title='Heaven's Gate': the restored director's cut |url=https://www.ft.com/content/9a7d72e0-f8fd-11e2-86e1-00144feabdc0 |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221210/https://www.ft.com/content/9a7d72e0-f8fd-11e2-86e1-00144feabdc0 |archive-date=December 10, 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |newspaper=[[The Financial Times]]|date=August 2, 2013 }}</ref><ref>[https://www.criterion.com/films/28036-heaven-s-gate The Criterion Collection]</ref>

=== 2014 Steven Soderbergh's "The Butcher's Cut" ===
On April 21, 2014, director, cinematographer, and editor [[Steven Soderbergh]] released an unofficial alternate cut of ''Heaven's Gate'' via his website extension765.com, under his pseudonym Mary Ann Bernard. Soderbergh's version, which runs 108 minutes, is dubbed "The Butcher's Cut".<ref name=":0" /><ref>{{Cite web |title=HEAVEN'S GATE: THE BUTCHER'S CUT |url=https://extension765.com/blogs/soderblog/heavens-gate-the-butchers-cut |access-date=2024-01-28 |website=extension765.com}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Adams |first=Sam |date=2014-04-22 |title=Steven Soderbergh Cuts "Heaven's Gate" Down to Size |url=https://www.indiewire.com/features/general/steven-soderbergh-cuts-heavens-gate-down-to-size-126588/ |access-date=2024-01-28 |website=IndieWire |language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=mrbeaks |title=Steven Soderbergh Takes A Cleaver To Michael Cimino With HEAVEN'S GATE: THE BUTCHER'S CUT! |url=http://legacy.aintitcool.com/node/67024 |access-date=2024-01-28 |website=Aint It Cool News |language=en}}</ref>