The Alter in Alternate
A lot of time in films, alternate scenes can be put into the finished running time in order to flesh out the running time. This could easily have been the case with Lethal Weapon (1987) since Mel Gibson had filmed a few scenes which worked as standalone stories (or rather isolated incidents) where each one could serve as the introduction to his character, Martin Riggs. Just focusing on two of these scenes, I think that the fight in the bar could have been his intro in the Hong Kong version whereas the sniper at the school could have been the intro in the Australian version. In some cases, you film different versions of the same scene so as to gauge the reactions of audiences in different test screenings.
Alien (1979) had negative test screenings supposedly because of the film being originally more violent. While this is true, there were also issues of how to present the xenomorph i.e. choosing between “less is more” like Jaws (1976) or showcasing the full features since the xenomorph’s design was the main selling point. In terms of narrative, different characters doing the same thing can elicit different reactions. There was a scene where it was Lambert instead of Ripley who had the conversation with Ash about noticing a dark patch over Kane’s lungs on the scanner. Had both versions of this scene been included, it would have made the film seem like a black comedy. Speaking of tone, there were two versions of Ripley wanting Brett and Parker to fix a mechanical problem. One conversation had playful banter whereas the other was serious.
With mystery movies, you don’t want to repeat a certain idea or people will twig about what the plot twist is. There are two scenes in Alien where Ripley raises suspicion about Ash. In one scene, she discusses it with Dallas. In another, she discusses it with Lambert. Had the people behind the film got enough money to film the scene where Ash sabotages the plan for the xenomorph to be blown out through the airlock, both dialogue scenes would have been removed because you don’t want telegraphing in a mysterious thriller. In an ideal world, both dialogue scenes wouldn’t have been filmed at all. Half of the airlock scene was filmed because having Ripley and Lambert listen to Parker’s voice on the intercom talk about seeing the xenomorph was a foreshadowing of having Ripley listen to Lambert and Parker talk on the intercom about seeing it.
This type of mirroring is why Brett’s death being refilmed changed how Parker’s death was filmed. The xenomorph uses both hands to make Brett’s head bleed but then originally uses only one hand to do the same to Parker. There was an attempt on YouTube to combine all of the footage involving the final scene of Parker and Lambert but the YouTuber didn’t realize that some of the footage was supposed to be for alternate versions. In one version, Lambert hears the xenomorph but doesn’t see it when it first comes to her attention. In another version, we see the xenomorph crawl like a crab to her after it shows her how flexible its tail is. There were even different versions of the xenomorph rising up to tower over her.
Generally in filmmaking, you will film different versions of the same scene or even different scenes (i.e. new location and characters) with the same message because there are different ways for a story to progress. Some call it same difference, others call it the difference between different markets in different territories. Alternatively, you never know what idea works best until you hash it out. Hence why Arnold Schwarzenegger had four different one-liners to say after he killed the villain in Commando (1985). Twentieth Century Fox, the studio behind Alien, had an opportunity to release four different versions of Commando i.e. one for Europe, one for Australia, one for the U.S. and the remaining version for Canada.
Enter the Dragon is a failure of editing yet a financial success nonetheless. There were three different scenes explaining why Lee had to go to Han’s Island in order to attend the tournament. In one scene, he is approached by a member of British intelligence to bust a drugs ring run by Han. In another, he is called upon by his local abbot to restore the honour of the Shaolin temple by punishing the renegade monk for an obscure reason. The other motivation is that an old family friend confesses that Lee’s sister committed suicide because of an affiliate of Han. There are too many coincidences, and it’s telling that the abbot scene was (for over 20 years) only available in the Asian version…but not at the expense of the other two scenes.
The movie was conceived as an attempt to combine the martial arts and spy genres, so only the British spy motive should have been used. Part of the problem with the convolution is that producer Raymond Chow knew that Bruce Lee was going to leave the Golden Harvest film company, so he needed a contingency plan. This is why the suicidal sister plot was put into the movie as insurance so that Golden Harvest could use Angela Mao to piggyback off the impending success of Bruce’s first American starring role. This never came into fruition because mainstream America never really warmed up to the idea of a female martial arts movie star until decades later. Had Bruce’s character had a murdered brother played by Carter Wong then there would have been a different turn of events.
Since Hong Kong was a British colony, it was a bad idea to have the Hong Kong version still depict Lee as someone who was working for the British government. Sensing that this would alienate his local fanbase, Golden Harvest set about filming an alternate version of the movie where the Chinese characters didn’t speak English. Due to the messy nature of the production, the plan didn’t stick. One such alternate scene involved Lee telling his sister’s attacker, Oharra, to leave his room after Lee is told that he must attend the morning ritual in uniform. There was already a scene filmed where Lee was informed about this by one of Han’s Chinese men at the tournament.
Before the new scene with Bob Wall was filmed, the narrative structure was different in that the movie was not going to begin with Bruce Lee fighting Sammo Hung in front of a crowd of Buddhist monks. This means that the audience would have waited for over half an hour to see Lee fight. The movie was originally going to begin with the scenes showing Roper and Williams in different parts of America, then we would see Lee being approached by Braithwaite in China. When it was decided to repurpose those American scenes as flashbacks for the trio’s individual sampan trips, the fight with Sammo could have been a flashback meant to show why Braithwaite had confidence in Lee. Alas, it was not to be.
What makes Enter the Dragon become a failure of editing is that you can tell that the narrative structure had been changed. Initially, the first day of the tournament had Han wearing a navy blue jacket whereas the second day was where he wore a brown one. As you might gather, the finished version has continuity errors. On that first day (after the banquet night), Han initiated the tournament and commanded Bolo to execute guards who failed in their jobs for their actions (or lack thereof) on the previous night. In the novelization (based on an earlier draft), the tournament fights with Williams, Roper and Lee had happened on the second day. In its current form, the first day goes from initiation to Williams fighting Parsons. Then on the second day, Bolo executes the guards, Han tries to intimidate Williams, and Lee fights Oharra. This explains why we can still see Parsons during the execution but not during Lee’s fight with Oharra.
With the exception of Lee, all the tournament fighters had worn yellow uniforms. Because no tournament fighting was meant to happen on that first day, it made the day seem anticlimactic. It would appear that Bruce picked up on this because there are photos and behind-the-scenes footage of Lee fighting a yellow-costumed fighter played by Yuen Wah, who was meant to be only seen during that first day. The rationale for the fight is that Lee has disregarded the tournament’s rule for uniform protocol. When Lee wins, he is presumably free to wear whatever he likes. There is an interview that Yuen Wah did where he confirmed that he went to Bruce’s house to coordinate a sequence. Since Lee only wears a brown suit on the first tournament day, and a white suit on the second tournament day, my theory holds up.
