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Comparison between the edited DVD version (reissue) and the Blu-ray version ("Unrated Director's Cut")
- 1 alteration - No difference in running time The home cinema release for this great thriller had to be digitally altered because a sculpture had been found to be too similar to one of the artist Frederick Hart, as mentioned in our previous comparison regarding this movie. In September 2012, the movie was released on Blu-ray for the first time. The announcement of an "Unrated Director's Cut" as well as the reappearance of the red banner that could be found on the first issue DVDs with the original theatrical version raised hopes for the use of the original footage including the sculpture:
The cover of the German Blu-ray does not announce any alternative movie version, therefore we will compare these different releases:  US Blu-ray ("Unrated Director's Cut")
German Blu-ray
(German) DVD Reissue (Altered sculpture)
US first DVD issue (Theatrical Version)
These are the results of this comparison: 1. The US and German Blu-rays are identical, the "Unrated DC" advertisement is actually only confusing here. It is rather probably that Warner released the same BD in other countries as well, as this is usual company practice. 2. The Blu-ray version does not feature the original footage of the wall sculpture!. The partially alternative shots of the reissue DVDs have been used again as well. There are also no other extensions that would justify an "Unrated" version, e.g. more nude scenes of Charlize Theron or Connie Nielsen. On the contrary, it seems that the announcement on the US BD mainly means that it does not contain the original R-Rated version. 3. However, there is at least one alteration in comparison to the reissue, even though it does not result in any running time difference, which could maybe be used to justify the title "Director's Cut". An almost 10 seconds long shot of the sculpture was altered again. Originally, there had been some camera tracking to the faces on the statue, which had looked a bit weird in the new version without these faces. Now, the camera movement has been slowed down, it also only moves straight upwards. It is of course doubtful whether this really alters the viewer experience. The original sculpture would have been better, but the new BD, which is also not very expensive from the start, beats the old DVD in terms of picture quality by far. Note: The last German TV broadcast of the movie also featured this new alteration, it does not seem to be very exclusive. Running time designations are formatted like this German DVD (PAL) / Blu-ray Logos
The BD features a newer version of the Warner logo. BD 2 sec longer
47:48-47:57 / 49:53-50:02 After some shots which were identical (altered) in the background, there is a difference in a close-up. The visible part of the picture is different, but the main difference is the missing camera movement (up and right, then up and left) in the Blu-ray version, which has been replaced by a small movement straight upwards. The pictures show the movement, visible are the frames #1/50/100/150/200 of both version.
As a reminder: The original scene looked like this:
Lastly a pure image comparison with other scenes showing the sculpture. Besides the differences concerning quality and colors, this is supposed to show that the versions do not differ besides the one mentioned alteration. There are also pictures from two scenes that show the color differens the most. These are from minutes 50 an 63 (PAL DVD) resp. 52 and 66 (Blu-ray).
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