There’s a reason why the biggest, most famous filmmakers in the world all want “final cut” of their movies. It’s because they don’t want anyone, least of all a studio executive, to have an impact on their vision. More often than not, when studios meddle in editing, it’s to make films shorter. However, the exact opposite happened on the new Jurassic film, Jurassic World Rebirth.
Rebirth started shooting in June 2024, finished in October 2024 and, right after Christmas, director Gareth Edwards was ready to show a cut to the studio. “I was determined to do a film that was under two hours,” Edwards told io9. “And so we showed this one hour 59 [minute] cut to the studio. And essentially their note was like, ‘Great, could you put the five minutes that you cut out back in?’ And so we put those five minutes back in, and it was essentially the movie.”
Which isn’t to say nothing hit the cutting room floor. Though there was a very tight turnaround, especially for a blockbuster of this size, Edwards said there are three deleted scenes that will probably be available with the home release. Two he was fine with cutting. One he was very torn about.
“I really wanted [it] to stay in the movie,” Edwards said. “I really liked it. And that was a kill-your-baby sort of moment. I won’t ruin it for people, but there’s a section out the front of the gas station that used to be a little bit more like being hunted. The tension of something coming. And it was a note from [writer] David Koepp, which was essentially, the third act, if you give it a name, it would be ‘Run like hell.’ And so basically once they started running, it was like, don’t make them stop. And it felt like it stopped again. And so we removed that idea, those beats, and it got a lot better. But I do really like what happened in the bit where they did stop. And that will be on the extras.”
See each and every moment of Jurassic World Rebirth when it comes to theaters July 2.
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