‘Snowpiercer’ Loses 20 Minutes Of Footage For US Release

If you want to see the complete version of Joon-ho Bong’s Snowpiercer, then you might want to skip the cut that’s currently headed to US theaters.

Rumor has it that The Weinstein Company is cutting around 20 minutes worth of footage from the film’s North American release. Why is Harvey Weinstein taking the scissors to the upcoming sci-fi flick? Apparently he thinks you’re too stupid for the complete version.

Film festival programmer and critic Tony Rayns recently told IF.com.au that Weinstein is removing 20 minutes from Snowpiercer in order to make it easier for American audiences to understand. In other words, The Weinstein Company has very little faith in your intellectual abilities.

Joon-ho explained that the excised footage would “eliminate much of the character detail, which would make the film seem more like an action movie.”

“Leaving aside the issue of what Weinstein thinks of its audience, it seems to say the least anomalous that the rest of the English-speaking world has to be dragged down to the presumed level of American mid-west hicks,” Rayns said.

Adding insult to injury, Weinstein is reportedly interested in adding a voice over to the flick. Those who us who want to see the complete version of the sci-fi flick should probably wait until the movie hits home video in other territories. An all-region Blu-ray release might be worth the wait.

Anyone familiar with Harvey Weinstein’s days at Miramax already knows the guy has a penchant for butchering movies to pieces. Dimension Films was responsible for ripping apart Hong Kong efforts from the likes of Jackie Chan and Jet Li back in the 90s. Although Snowpiercer’s fate isn’t surprising, it’s definitely unfortunate for those of us who want to see the director’s original vision.

Here’s the official plot synopsis for the upcoming drama:

Snowpiercer, based on the French graphic novel Le Transperceneige, is set in a future where, after a failed experiment to stop global warming, an Ice Age kills off all life on the planet except for the inhabitants of the Snow Piercer, a train that travels around the globe and is powered by a sacred perpetual-motion engine. A class system evolves on the train but a revolution brews.

The international trailer lies below.

Snowpiercer stars Chris Evans, Song Kangho, Tilda Swinton, Jamie Bell, Octavia Spencer, Ewen Brewmner, Alison Pill, John Hurt, and Ed Harris. Are you disappointed that The Weinstein Company is cutting 20 minutes from the US release?

[Image via The Weinstein Company]