Less than a year after Poor Things hit theaters, Kinds of Kindness brought the weirdness, violence, and mature content that audiences associate with director Yorgos Lanthimos back into cinemas. With a runtime of two hours and 40 minutes, the new film features three loosely connected stories filled with the violent eccentricities for which the director is best known. However, according to the film’s editor, Yorgos Mavropsaridis, the original cut of the movie was over three hours and featured even darker scenes.
Yorgos Mavropsaridis recently spoke with Collider about his work on Lanthimos’s divisive movie and revealed that an earlier cut of the film actually exceeded three hours. The editor said that the version wasn’t just cut down because of length, but also out of fear that it was too much for audiences to handle:
“We knew that would represent a problem, and that was also one of the hardest things for us to do because we knew we were satisfied with, let’s say, a three-hour and 10-minute edit.
They had not only to do with the length but it had to do with the development of the character, the certain scenes, and also the degree of how much you want to torture your audience because there were some scenes that were more extreme. So, we thought, ‘Yes, maybe keep it less.'”
Kinds of Kindness (2024)
Kinds of Kindness is a 2024 comedy-drama film by writer-director Yorgos Lanthimos. Split across segments, Kinds of Kindness tells the stories of a man trying to reclaim his destiny, a police officer whose wife returns after being lost at sea only to seem like a different person, and a woman tasked with finding a future spiritual leader.
- Release Date
- June 21, 2024
- Runtime
- 164 Minutes
- Distributor(s)
- Searchlight Pictures
Don’t Hold Your Breath for the Kinds of Kindness Director’s Cut
Of course, the moment something is removed from the realm of possibility, we want it even more. Knowing that a three-hour cut of Kinds of Kindness exists, fans will be desperate to witness the longer version. Coupled with the unintentional tease that the original cut was far more gruesome and disturbing, and it’s impossible not to want to see it. Kinds of Kindness already features some shocking elements, including cannibalism, self-mutilation, and graphic sexual content. How much more extreme can it get?
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Yorgos Mavropsaridis was kind enough to manage audiences’ expectations and anticipation, saying that Lanthimos isn’t the kind of director who releases director’s cuts. While some directors love re-working the theatrical cuts of their movies — Ridley Scott’s Napoleon Director’s Cut is currently in development — others, like Stanley Kubrick and Christopher Nolan, are adamant that the finished version shown in theaters is the only version. Lanthimos falls into the latter group. Mavropsaridis explained:
“Oh, it’s true — if it’s not in the movie, it’s never going to be seen because they were conscious decisions. Of course, we always saw the deleted scenes on the DVD, so it’s not going to be, ‘This is the director’s cut,’ in any case. The one that comes out is Yorgos’ final cut, so it is his film in any case.”
As well as producing incredibly eccentric films, Yorgos Lanthimos is also one of the hardest working directors in Hollywood. There was only a six-month gap between the theatrical releases of Poor Things and Kinds of Kindness. Many directors take a few years between releases, but Lanthimos’ next movie will be in theaters in just a year’s time. Bugonia sees Lanthimos reuniting with Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons, with a script penned by Will Tracy (The Menu), based on Jang Joon-hwan’s 2003 film Save the Green Planet. The official logline reads:
“Two conspiracy obsessed young men kidnap the high-powered CEO of a major company, convinced that she is an alien intent on destroying planet Earth.”
Kinds of Kindness
is currently playing in theaters.