In 1994, James Cameron's action comedy True Lies -- starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis -- debuted at the box office and would go on to become the third highest-grossing film of the year. The film passed with an R rating in
the United States with ease, but in the UK, the BBFC decided that a single cut was required for the film's theatrical run before a 15 rating could be awarded.
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James Cameron, good box office action
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The Inimitable James Ferman, Director of the BBFC
Throughout his tenure as director of the BBFC, James Ferman regularly took issue with what he called imitable
techniques ; potentially dangerous combat moves that he thought may inspire copycat behavior amongst the British public; scenes showing head-butts, ear claps, throat chops and neck breaks would often be cited as immediate grounds for deletion,
regardless of the rating of the film they were featured in. Ferman's treatment of these techniques was usually harsher on video, where such events could be played out of context or in slow-motion, and thus -- in his eyes -- be more damaging to viewers.
In addition, the unregulated nature of viewing in the home where underage viewers were more likely to be exposed to such atrocities was also taken into account. On film, however, these same combat moves were sometimes treated more leniently, where
underage viewing was far less likely and the ability to rewind and review scenes was impossible in the confines of a theatrical environment.
BBFC Cinema Rating
The BBFC passed True Lies
with a 15 rating on film on August 9th 1994, after demanding one second's worth of cuts.
Cut Scenes: Toilet Ear Clap The affected scene occurs during the comical fight scene in a men's bathroom between Harry Tasker (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and a terrorist agent. In the cuts list sent to the film's
distributor, United Artists Pictures, the BBFC cited one imitable technique in Reel 2 of the film that would need to removed for the 15 rating to be given: In fight in men's toilets, remove hero's double
ear-clap... together with victim's agonised reaction, resuming to see hero push him out of the cubicle.
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A heavy head-butt delivered by Harry earlier in the fight was left untouched - although the scene would be treated more strictly on video when the film's VHS release came in for classification the following year.
BBFC Video Rating
CIC Video submitted True Lies to the BBFC for video classification in early 1995, and the version of the film submitted was the pre-cut version seen in UK cinemas, which had the double
ear-clap already removed. However, the Board demanded further cuts to the film in order to maintain the same 15 rating on video. Imitable techniques were the main order of the day, but a couple of scenes where the BBFC felt that Harry was using a little
more force than necessary were also trimmed, to tone down their brutality.
Cut Scenes: Toilet Killing The bathroom fight was the first scene to receive further cuts, with the BBFC stating: Reduce fight in men's toilets by removing the following
blows by Schwarzenegger to terrorist's head: head butt, impacts of second and third blows with hand dryer [and] second blow against back of urinal.
| Missing headbutt
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| Reduced battering with dryer
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Cut Scenes: Test Drive Punch The overtly comic nature of True Lies did little to mitigate the impact of the violence in the eyes of the BBFC. A scene in the middle of film where Harry fantasizes about punching the
sleazy car salesman, Simon -- whom Harry suspects is having an affair with his wife, Helen -- was also cut on video. During a test drive, we see Harry apparently slamming his fist into Simon's face and knocking him out. A lingering shot of Simon lying
battered and bloody was reduced to the briefest of moments, with the BBFC keen to ensure that audiences were not horrified by Harry's apparent striking of a defenseless man: Reduce hero's fantasy of punching salesman
in the jaw by removing most of the following shot showing the latter's head reduced to a bloody pulp, resuming quickly on Schwarzenegger to show it was only a fantasy.
A rather superfluous cut, considering that the outcome of the
audience learning that this is a fantasy is the same in the uncut version too.
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Reduced effect of Schwarzenegger punch
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Cut Scenes: Kidnapping Harry and Helen wind up being kidnapped by the terrorists later in the film, but Harry breaks out of his handcuffs and enables both he and his wife to escape. In the process, Harry kills the two
men guarding him; throwing a metal spike into one of the man's eyes before snapping the second guard's neck. Both of these instances were cited for deletion by the BBFC, with their cuts list to the distributor demanding:
Reduce violence by Schwarzenegger during his escape from terrorists by removing clear-focus impact shot of spike thrown into man's eye together with beginning of neck twist to other man, cutting away after spike sends man's head back
in soft focus [and] resuming to see end of neck twist.
Realizing it would be impossible to simply remove these two acts of violence completely without damaging the flow of the scene, James Cameron re-edited the sequence by not only removing both the clear-focus on the spike going into the eye and
the start of the subsequent neck break, but also optically extending the whip pan shot of the spike flying through the air to help cover the missing footage. Immediately following these two kills, Harry grabs a tire iron and lies in wait as a
third man from outside comes to investigate. Harry rams the tire iron into the man's chest, before quickly wrenching it upwards and cracking the man's ribs. Again, the BBFC objected, stating: [Remove] second, upward
blow with tyre tool into belly of third man, resuming to see Schwarzenegger drag him away as if first blow felled him.
One final cut was ordered by the BBFC a few minutes later, as Harry slides down a rope hanging above another terrorist before breaking the man's neck, with the Board requesting: Reduce neck twist as Schwarzenegger
climbs down rope and reaches out to grasp terrorist's head, cutting away as he twists and resuming on high angle shot with twist being completed just before hero jumps down.
This sequence is covered in three shots in the uncut
version:
- a high-angle shot of Harry moving down the rope
- a profile shot of the terrorist getting his neck twisted with a crack
- a return to a high-angle shot of Harry coming down from the rope
To accommodate this change satisfactorily, James Cameron rearranged the surrounding footage slightly to appease the BBFC. The profile shot of Harry twisting the man's neck with a loud crack was removed entirely, and other footage inserted between the
two high-angle shots to fill in the gap.
| Removed footage
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| Replacement footage from earlier in the scene
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Following these changes, True Lies was passed with a 15 rating after eight seconds of cuts for its video release on Valentine's Day 1995, and the cut version of the film was also released on Laserdisc. James Cameron was allegedly rather miffed at the
BBFC's treatment of the film and in an unusual turn of events, a disclaimer was printed on the reverse of the UK video cover that read:
This film has been edited for censorship purposes.
Admittedly
the cuts in the original video version were quite well concealed, but this would all change a few years later when a widescreen version of True Lies came in for a DVD classification.
Same But
Different: A 2nd Cut Video Version
The uncut version of the film was resubmitted to the BBFC in 2001 by Columbia Tri-Star. At the time, the BBFC would not pass an uncut version of a film with a higher rating if the cut version was still on the
market. Ergo, with the cut version of True Lies still available on VHS, the BBFC demanded the same video cuts be made before it could be passed with a 15 rating for DVD, with the BBFC noting:
Cuts required to detailed
scenes of violence in order to allow the work to pass at the same category as previous versions of the same feature, in accordance with BBFC policy.
Cut Scenes: Re-cut In an effort to avoid removing any footage and affecting the film's running time and soundtrack as much as possible, the distributors opted to reuse shots in the affected scenes by inserting
repeated footage in place of the offending shots. For example, to hide the head-butt and blows with the hand dryer in the cut UK DVD, we are repeatedly treated to totally incongruous cutaway shots of the old man sitting on the toilet, along with a
completely out of place shot of the terrorist wearing his coat from earlier in the fight. The scene where Harry fantasizes about smashing Simon in the face is also handled with the same aplomb; repeating the zoom-in to Harry looking at Simon from
before the punch and causing a jump cut to occur when the inoffensive footage resumes. Harry's escape from the terrorists has the spike in the eye and the neck break removed entirely, with the film resuming on the torturer's neck already broken -
but the cracking sound effect is shifted to play over this shot, which looks rather ridiculous. The tire iron in the third terrorist's chest is cut in the same manner as the video version, however, and is the only cut that is not noticeable in the cut UK
DVD. The last cut where Harry breaks the terrorist's neck after sliding down the rope is also handled in a ham-fisted manner. The visuals of the neck break contained in the profile shot have been removed, with the footage following the twisting of
his head that shows the terrorist slumping forward now slowed down to fill in the gap left by the removal of offending footage. |
Not only do all of these cuts make a mockery of the skill of a such a respected filmmaker like James Cameron, but they introduce continuity errors in scenes such as the bathroom fight and the scene with Harry and Simon.
Following these changes
and dire substitutions, the resulting cuts amount to 20 seconds for the cut UK DVD version. However, when the actual DVD was released later in the year, the wrong master ended up making its way onto the UK market. The UK shares its DVD region, Region 2,
with Europe and the uncut Spanish DVD ended up being the disc that actually made its way into UK stores. Learning of the anomaly, film fans quickly snatched up the disc fearing it would be removed from sale as per UK law. In the end, the disc stayed on
the market in this uncut form for another two years, and it would be 2003 before a re-pressed disc made its way into stores. By then, of course, the horse had already bolted. The original uncut UK release can be identified by the red widescreen banner
across the top edge of the front cover, the presence of both English and Spanish audio tracks on the disc, and a selection of 14 different subtitle tracks.
One may like to think that Columbia released this uncut disc on purpose; ashamed with
themselves for producing such an atrocious cut version of a much-loved film. There is, nevertheless, no proof that this was done. The cut 2003 DVD release can be identified by the Universal logo in the lower right corner on the front cover, as well as
the presence of only English 5.1 audio and English subtitles
The uncut version of True Lies also appeared in a 2008 DVD collection entitled Greatest Ever Action Heroes alongside other films of varying quality that was released in October of
that year. The film had still not been officially passed uncut by the BBFC at this time, but no one in the industry seemed to care.
