Stellan Skarsgård working overtime.
Over at Alex on Film I’ve been looking at the two attempts made at an Exorcist prequel: Paul Schrader’s Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist and Renny Harlin’s Exorcist: The Beginning. What a two-car pile-up. Schrader was first man up, but the studio hated what he did and told Harlin to fix it. He ended up making an entirely new movie, which the studio didn’t like any better so they got Schrader to rejig his version.
It’s interesting to look at the two movies side by side just to see what two very different directors did with the same basic material. Both movies are terrible, but I can’t think of any other examples of something like this happening.
Alex Good 
What about Superman II?
LikeLiked by 1 person
That’s a good comparison, and a good catch, but the two different versions of that weren’t both released theatrically were they? I don’t think I’ve seen Donner’s version.
LikeLike
They did release Donner’s original cut years later, but not as quickly on each others heels as the Exorcist ones. But it would fit the ideo of two different versions, with the second director trying to create a commerically-orientated version of the first’s vision. Not sure how much Lester re-shot.
LikeLike