In All Its Gory Glory

Mickey and Mallory Knox refuse to die. It has been nearly two years since those “Natural Born Killers” rode unpunished and unrepentant into the sunset. Oliver Stone’s R-rated film has triggered intense debate by critics and politicians, Bob Dole most prominent among them, over the violent content of Hollywood films.

Then the studio that released the movie balked at releasing on video the version Stone wanted.

In recent months, its video release in England and France has been delayed or withdrawn in the wake of real-life slayings. In this country, author John Grisham has held Stone accountable in print for the copycat murders allegedly inspired by the film.

To quote one of the most unsettling exchanges in “Natural Born Killers,” what does Stone have to say to his fans (and critics)? You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

Today Vidmark Entertainment will release “Natural Born Killers” in a “director’s cut” that will restore the estimated 150 edits--roughly three minutes--that Stone made to earn the film an R rating. Among the more infamous trims are the point-of-view shot through a wound in Robert Downey Jr.’s hand, and a prison riot that climaxes with Tommy Lee Jones’ head impaled on a stick.

The two-tape set also will contain more than one hour of previously unseen footage, including several scenes that were deleted from the theatrical release for pacing, tonal and other considerations, as well as a recently filmed feature about the making of the film, and from the soundtrack, the Nine Inch Nails music video, “Burn.”

All this for $29.99 suggested retail, a price meant to attract not just fans of the film, but also the growing market of collectors and director’s cut aficionados.

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Stone and Vidmark did not rush to market with this definitive video edition of “Natural Born Killers.” The version with the restored three minutes has been in the works for more than half a year. The additional hour, including the “making of” segment, is a recent addition and includes a passing reference to Grisham in an overall defense of the film by, among others, cast members Woody Harrelson and Jones.

When Stone submitted his original version to the ratings board, he was told that it would be classified NC-17 and that “there was no way it could be anything else than that, and to not bother to come back with suggestions,” he said. Warners’ policy against releasing NC-17 films led to the studio’s decision to relinquish rights to the home video release of the director’s cut to the film’s producers, Ixtlan/New Regency.

“I understand the corporate policy, but I think it’s dead wrong,” Stone said. “NC-17 was created as an adult category, not for sex and violence. That was the intention, but now everyone has weaseled out of the deal.”

Stone said he personally asked Warner Bros. to give up the video rights by appealing directly to studio chief Terry Semel, who “believed in me and backed three of my movies.”

“I said you must let me release this director’s version even if it goes to another place,” he said. “After I asked him sincerely several times, he gave it to me. He didn’t have to, and he didn’t make any money. It hurts [Warners’] R version, so as a result it was an act of great generosity.”

For the director, who has already released to video expanded versions of his films “JFK” and “Nixon,” a director’s cut was, he said, an opportunity to “finish what I started.”

“I knew someday it would get out,” Stone said. “When I first cut the film, it was honest and accurate to what I had to say. The cuts that I negotiated with the ratings board completely messed up the timing, the rhythm and in some cases, the intention of certain scenes. I backed the R-rated version. If I thought the film had been ruined, I wouldn’t have supported it. But it has always been a compromised version, and this was a chance to get it right.”

One scene that benefits from the restoration, he said, was the prison riot. “It had a beauty to it,” he said. “It was incredible. There was a tremendous amount of madness and testosterone. It was just an insane scene. It played like gangbusters with the music driving it. But it was chopped up so you couldn’t get any roll on, and that was part of the trip.”

Other bonuses of the director’s cut are the scenes Stone himself deleted, including an alternative ending in which Mickey and Mallory are blown away in their getaway car by a shotgun-toting prison inmate portrayed by Arliss Howard. In the theatrical version of the film, his character helps the couple to escape.

“Arliss Howard is sort of a guardian angel,” Stone said. “He also shows up in the first scene in the movie if you can spot him [he is seen fleetingly as a patron in the cafe before his image fades]. The twist is that he becomes the psychotic, random killer that Mickey and Mallory were at the beginning of the movie. We tried both endings, but it felt more ‘90s for [Mickey and Mallory] to get away.”

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Also rescued from the cutting-room floor are Ashley Judd, as the sister of one of Mickey’s victims who makes the fatal mistake of testifying against him in court, and Denis Leary, performing a hyper-monologue from a prison cell.

“I never saw it myself,” Leary said by phone from the set of the movie “Love Walked In.” “I assumed it would be lost in the vacuum of editing.”

Leary’s contribution was a version of the image campaign spots he did for MTV. “The problem was that I was scheduled to shoot ‘The Ref’ in Toronto,” he recalled, “but Oliver doesn’t take no for an answer. I didn’t have time to write anything, but he said to come down for the weekend to [Joliet, Ill.] and we would make it up as we go along.

“I was in a cell on death row. He pointed the camera and I rattled on and on. He wanted to do stuff about the Kennedy assassination, of course. We did five or six different versions. Later, he called and said he had to cut the scene out.”

One studio’s controversy is another’s opportunity. Vidmark aggressively went after “Natural Born Killers” after Warners relinquished the rights. Once primarily a direct-to-video label, Vidmark has in recent years courted independent filmmakers by embracing such hot-button, NC-17 and unrated titles as “The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover,” “The Doom Generation” and “Kids.”

“I like these young companies,” Stone said. “They’re hungry. They’re eager. They do things at about a tenth of the price, but they make up for it by taking on controversial projects.”

One of the things they did was create a new video box that targets the “untapped” 35-and-under audience with a ‘60s, psychedelic design and multilayered look that reflects the nature of the film.

“Natural Born Killers” has the potential to be “a tent pole” for Vidmark, said Don Gold, senior vice president for sell-through programming. “This was a way not only to work with someone of Oliver’s caliber whom we respect and are fond of, but to show other filmmakers what we can do when we have the spotlight on us.”

Stone said this original cut of the film validates what has been dismissed in some quarters as “a blood and gore film” and “completes what I had to say . . . about our society and the madness, the corruption, the hate and the aggression.”

He said he hoped those people who missed the point the first time “might be open-minded and tolerant enough to look at it a second time a year and a half later and see it in another way.”

* Oliver Stone and Trent Reznor, who assembled the film’s soundtrack, are scheduled to appear at Sam Goody’s at Universal CityWalk today 5-7 p.m. in conjunction with the release of “Natural Born Killers.”