Badmovies.org Forum

Last night, the love of my life and I sat down and watched "Visiting Hours". Not nearly as much fun as I remember, though Michael Ironside stole the movie and got to play an extremely nasty villain. Still, I enjoyed making fun of the stupid story elements and silly dialogue.

Here's the problem: A friend and I watched this when it came out in the theaters back in 1982. Yes, we were rude moviegoers and loudly heckled the movie. Two scenes I clearly remember from this film were a scene with a discussion about medication being in lock down but behind Linda Purl you see shelf after shelf of medications in the huge containers you see in a pharmacy (and they obviously were NOT in lock down, so we were screaming, "LOOK BEHIND YOU!!!") and a scene of Shatner talking to Lee Grant in which Shatner proceeds to eat everything on her lunch tray, asking, "Are you going to eat that? Do you mind if I drink this?" I clearly remember him opening one of those pint cartons of milk where you have to fold it back and then pull the spout forward.

My friend and I laughed about those scenes over and over for years, so I know we didn't both imagine them. Yet they were nowhere to be found in the version I watched last night.

And I just double checked, and the DVD is 103 minutes and IMDb.com lists the film at 105, which would account for the two scenes.

Before anyone points to the edited UK version as an explanation, I looked into it. All the scenes they trimmed out for UK release are in this version, and their edits amounted to something like a minute and 31 seconds.

I figure if any group of folks would be knowledgeable of this weird info, it's gonna be the fine folk here in this forum.

Help me, BadMovies.org Forum! You're my only hope!

I have bought quite a few movies on DVD-R in recent years and based on the research I have done and the purchases I have made, it seems as though many movies (especially from the 1960s through 1980s) had at least two (and often many more than two) versions for various countries.  For instance, I bought the movie FACELESS from Super Strange Video and about 2 weeks later the guy who runs the website said he got his hands on another version that was a couple minutes longer, so he sent it to me free of charge.  My guess is there are 3, 4, 5 or maybe more versions of VISITING HOURS floating around.  Maybe a U.S. version, a U.K. version, a Canadian version, etc., and they are all slightly different lengths. 

I understand a lot of countries has different running speeds for movies, which lend themselves to variations in overall running time for movies. So there is always that concept to deal with.

This is two completely harmless scenes (okay, ANYTHING that further pads the length of "Visiting Hours" cannot be considered "harmless") I'm talking about. And I checked the length of the pervious DVD release from Starz/Anchor Bay, and it also says 103 minutes, instead of IMDb's tech specs which says 105.

I'm almost tempted to plunk down the money for a used copy of the Anchor Bay version, but if anyone reading this has that version, PLEASE scan through your DVD and look for the scenes I mentioned. This is driving me nuts, which, sadly, isn't a very far trip.

The VHS I had in my collection had those scenes.  :smile:

Bless you, my friend!!

Now I know I wasn't insane!

I just have to find a copy on DVD with those scenes.....