The French Connection allegedly being censored by Disney

[BluBonnet]

All digital copies of "The French Connection" have allegedly been censored by Disney, including the one that is currently being shown on The Criterion Channel.

https://twitter.com/CerealMidnight/s...78216530935808

[danman227460]

Originally Posted by BluBonnet

All digital copies of "The French Connection" have allegedly been censored by Disney, including the one that is currently being shown on The Criterion Channel.

https://twitter.com/CerealMidnight/s...78216530935808

There has been confirmed reports that the movie remains uncensored on D+ UK and Canada.

Confirmed to be no fault of Disney:

https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comm...mment/jn69vw5/

[BluBonnet]

Originally Posted by danman227460

There has been confirmed reports that the movie remains uncensored on D+ UK and Canada.

Confirmed to be no fault of Disney:

https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comm...mment/jn69vw5/

[MifuneFan]

Gotta love the ppl on reddit that think Criterion edited the movie

[danman227460]

Originally Posted by BluBonnet

I am in Canada and just scanned through the movie on Disney Plus. I can confirm at 10:21 that the line remains intact.

So the question is why would Disney censor it everywhere but their own streaming service? If they did censor it, wouldn't they also censored it on Disney Plus as well?

[BluBonnet]

Originally Posted by danman227460

I am in Canada and just scanned through the movie on Disney Plus. I can confirm at 10:21 that the line remains intact.

So the question is why would Disney censor it everywhere but their own streaming service? If they did censor it, wouldn't they also censored it on Disney Plus as well?

The movie is definitely not on Disney+ in the US

Also, as just pointed out in the post you're replying to, the censored version has also been reported in theatrical showings and digital copies such as Vudu and iTunes

[Trekkie313]

Originally Posted by BluBonnet

The movie is definitely not on Disney+ in the US

It is in other territories.

[BluBonnet]

Originally Posted by Trekkie313

It is in other territories.

Yes, so I've gathered.

[danman227460]

Originally Posted by BluBonnet

The movie is definitely not on Disney+ in the US

Yes that is known but I am in Canada which has it on their service. We have Star which has a lot of Fox titles including The French Connection.

My question still remains that if it was censored everywhere, why was it not censored on Disney Plus Canada? There is also reports of it remaining uncensored on Disney Plus UK.

[MifuneFan]

Originally Posted by danman227460

Yes that is known but I am in CANADA which has it on their service. We have Star which has a lot of Fox titles including The French Connection.

My question still remains that if it was censored everywhere, why was it not censored on Disney Plus Canada? There is also reports of it remaining uncensored on Disney Plus UK.

Likely because they haven't gotten around to switching out one file for the other.

[danman227460]

Originally Posted by MifuneFan

Likely because they haven't gotten around to switching out one file for the other.

Good point. I'll keep an eye out and report if it has been censored in the coming weeks.

[BluBonnet]

Originally Posted by danman227460

My question still remains that if it was censored everywhere, why was it not censored on Disney Plus Canada? There is also reports of it remaining uncensored on Disney Plus UK.

Well if this is not happening (at least not yet) outside the US then this is primarily of interest to folks here in the US

[Trekkie313]

Are the streaming and digital versions based on the 2012 remaster or older HDTV copies?

[spanky87]

Well, lucky for those of us who bought the signature series blu-ray. It appears to be out of print now. And this is another example to use when explaining to people why you still collect physical media.

Has Friedkin been made aware of this? I can’t see him being complicit with this change, and his other films haven’t been censored for any insensitive or non-pc material.

[BluBonnet]

[SpacemanDoug]

Originally Posted by BluBonnet

Ah yes, the first since the laserdisc and VHS days at least, it surprises me how the DVDs left off the mono mix entirely

However unfortunately the uncensored translation subtitles remain exclusive to the older home video releases, I remember reading somewhere that the DVD/BD versions used the censored TV translation subs
(ex: originally a line said "the bastard who followed me" and now is "the one who followed me")

Unfortunately I don't have any proof of this but I wouldn't be surprised if it was in fact legit

[Achtung Englander]

Hi. I am in the UK and can confirm those scenes are still intact on Disney+

Look like its a US issue. Bad luck guys. Here are my thoughts I posted on a YT video about this issue:

The French Connection is one of my all time favorite. I am very sad and somewhat confused by news of this edit. Luckily I already own it twice on Physical.

Regards the n word. Many films have black characters who refer to each other by that slur, I presume they should all now get an edit? Regards Popeye, given he was a street cop who worked in the slums and with the lowest of people, he was surrounded by that sort of language. The usage of the word was in context of the environment he was working in. Now here is an interesting point. In the film one of his colleague friend was an undercover black police officer whom Popeye had respect for. You could tell Popeye liked him.

The film is a snapshot of gritty 70s. It happened. To censor it given 21st century sensibilities is just lying to yourself. If you don't learn from history, you just end up repeating it.

[BDBert]

Originally Posted by spanky87

Well, lucky for those of us who bought the signature series blu-ray. It appears to be out of print now.

It's simply astonishing that classic movies like this are so hard to come by on Blu-ray.

I have the old UK Blu-ray, but only yesterday I learned that this contains an older and bad version of the movie, and that the one to look for was the remaster one. Which was only available in the UK on a steelbook that's not been available for years.

I wanted to buy the remastered USA one, saw that Amazon USA had a single copy, put it in my shopping basket and went looking for some other BDs to put in the same order to alleviate the shipping costs, and by the time I added a third Blu-ray five minutes later I noticed the French Connection BD had disappeared from my basket...

Thankfully I found a copy on eBay, but paying $30+ for it (most of it on shipping and taxes) did kinda hurt.

[Member-810559]

I was literally about to buy the signature series blu-ray yesterday. I was about to check out this morning when I saw that it was out of stock becuase of the news that dropped.
I'm kicking myself so bad for not checking out earlier.

[s2mikey]

Originally Posted by BluBonnet

All digital copies of "The French Connection" have allegedly been censored by Disney, including the one that is currently being shown on The Criterion Channel.

https://twitter.com/CerealMidnight/s...78216530935808

Just appalling. Hard to say I can’t believe this since, you know, we must coddle "modern audiences" but really?

Originally Posted by spanky87

Well, lucky for those of us who bought the signature series blu-ray. It appears to be out of print now. And this is another example to use when explaining to people why you still collect physical media.

Has Friedkin been made aware of this? I can’t see him being complicit with this change, and his other films haven’t been censored for any insensitive or non-pc material.

First paragraph is the best thing I’ve read in a while, Spanky. Love to hear what the disc hating, streaming cultists have to say about this.

I hope Friedkin can force them to pull all his stuff from the service or somehow stop this.