Mel Gibson Has An Hour of Braveheart Deleted Scenes

They may take away our lives, but they’ll never take our footage? Sadly, when it comes to Mel Gibson’s Braveheart, the film could not avoid having some of its film reels excised. In a recent interview with Collider, the acclaimed actor and director spoke about the final cut of Braveheart and admitted he has over an hour of deleted scenes sitting around.

When Gibson was asked about Braveheart‘s full cut, the director said the film “lost almost an hour” by the time the final version was completed. “There’s almost an hour lying around someplace.”

As such, Gibson confirmed that there are a lot of scenes which fans have never seen because of the lengthy cut. That’s not too surprising to hear considering the amount of footage that was taken out; A lot can happen in an hour’s time, and an original runtime of 3 hours and 45 minutes could’ve held plenty of bonus scenes.

Collider asked if Gibson would be interested in releasing an ‘Ultimate’ or ‘Redux’ Edition of the Braveheart for fans who want to see the extra scenes. Unsurprisingly, the director said he would be game.

“People have mentioned it. It’s a big deal,” he said about an extended cut. “If somebody at Fox or Paramount want to finance that then yeah. If they want to dig up the footage, then I’ll slap it back together.

Gibson went on to say, “I have it on tape somewhere, the whole three hour and forty-five minute thing. It’s like, ‘Wow, there’s a lot of things in there.’ We did excise the right stuff.”

After editing, Braveheart clocked in at 178 minutes, making the film nearly three hours long. Gibson told the site the team behind the film struggled to get the film down to that amount. The director said he and editor Steven Rosenblum were pulling their hair out trying to condense Braveheart even more.

The two were finally able to cut the film down to its final runtime after they received a note from an executive named Sherry. The letter contained a general note about Braveheart letting audiences get ahead of themselves, something which Gibson and Rosenblum denied at first. However, the two decided her advice was spot-on after a night’s rest, and they spent the next day shedding extra footage.

Obviously, the final editing touches helped Braveheart streamline its compelling story. The film went on to earn 10 Academy Award nominations and won 5: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Cinematography, Best Makeup, and Best Sound Editing.

So, what do you guys think? Would you want to see an extended cut of Braveheart? Let us know in the comments below!

[H/T] Collider