Natural Born Killers: The Director’s Cut

Movie Grade: A-

DVD Features Grade: A+

Overall Grade: A

Ultra-violent satires are one thing that is often completely misunderstood by a good portion of people. Though people understand what it all comes down to, a certain percentage always seem to want to condemn the artistic message for what it holds at face value. At the heart of Natural Born Killers, it isn’t just something made for college kids to watch while they are tripping on psychedelics, it is a well thought out piece of satirical cinema that has an extreme message about the modern media.

The film revolves around the loving couple of Mickey (Woody Harrelson) and Mallory (Juliette Lewis) who aren’t your standard edition set of lovers. The two go on a rampage across America, killing randomly and brutally. When the two are caught, they are incarcerated and Wayne Gal (Robert Downey Jr.) cashes in on the bizarre fan base that the two have collected. The young people of the world embrace the couple and they become the hot new celebrities of the day.

The films brutality and social commentary are not the only magnetic factors about it. One of the most renounced is the psychedelic effects used in the film. Bizarre camera angles, strange scene cuts, odd coloring, and strange green screen effects are all factors that truly personify this cult classic. Without these features this would still be a strong film, but they make it truly an entity of its own.

NBK Evolution Is an outstanding feature to go along with this countercultural piece. Being that the film was released in 1993 and since then the media of which the film revolves so closely around has changed so drastically, The feature has experts in the fields of media, as well as cast and crew discussing the films message, The feature doges into not only how the film would pan out today, but if the couples ultimate escape is possible in this modern, media saturated society.

Chaos: The Story Around Natural Born Killers is an older feature about the making of the film. Not so much a behind the scenes “Making of…” but more from the point of view of the director and actors. The feature focuses more on why things were chosen and set up the way they were, rather than how these things were executed. All of the footage is somewhat strange because it is all very old. It looks as if it was shot shortly after the film had originally been released. This was a little upsetting because even though this is all important material, time can change perspective and it would be interesting to see how these people felt about the film today.

Even the deleted scenes manage to keep up with the flow of the rest of the film and features. It is almost as if there was nothing filmed

that wasn’t absolutely worth putting in the film, and things were cut merely to conserve time. Some aren’t as important as others, but The Courtroom and The Hun Brothers actually left me shocked that they weren’t included in the film. Also, Denis Leary has a quick cameo scene which was deleted where he goes on a rant that is nothing short of excellent – definitely tops his role in The Sandlot. The alternative ending is the only thing that seemed to benefit the film in its absence. It follows Mickey and Mallory after they escape, but shows them gunned down. It isn’t a terrible ending, but it is less symbolic then the theatrical one.

Movie Grade: A-

DVD Features Grade: A+

Overall Grade: A