In case nobody else has recently browsed DonBluth.com, Gary Goldman has released another slightly different answer to the famous deleted scenes question:
"The scenes were deleted from the work print during a meeting with Steven Spielberg and George Lucas after a screening in late April of 1988, to reduce the more frightening scenes within the sharptooth attack of Littlefoot and Cera through the briars. Most of these scenes were in pencil test, not yet in color. The actual drawings may still be in the film's archive, now at Universal, but there is no negative film of these scenes. So a "director's cut" is completely out of the question. Further, we would have to get Universal, Steve and George to all agree that it would be worth the time and cost to complete these scenes to color, cut them into the negative and prepare a new master color print and inter-positive to strike a new digital master for DVD and DVD Blu-ray production. The chances of that, I believe, are nil. Looking back, I wish that we would have just finished the scenes to color with painted backgrounds and filmed them, just in case there would be a call for an original "director's cut" - but, alas, we did not. Thanks again for your inquiry."
I have to ask though, if there really was no negative made of those scenes, how did one of those shots find its way into a TV spot? How did the rest of the deleted scenes mentioned on this board find their way onto Finnish TV and in the hands of skilled dubbers? Seeing how popular the original film is, if Gary did ask Lucas and Spielberg about restoring the cut, even if those scenes may not be recoloured, I reckon it would make a bootful of money, but only if marketed correctly.
Pikkutassu, I really do hope they show the uncut version on Finnish TV. The worst case scenario would be that the station could show a new print of the film and not the version you saw all those years ago. At least they are open enough to listen to viewer's comments, unlike a lot of stations these days.
