Until The End of The World - Director's Cut

Director's Cut

Wenders realized the film would be too long for the commercial distribution, so he kept control of the unedited film rather than surrendering it to distributors. After the film's theatrical release, Wenders worked with multiple copies and, with Sam Neill, recording additional narration, completed a 280-minute version. The longer cut, which Wenders regards as the definitive version of the film, unfolds as a trilogy and is presented in three parts (the titles appear three different times). This version was screened publicly numerous times, including at the University of Washington in 1996; at least two presentations by American Cinematheque; once by the American Museum of the Moving Image; at the USA Film Festival in Dallas, Texas; by the Film Society of Lincoln Center, in New York City; and once at the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington, NY. Wenders has been present at almost all of these screenings.

The 158-minute cut of Until the End of the World was released on VHS, laserdisc (widescreen) and, more recently, Amazon Instant Video in the United States. In addition, a 179-minute "European cut" was released on laserdisc (letterboxed) in Japan, accompanied by a 58-minute featurette shot in Tokyo entitled Dream Island by Sean Naughton, who had worked with Wenders on the HD sequences in Until the End of the World. The 280-minute "trilogy" version of Until the End of the World made its first DVD appearance in 2004, with an Italian 4-disc edition featuring outtakes, bloopers, trailers, and interviews with Wenders. In 2005, a 3-disc DVD edition was released in Germany. Both editions feature new digital transfers personally supervised by Wenders.

Anchor Bay Entertainment had once announced that it would be releasing the director's cut of Until the End of the World in North America, but has since changed ownership and interest in Wenders' work was abandoned. Currently, there are no known plans to release the film on DVD or Blu-ray in North America.