MovieChat Forums > Serial (1980) Discussion > Deleted scenes? (spoilers)

Deleted scenes? (spoilers)


I just watched this movie again for the first time in, oh, thirty years I guess, and a pair of scenes I was hoping to see just weren't there. Unfortunately the DVD I watched didn't contain a deleted scenes section. Was I just imagining it, or possibly mentally moving it from another film to this one? There were certainly many scenes I misunderstood as a fourteen year old when I first saw the movie. The problem is I can't think of any other movie with Tom Smothers playing that kind of character, and it was definitely Tom Smothers I remembered in those scenes.

The scenes both involved Reverend Spike. One showed him wearing a pyramid hat delivering his own baby and proposing a name something like Hallelujah Christian Jesus (and asking his birth cohort whether she thought the name was maybe a little heavy a burden to carry) and the other showed him bagging groceries. I don't remember where in the film these were supposed to be. I can see why they would have been removed. While they were funny and showed a little character development for Reverend Spike they had little bearing on the rest of the film.

It's like watching grass grow, except there's an explosion at the end

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Can't confirm the existence of the scenes you described. What I can say is it was not at all unusual for them to prepare alternate versions of movies for TV broadcasts back in those days, substituting unused footage for the racier material. Sadly, most of the old TV prints have completely vanished (since censorship drastically changed after TV ratings were implemented) and alternate TV footage is almost never included on DVD releases.

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I don't remember any missing Reverend Spike scenes, but I have seen the movie just one time where an additional bit was included at the end where Kate says the finances won't be THAT tough in Denver because she made a sizeable commission from selling THEIR house. I suppose that might have been removed because it wouldn't have made sense to sell THEIR house if she didn't yet know that they were moving. And may not have legally been able to anyway without Harvey's consent.

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I saw this several times on HBO when it aired in the early '80s, and I don't remember any of those scenes. I also have the VHS release, and I don't believe they are there either. Did you by chance see this in the theater?

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