Spielberg Regrets The Whole ‘E.T.’ Walkie-Talkie Fiasco

Well, perhaps “regrets” is too strong a word, but in the spirit of this news, I won’t go back and change it.

In a recent interview, Steven Spielberg discussed the currently-being-worked-on Blu-ray edition of Jaws. If your favorite Spielberg movie was the 2002 20th Anniversary Edition version of E.T. with the infamous replacement of guns for walkie-talkies – first of all, really? Second of all, you’re out of luck with Jaws.

The famous director has gone back on the idea of digitally altering past films, putting Spielberg at odds with his friend George “I Change My Old Movies All The Time, Just To Piss You Off” Lucas. Hear that? It’s the collective sigh of relief from moviephiles and people who don’t fix things when they’re not broken. Direct from The Spielberg’s mouth:

“[In the future] there’s going to be no more digital enhancements or digital additions to anything based on any film I direct. I’m not going to do any corrections digitally to even wires that show…At this point right now I think letting movies exist in the era, with all the flaws and all of the flourishes, is a wonderful way to mark time and mark history.”

Yeah, why remove wires? I go out of my way to watch “The Wire,” though I will admit that’s entirely not what he’s talking about. He continues…

“When people ask me which E.T. they should look at, I always tell them to look at the original 1982 E.T. If you notice, when we did put out E.T. we put out two E.T.s. We put out the digitally enhanced version with the additional scenes and for no extra money, in the same package, we put out the original ‘82 version. I always tell people to go back to the ’82 version.”

Celebratory Reese’s Pieces, anyone? (AICN)