Nighthawks (1981)

Yeah, I remember reading a bit of how it was Rutger Hauer's first american movie, and he early on, got onto the wrong side of Sly during the making. So much, that Hauer supposedly got fed up, and threatened to "hurt" Stallone, very badly, if he did not back down, with his "prima donna" act.

Not sure how much of it is true, or not. But I guess Hauer, coming straight from Europe, and then into a big budget Hollywood Stallone movie, well, maybe a bit too big of an cultural clash of egos, took place during the making, but then again, I felt maybe it got benefitted into their intense characters on screen.

Anyway, I also remember hearing some of this, during a rather enjoyable and informative Joe Spinnell documentary, some years ago, and that this film was to be the last one, that Spinnell and his former close friend Stallone did together. 

Well, having just browsed through some of the trivia sections of IMDb, I guess it is not that unthinkable, that there were some differences, during filming:

Rutger Hauer lost his mother and his best friend during the production of this movie. He returned to his native Netherlands for both of their respective funerals, but returned to the production each time within a few days. Despite all of the personal drama and all the difficulties on the set, Hauer stated in his autobiography that he was happy he stayed aboard, as this movie caused him to be noticed in Hollywood, and started an impressive international career.

Amongst the scenes which were deleted from the original cut of the movie are most of the scenes between Sylvester Stallone and Lindsay Wagner, Rutger Hauer and Persis Khambatta, more scenes explaining the plot better, and many other scenes because Universal Pictures wanted a fast-paced action movie. They also deleted most of the graphic and gory scenes due to the concern that the movie would get "X" rating. And indeed, even though it was already deleted for violence by the studio, this movie still got an "X" rating when it was submitted to the M.P.A.A. and it again had to be heavily edited for an "R" rating. Stallone also had a hand in the re-editing of this movie. He was jealous of Hauer whose performance dominated the movie, so during filming, he wrote and added more scenes for his character, and later he also deleted some of Hauer's scenes from the movie.

Although stories about their on-set fights are still talked about amongst fans of this movie and both actors, Rutger Hauer has said in recent interviews that he actually didn't take his arguments with Sylvester Stallone personally and that the biggest problem during filming was that it was a very difficult movie to make.

(A shame, it seems like Sly did take it more personal, if any of these trivia sections are true, and comes of as yeah, quite a prima-donna, a shame if it hurted how the film could have been a better made one, because of personal difficulties with his fellow actor)

All in all, I always wanted to like it much more, than I did. Learning just know, of how much that were either cut out or edited, I think both of the DVDs I own, also have edited away certain scenes or musical score, as well. I wonder if an Director's cut, would do it any justice, as the performances are stellar, but the story and pace, somehow drags on, as others has already mentioned.