Alice in Wonderland was originally shot as a softcore musical comedy, partly because director Bud Townsend and the producers had expanded the production into elaborate 35mm sets without enough time or money to film the close-up material normally required for hardcore pornography. After the R-rated version became a major commercial success, producer William Osco re-edited the movie and inserted explicit penetration footage that had not been filmed as part of the original production. The most notorious addition involved footage of Kristine De Bell performing oral sex on Osco, which was cut into the Mad Hatter sequence. Members of the cast and crew, along with Kaleidoscope Films, sued Osco over the unauthorized material, unpaid obligations, and alleged theft of money. Kaleidoscope ultimately acquired the rights through the litigation. Osco reportedly went further by having prints stolen so that he could continue distributing the film without the rights holders' permission. Both the R-rated and hardcore versions later circulated on VHS, and Subversive Cinema released them together on DVD in 2007, preserving the bizarre split identity of a movie whose explicit version was partly manufactured after production.
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AI concept artworkArchive Record · 1970s
The Unauthorized Hardcore Cut That Turned Alice in Wonderland Into a Legal War
Alice in Wonderland (1976) / 1970s
Alice in Wonderland was originally shot as a softcore musical comedy, partly because director Bud Townsend and the producers had expanded the production into elaborate 35mm sets without enough time or money to film the close-up material normally required for hardcore pornography. After the R-rated version became a major commercial success, producer William Osco re-edited the movie and inserted explicit penetration footage that had not been filmed as part of the original production. The most notorious addition involved footage of Kristine De Bell performing oral sex on Osco, which was cut into the Mad Hatter sequence. Members of the cast and crew, along with Kaleidoscope Films, sued Osco over the unauthorized material, unpaid obligations, and alleged theft of money. Kaleidoscope ultimately acquired the rights through the litigation. Osco reportedly went further by having prints stolen so that he could continue distributing the film without the rights holders' permission. Both the R-rated and hardcore versions later circulated on VHS, and Subversive Cinema released them together on DVD in 2007, preserving the bizarre split identity of a movie whose explicit version was partly manufactured after production.
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