'Noah' Movie 2014 Controversy: Director Darren Aronofsky Wins Battle Over Final Version of Movie [VIDEO]
Director Darren Aronofsky has won his biblical battle against Paramount - the version of Noah that hits theaters will be his own.
Following Aronofsky's decision to relinquish final cut rights in exchange for a nearly $130 million budget, the studio attempted to rework his upcoming film after it received mixed feedback from religious test audiences.
While the studio rolled out nearly a dozen different cuts in an effort to appease more people, Paramount ultimately decided to go with Aronofsky's original vision.
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"They tried what they wanted to try, and eventually they came back," Aronofsky said, according to The Hollywood Reporter. "My version of the film hasn't been tested ... It's what we wrote and what was greenlighted."
While Noah will follow the original tale as it is set out in Genesis, the Noah (Russell Crowe) viewers will see on screen is more of a dark and conflicted character, according to The Guardian. A dark Noah, along with viewer's mixed recollections of the actual story, led to some unsatisfied viewers. The film features many details that moviegoers may have forgotten, such as when Noah gets a wee bit tipsy after finally finding land.
The Black Swan director explained to The Hollywood Reporter that, while Paramount's other versions tried to correct these issues, they ultimately failed because there is no way to unravel the original sequence of scenes and still have them fit together coherently.
"My guys and I were pretty sure that because of the nature of the film and how we work, there wasn't another version," Aronofsky said. "That's what I told them ... the scenes were so interconnected -- if you started unwinding scenes, I just knew there would be holes. I showed it to filmmaker friends, and they said the DNA was set in this film."
The devout and the non-religious can assess the film for themselves when it hits theaters on March 18.
