Surprise! A24 is releasing the Midsommar director's cut in theaters this weekend
With a runtime of two hours and 27 minutes and a few rather gruesome scenes, Midsommar is already a viscerally challenging cinematic experience. Director Ari Aster has been talking up an extended, unrated version of his Hereditary follow-up ever since it hit theaters in July, and despite a recent screening of the director’s cut in New York, it seemed like most of us wouldn’t have a chance to see this iteration for the foreseeable future—particularly as A24 has no current plans to include that version in the upcoming Blu-ray release. But! In a surprising move, the studio has decided to release Aster’s unrated director’s cut in theaters nationwide this weekend:
Word of the surprise release began circulating on social media earlier today, with some cinephiles noticing that certain theaters were already selling tickets for this weekend’s screenings of the Midsommar director’s cut. That version features an additional 24 minutes of footage, and while it’s unclear exactly how many of those minutes are of Florence Pugh sobbing uncontrollably (I’m a fan), those who have seen the unrated cut note that much of the footage serves to enrich the character development and narrative. So if you have no particular plans this weekend and you’re into cinematic masochism, you could do a lot worse than watching a nearly three-hour unrated cut of Ari Aster’s darkly comedic exploration of the horrors of co-dependency, and also a bear.