Deadly Friend
| Deadly Friend | |
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Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Wes Craven |
| Produced by | Robert M. Sherman |
| Screenplay by | Bruce Joel Rubin |
| Based on | Friend by Diana Henstell |
| Starring | |
| Music by | Charles Bernstein |
| Cinematography | Philip H. Lathrop |
| Edited by | Michael Eliot |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
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Release date
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Running time
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91 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $11,000,000 |
| Box office | $8,988,731 (US) |
Deadly Friend is an American 1986 science fiction horror film directed by Wes Craven. It is based on the novel Friend by Diana Henstell, which was adapted for the screen by Bruce Joel Rubin.
Originally, the film was a sci-fi thriller without any graphic scenes, with a bigger focus on plot and character development, and a dark love story centering around the two main characters, which were not typical aspects of Craven's previous films. After Craven's original cut was shown to a test audience by Warner Bros., the audience criticized the lack of graphic, bloody violence and gore that Craven's other films included. Warner Bros. executive vice president Mark Canton and the film's producers then demanded script re-writes and re-shoots, which included filming gorier death scenes and nightmare sequences, similar to the ones from Craven's previous horror film, A Nightmare on Elm Street. Due to studio imposed re-shoots and re-editing, the film was drastically altered in post-production, losing much of the original plot and more scenes between characters, while other scenes, including more grisly deaths and a new ending, were added.
Although fans have been clamoring for the release of Craven's original version in a special edition, Warner Bros. currently has no plans to release a director's cut of Deadly Friend. In April 2014, an online petition for the release of the original cut was made.
Teenage science genius Paul Conway (Matthew Laborteaux) and his single mother Jeannie (Anne Twomey) move into their new house in the town of Welling. He soon becomes friends with newspaper delivery boy Tom Toomey (Michael Sharrett). Living next door to Paul is the beautiful Samantha Pringle (Kristy Swanson) and her abusive, alcoholic father Harry (Richard Marcus). Paul built a robot named BB (Charles Fleischer), which occasionally displays autonomous behavior, such as being protective of Paul. Paul, Jeannie, and BB meet Paul's professor, Dr. Johanson (Russ Marin), at Polytech, a prestigious university Paul has a scholarship at. Dr. Johanson gives them a tour of the new laboratory Paul will have access to.
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Wikipedia