In 1984, Swing Shift was released to middling reviews and was not a box office hit for star Goldie Hawn, but it did snag co-star Christine Lahti a Best Supporting Actress nomination.
The film, about women who go into the workforce while their husbands go to war during WWII, was directed by then rising star director Jonathan Demme, fresh off the success of both Melvin and Howard and the Talking Heads concert film, Stop Making Sense, generally considered to be one of the best concert films of all time. This was perhaps his biggest film to date, with Hawn as the star of the film and an ensemble which featured Kurt Russell (who would eventually become Hawn's romantic partner in real life) and future Oscar winner Holly Hunter; Belinda Carlisle even makes an appearance as a singer.
When Demme submitted his workprint of the film, star (and co-producer) Hawn was not pleased with the film. She didn't like the way her character came across. Rewrites and reshoots were requested (by Hawn or the studio, or both, remains the question) and both Demme and screenwriter Nancy Dowd were not pleased (Dowd requested a pseudonym, "Rob Morton", be used).
Rumor was that Hawn was not pleased with how co-star Lahti was "stealing" the film from her. In her autobiography, Hawn wrote that she felt Demme's cut didn't pay tribute to the women who entered the workforce during WWII and that her character didn't seem to have a conscience about falling in love with another man while her husband was at war.
A cut featuring reshoots and scenes from Demme's cut was eventually released to theatres but even critics could tell scenes were missing and the film had been tinkered with.
Rumors of a director's cut floating around have surfaced for years and in recent years, many people have admitted to having seen it.
I recently watched it and I have to say it's very much worth watching. It's a lot less Hollywood than the released version. You can definitely see that the theatrical version was tailored to be a star vehicle for Hawn. One of the interesting things about Demme's version is there are less close-ups of Hawn; she is more part of the ensemble than the star. Lahti does seem to get more love from the camera, but it's just that her character and performance are so compelling. However, Hawn is great too in Demme's cut. Her character is a lot more nuanced in Demme's version, more sexually liberated and she and Russell have great chemistry in Demme's version. In the theatrical version, their film relationship is hampered by contrived arguments whereas Demme's version, their relationship is much more erotic and organic. There's also some surprising nudity by all three main stars which was cut for the theatrical version. I don't think Russell has ever been more handsome or sexier.
The sound editing in Demme's version is also much more authentic and natural. You can see actors being dubbed in the theatrical film. Even in the last scene, one of Lahti's lines is muted (her back is to the camera). In one of the most intriguing sequences of the Demme's cut, Lahti's character runs into her ex-boyfriend at a dance hall who is being shipped out to war by the Navy. One of his fellow Navy men comes up to him and says "They're playing our song. Let's go." There's seems to be a gay subtext there. But in the theatrical version, the actor is dubbed and simply says "Let's go".
Here is the director's cut if you've never seen it before. Decide for yourself if Hawn, as star and producer, was right, or was Demme's version too inaccessible for audiences? Remember this is a workprint so it was most likely not the final version but you can definitely see Demme's stamp over this version.
