Director says there will be an edgier cut of Fantasy Island on home video

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

I haven't seen Blumhouse's horror film reboot of the FANTASY ISLAND television series yet – like the TV show, that looks to me like something that's best suited for watching at home. I have been seeing split opinions on the movie; while our own Chris Bumbray gave it a 4/10 review and it has an 8% on Rotten Tomatoes, I've also seen comments from a lot of people who really enjoyed it. Mixed with comments from viewers who really hated it.

I doubt the PG-13 rating was much of a deciding factor in whether or not someone would be a fan of FANTASY ISLAND, but in an interview with Cinema Blend the film's director Jeff Wadlow said he had always intended for the movie to be rated R:

Upfront I said, 'Jason Blum, the movie has to be rated R.' And it's not. That's great example of having to change and kind of go with the flow. I felt that it had to be R, and I thought I shot an R movie, but then when we showed it to an audience we were like, 'Well, it's not really that R.' And just a couple of trims and it was a PG-13."

Wadlow went on to say that the "slightly edgier" R-rated or unrated cut of the film "will be available later on". So that's something to look forward to when the movie reaches home video.

Scripted by Wadlow, Chris Roach, and Jillian Jacobs, FANTASY ISLAND stars Lucy Hale, Maggie Q, Michael Rooker, Ryan Hansen, Jimmy O. Yang, Charlotte McKinney, Parisa Fitz-Henley, Portia Doubleday, Austin Stowell, and Michael Pena. The film tells the story of 

the enigmatic Mr. Roarke, who makes the secret dreams of his lucky guests come true at a luxurious but remote tropical resort. But when the fantasies turn into nightmares, the guests have to solve the island’s mystery in order to escape with their lives.

The theatrical cut was rated PG-13 for violence, terror, drug content, suggestive material, and brief strong language.