Amazon Butchers ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’ With Edited Version

In what appears to be an astonishingly empty-headed move, Amazon Prime Video offered an abridged version of the classic Christmas film “It’s A Wonderful Life” in which they deleted all the scenes where George Bailey, played by Jimmy Stewart, experiences what the world would be like if he never existed.

The abridged film cuts out George’s terrifying journey through a world where he never existed. That frightening journey follows him after he is threatened with arrest by the bank’s greedy owner, Mr. Potter, played by Lionel Barrymore. Potter knows George doesn’t have the money for an imminent audit of the Bailey Building and Loan because George’s absent-minded uncle has lost $8,000, leaving it in Potter’s hands. When George goes to Potter for help, Potter mocks him, saying George is worth more dead than alive, prompting George’s descent into despair.

At the end of his rope, George is preparing to leap off a bridge when Clarence jumps in first, prompting George to dive into the water and save him. During their subsequent conversation, in the toll house by the bridge, as they are drying off, George tells Clarence, “Only one way you can help me. You don’t happen to have eight thousand bucks on you?”

That is where Prime Video’s abridged version of the film breaks off and makes a hard cut.

In the complete film, George follows by stating he’s “worth more dead than alive,” adding, “If it hadn’t been for me, everybody’d be a lot better off,” followed by, “I suppose it would have been better if I’d never been born at all,” Clarence then grants him his wish.

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What follows is George’s harrowing odyssey through a world in which he had never been born, including scenes where George cannot find his car, which was left adrift in the snow. He discovers the town is now called Pottersville instead of Bedford Falls. He goes to a bar where no one knows him. He sees the druggist whom George had saved from disaster by recognizing a wrong prescription, but who now has spent 20 years in jail because George had not been there. George discovers he has no documents at all to identify himself with. He finds his Building and Loan business gone. The local cop, who is supposed to be a friend, does not recognize him. His mother denies his existence. He visits the grave of his brother who he had saved in his actual life. And his wife faints when he insists they are married.

George finally runs back to the bridge, where he falls on his knees and prays to have his life back, sobbing, “I want to live again. I want to live again. Please, God, let me live again.”

George’s prayer is answered when a police car arrives and the cop recognizes him, prompting George to suddenly realize he has his life back.

The abridged version only returns to the original movie as George discovers his car where he had left it and joyously returns to town.

If you want to know what’s wrong with the world, Prime Video has an “abridged” version of It’s a Wonderful Life that removes THE ENTIRE POTTERSVILLE SCENE where George sees life if he wasn’t born.

That’s all that abridged. The best most crucial part of the movie. Just. Wow. pic.twitter.com/H8Z82lGk9X

— Germain Lussier (@GermainLussier) December 24, 2024

Just beyond awful. pic.twitter.com/sGNdLOQCpI

— Germain Lussier (@GermainLussier) December 24, 2024