Snowpiercer premiered at the Times Square on 29 July 2013 in Seoul, South Korea,[137] before screening at the Deauville American Film Festival as the closing film on 7 September 2013,[138] the Berlin International Film Festival as the part of Berlin's Forum sidebar on 7 February 2014,[139] opening the Los Angeles Film Festival on 11 June 2014,[140] and the Edinburgh International Film Festival on 22 June 2014.[141]
Cutting request
On 9 November 2012, The Weinstein Company acquired the distribution rights to Snowpiercer from CJ Entertainment based on the script and some completed footage, with a plan for wide release in North America, as well as throughout the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.[142] It was released in the United States on 27 June 2014 in just eight theaters in selected cities.[143] This delay was caused by Harvey Weinstein, an owner of The Weinstein Company, requesting 25 minutes of footage be cut, asking for less dialogue and more action,[144] and a voice-over sequence at the end of the film.[145] The fish-gutting scene was one that Weinstein was adamant about removing, but Bong lied to Weinstein, claiming his father was a fisherman and the scene was in tribute to his father, to get Weinstein to agree to keep it.[144] Weinstein screened his cut to a test audience of around 250 members. In response to the poor score given by the test audience, Weinstein said to Bong they needed to cut more.[144] In a later test screening of Bong's original cut of the film, the audience's score was "much higher".[145] Following the news of the cut, a Free Snowpiercer petition campaign demanding the director's cut of the film to be released in the US was created by cinema activist Denise Heard-Bashur,[146] with support from the film's stars Tilda Swinton and John Hurt.[144] Bong's uncut version of the film was eventually released,[147] but with the caveat that the film switched distributors to Radius-TWC, resulting in a limited release in art house cinemas.[144] On 3 July 2014, it was announced that thanks to positive reviews, Snowpiercer would get a wider US release and play in over 150 theaters.[148][149]
Home media
The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray in various countries, including France and Korea, over Q3 and Q4 first, before the movie was finally debuted in North American theaters. The film was eventually released on home media in North America by Starz's Anchor Bay Entertainment through The Weinstein Company Home Entertainment on 21 October 2014,[150] and became available on Netflix for streaming on 1 November 2014. It did not get a genuine UK release until November 2018, when it was made available digitally via Amazon Prime Video and was released on DVD & Blu-ray in 2020.
