This unrated Director's Cut was originally going to be released on the Special Edition DVD. Disney owns Dimension films and will not release unrated/x-rated material on dvd or video.

• Running audio commentaries by director Wes Craven and writer Kevin Williamson on analog track 1
• Exclusive Director's Cut containing 20 seconds of never-before-seen footage, cut from the theatrical release to avoid an NC-17 rating

The US LaserDisc version contains the director's cut with ca. 20 seconds of restored footage that was originally cut to avoid being slapped with the NC-17 by the MPAA. It also has commentary by director Wes Craven and writer Kevin Williamson. In the commentary, Craven notes five places where his cut differs from the theatrical release:

• Steve's guts are shown pouring out of him as Casey looks on. In the released version, the very last few moments of this are shown.
• Casey hanging from the tree was time compressed in the film release (it is at normal speed here).
• When Tatum meets her death by garage door, her head is shown, very briefly being flattened.
• After Kenny the cameraman's throat is cut, he stares at the blood on his hand after touching his neck, and then looks up at the killer.
• Billy clearly loses control as he delivers his final cuts to Stuart.
• After Billy and Stuart have finished stabbing each other, there is a shot of Stu's hand dripping blood into a puddle, with Sydney's father looking on.

Even the 2011 Blu-ray from Lionsgate excludes this footage.

Disney released the in house made slasher stay alive uncut/unrated on dvd in 2006; so, the reasons for why this cut of the film is stuck on LD currently seems to be due to Disney possibly having the rights for this version, preventing its release.

Possibly like the blu-ray release of Legend by arrow video; the studio would not allow the version of the film they had the rights for be included in the physical release.