I taped "Top Secret!" off the Comedy Central cable channel, just to see how it was cut for TV. Imagine my surprise when I found that the TV version had added as well as missing footage. Since then I have seen "Top Secret!" On Comedy Central 4 different times and gotten four different versions. Many Val Kilmer fans don't bother to watch the TV version because they own the video and don't want to watch a version that is broken up by commercials. However, "edited for TV" in this case means footage has been added as well as cut! Cut out the commercials, and who knows, you may prefer the TV version!

Here are the changes that are made:

CUT: Any footage showing the "enhanced codpieces" of the male dancers in the ballet.

ADDED: A bit where the commandant tosses a ball to his dog is added. The dog jumps out the window after the ball and then limps in later, all bandaged, to return the ball.

The part of the prison cell scene with Nick and his manager and the "Anal Intruder" kit is cut. Sometimes that whole scene is cut. This cut makes the later scene (which is left in), where the Germans tell Nick that his manager was found "impaled on an electrical device" hard to understand.

CUT: Nick gives his manager this box, which he just happens to have under the bed in his prison cell.

CUT: Nick's manager admires the assembled large electrical device which he was found impaled on later in the movie.

The scene where Nick bursts into the dungeon and discovers Professor Flammond is expanded, and includes a bit where a laboratory assistant rushes in and tells the professor that they have finally made an apple.
And, instead of telling Nick that
"If they find you here, your life will be worth less than a truckload of dead rats at a tampon factory,"
the professor tells him,
"If they find you here, your life will be worth less than a beaker of methylpropylene in a colloid solution!"

ADDED: After the professor complains to Nick that science cannot make one little apple, his assistant rushes in with this apple they made. The professor throws it out the window, and it explodes--making this the first of two Val movies with an exploding apple!

ADDED: Nick explains to the professor why he was arrested for murder at the ballet.

When Hilary helps Nick escape from the concert, and they pause in the park:
In the TV version there is a section added to this scene, in which Hilary complains that she is thirsty and Nick offers her a series of beverages (which he inexplicably gets from offscreen), each of which she refuses for a different reason. Two from the series are shown below:

ADDED: Nick offers Hilary coffee, which she refuses, saying "Caffeine makes me too edgy."

ADDED: Nick pours Hilary milk, which she also refuses, exclaiming "Have you seen what they do to those cows?"

CUT: The action in the background, where three parachutists land on a giant pigeon statue, urinate, and then take off again, followed by a giant dump from the statue itself, is omitted.

In the video, when Hilary and Nick kiss in the loft of the Swedish bookstore (crushing the guitar between them), they roll over in front of a fireplace, then another fireplace is shown, then the movie cuts to the singing horse. In one of the TV versions I saw, this scene is continued so that they roll across the rug in front of the second fireplace, stand up still embracing in front of a wall-mounted fireplace, and finally end up in front of the window through which a building can be seen burning down.

Part of the scene with the cow, the calf and the bull is cut.

A scene is added at the very end where Cedric (still trapped in the remains of his car) gets his revenge by putting the Germans in their car through the car crusher.

ADDED: A happy Cedric gets his revenge by putting the Germans through the car-crusher.

This article is a composite of articles originally printed in the May and July 1996 issues of the Val Kilmer Newsletter.

Dig yet deeper into TOP SECRET! by looking at these other articles originally published in Val Kilmer Newsletter Online:

• Sight gags
• Do you know a little German?
• Symbolism

Jean Mermoz || Footnote Page