Mike Flanagan: 3 hour cut of Doctor Sleep has new material throughout

Yesterday brought the news that writer/director Mike Flanagan's Stephen King adaptation DOCTOR SLEEP will be getting a Digital release on January 21st, with a 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray, and DVD release to follow on February 4th (copies can be pre-ordered HERE)… and that news contained the very cool and intriguing tidbit that there will be two different versions of DOCTOR SLEEP being released on those dates.

Not only will we be able to watch the 2 hour and 32 minute theatrical cut, there will also be a director's cut with roughly 30 extra minutes to it, boosting the film up to a 3 hour running time.

Starring Ewan McGregor as an adult version of the shining-gifted Danny Torrance, DOCTOR SLEEP has the following synopsis: 

Still irrevocably scarred by the trauma he endured as a child at the Overlook, Dan Torrance has fought to find some semblance of peace. But that peace is shattered when he encounters Abra, a courageous teenager with her own powerful extrasensory gift, known as the “shine.” Instinctively recognizing that Dan shares her power, Abra has sought him out, desperate for his help against the merciless Rose the Hat and her followers, The True Knot, who feed off the shine of innocents in their quest for immortality.

Forming an unlikely alliance, Dan and Abra engage in a brutal life-or-death battle with Rose. Abra’s innocence and fearless embrace of her shine compel Dan to call upon his own powers as never before — at once facing his fears and reawakening the ghosts of the past.

Our friends over at Collider reached out to Flanagan hoping to find out what we can expect from the 3 hour cut, and they got an exclusive statement from the filmmaker in which he confirmed that the director's cut is "a finished, complete, fully polished new cut of the movie."

Flanagan said, 

There is new material throughout the whole film. Some of it is brand new stuff that was never included in the theatrical cut, and there’s also a handful of extended (or altered) scenes as well. There was never any intention to release this cut theatrically, we always knew it was too long. But we worked on it alongside the theatrical cut throughout post, and it made it a lot easier to make hard decisions in the edit, knowing that some day this cut might see the light of day.

There are some big new scenes, for sure. I don’t want to spoil any of that, but I can say that there is new material throughout (including in the final act at the Overlook). Some of my favorite stuff involved Young Danny and Wendy (there’s some terrific material with Alex Essoe that I’m thrilled is restored here), and will be familiar to fans of the book. There’s also a fair amount of new stuff involving young Abra in the film’s first act, learning about her shine, and how it affects her parents.

And there are some surprises I definitely won’t spoil here.

He described the 3 hour cut as "more literary" than the theatrical cut, as it "feels like reading a novel". The director's cut is even broken up into chapters.

I didn't manage to catch DOCTOR SLEEP on the big screen, so I'm excited that I will have the chance to see two different cuts of the movie very soon.