BY MATT RICHTEL / Sep 10, 1998The New York Times
James Cameron won an Oscar for directing ''Titanic.'' Now Carol Biesinger, the owner of a video rental store in Utah, is winning business for making some creative cuts to the biggest-selling movie of all time.
For $5, Sunrise Family Video in American Fork, Utah, which does not rent R-rated movies, will cut two steamy scenes from home video copies of ''Titanic.'' Ms. Biesinger said she had got the idea after customers complained they would not be able to share it with their children.
The scenes Ms. Biesinger trims in her back office include one in which Kate Winslet, who plays the heroine, appears topless and one in which she and her co-star, Leonardo DiCaprio, steam up the windows of an automobile. For an additional $3, Ms. Biesinger will cut other scenes at the customer's request.
''We had customer after customer come in and talk about the movie,'' she said. ''They said they couldn't sit on the couch and watch it with the family without being embarrassed.''
The procedure to cut the film and takes only 10 minutes, she said. But, thanks to the more than 1,000 orders Sunrise video has received for the surgical procedure, the wait is five weeks.
The wait is not the only sticking point. Ms. Biesinger said she had received a call from Paramount Pictures asking her to cease her unilateral cutting and pasting.
She said she had told the movie house that she would do so ''when they proved it is illegal.'' Then, she said, she will quit.
''I'm not out to break the law,'' she said. ''We're just trying to meet a demand.''
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