Steven Spielberg‘s 1982 classic ‘E.T.’ is a movie everyone cherishes. The emotionally enriching story of a human being forming a friendship with a lost alien still brings tears to our eyes. It’s also the film that Steven Spielberg considers “perfect” from his oeuvre. However, the filmmaker has one regret about the choices he made for the movie.

During his masterclass at the TIME100 Summit, he told a room full of people about regretting not having guns in the movie’s 20th-anniversary re-release edition. This revised edition replaces guns with walkies-talkies. It was a political decision guided by personal beliefs, which tampered with the film he was trying to make.

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Steven Spielberg Regrets Leaving Weapons Out Of Edited Version Of ‘E.T’

Steven Spielberg has a lot to say about censorship. The 76-year-old filmmaker passionately spoke about how it hinders the true creative spirit. He’s also guilty of it. During his conversation with former TIME editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal at the TIME100 Summit, he expressed remorse about one change he made for the 20th-anniversary edition of ‘E.T.’ The director left out the scenes with firearms on the cutting floor, replacing them with walkie-talkies. But he brought the guns back in the 30th-anniversary edition.

Steven Spielberg said, “That was a mistake. I never should have done that. ‘E.T.’ is a product of its era. No film should be revised based on the lenses we now are, either voluntarily, or being forced to peer through,” adding, ” ‘E.T.’ was a film that I was sensitive to the fact that the federal agents were approaching kids with firearms exposed and I thought I would change the guns into walkie talkies… Years went by and I changed my own views.”

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Steven Spielberg Weighs In On Literary Censorship Of Roald Dahl’s Books

Steven Spielberg doesn’t look kindly at the ongoing literary censorship. Some of Roald Dahl‘s stories like ‘Charlie And The Chocolate Factory,’ ‘The Twits,’ and ‘The Witches’ are going through editing to remove works deemed offensive today. Puffin Publishers and the Roald Dahl Story Company collaborated with an organization called ‘Inclusive Minds’ to ensure the books contain inclusive language.

The ‘E.T.’ filmmaker said, “Nobody should ever attempt to take the chocolate out of Willy Wonka! Ever! For me, it is sacrosanct. It’s our history, it’s our cultural heritage. I do not believe in censorship in that way.” The filmmaker recently directed Oscar-nominated ‘The Fabelmans’ and is prepping the ‘Napoleon’ miniseries from his late friend Stanley Kubrick’s screenplay.

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