<P> In The New York Times, Janet Maslin called it "a full - blown movie musical, and quite a winning one". Roger Ebert said in his review: "All of the wonders of Little Shop of Horrors are accomplished with an offhand, casual charm . This is the kind of movie that cults are made of, and after Little Shop finishes its first run, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see it develop as one of those movies that fans want to include in their lives". Oz's friend and Muppet colleague Jim Henson praised the film and said "the lip sync on the plant in that film is just absolutely amazing". </P> <P> The film was also nominated for two Academy Awards, one for Best Visual Effects (Lyle Conway, Bran Ferren, Martin Gutteridge), the other for Best Original Song (Alan Menken, Howard Ashman) for Audrey II's new number, "Mean Green Mother from Outer Space". "Mean Green" was the first Oscar - nominated song to contain profanity in the lyrics and thus had to be slightly censored for the show . It's also the first of only two songs sung by a villain to be nominated, the other being "Blame Canada" from South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (which also featured profanity). "Mean Green" lost to "Take My Breath Away" from Top Gun . It was also nominated for Best Motion Picture - Comedy / Musical (losing to Hannah and Her Sisters) and Best Original Score (Miles Goodman) during the 44th Golden Globe Awards . The Score went to Ennio Morricone for The Mission . </P> <P> Little Shop of Horrors was the first DVD to be recalled for content . In 1998, Warner Bros. released a special edition DVD that contained approximately 23 minutes of unfinished footage from Oz's original ending, although it was in black and white and was missing some sound, visual and special effects . Producer and rights owner David Geffen was not aware of this release until it made it to the stores . Geffen said, "They put out a black - and - white, un-scored, un-dubbed video copy of the original ending that looked like shit ." As a result, the studio removed it from shelves in a matter of days and replaced it with a second edition that did not contain the extra material . Geffen wanted to theatrically re-release the film with the original ending intact . Geffen also claimed to have a color copy of the original ending, while the studio had lower quality, black and white duplicates as their own color print was destroyed in a studio fire years earlier . But Geffen had not known, until after the DVD was pulled, that the studio did not know there was a colored copy of the original ending in existence . </P> <P> In November 2011, Oz held a Q&A session at the Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, Queens during a Henson - themed exhibit . During the talk, he announced that the film would be released as a new special edition with the original ending restored . Warner Bros. reconstructed and restored the ending in an alternate edit, with re-discovered color negatives of the sequence and the help of production notes from Oz and others on the film's creative team . It was released on DVD and Blu - ray on October 9, 2012 with features returning from the original DVD . It was initially subtitled as "The Intended Cut", but changed to "The Director's Cut" once Oz began to support the release . The new edit was screened at the 50th New York Film Festival in the "Masterwork" line - up on September 29, 2012, alongside titles such as Laurence Olivier's Richard III and Michael Cimino's Heaven's Gate . Oz worried that the audience would react negatively at the 2012 screening; however, "the audience accepted Audrey and Seymour's deaths with applause and roared in glee during the plant rampage," says Oz . </P>

Who owns the rights to little shop of horrors