There are few films as revered and now mysterious as the original theatrical cuts of the Star Wars franchise, and while George Lucas has tinkered and tampered with them over the years, they do still exist somewhere. 

Director John Landis hinted however, that they may see the light of day again as they could be due for a re-release, as we inch ever closer to the release of The Force Awakens. 

Speaking at the launch of Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios, Landis said that Disney, who bought the rights to Star Wars and will be behind the next trilogy, are going to give the original cuts a re-release in cinemas. 

At a Q&A tonight John Landis dropped that Disney are finally going to re-release the theatrical cuts of the original Star Wars trilogy.

— Empire Magazine (@empiremagazine) September 19, 2015

According to Collider, Landis was pretty clear on his view that Lucas' constant adjustments to the movie were to the detriment of those original cuts, but that he had wanted to release them before: 

"First of all, they wouldn’t let me. George owns his movies, so he can do what he wants...My personal opinion is George hurt his movies by doing what he did. However, George said to me, 'But they're my movies.' I thought, 'That's fair.'

Did you know Disney, by the way, is putting out the original Star Wars the way it was? So, Disney, they’re like, money on the floor."

There have been rumours about this before, but given that Landis and Lucas are friends, this source is a bit more reputable than others.

As pointed out by Uproxx however, Fox still own the rights on the original trilogy through to 2020, but given the renewed interest in the movies ahead of the release of the next installments, there's little doubt that a deal could be struck between the two that would make money for both parties. 

Via Uproxx