Steven Spielberg Says Editing Guns Out of 'E.T.' Was a 'Mistake': 'I Never Should Have Done That'

Steven Spielberg says he regrets censoring E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.

The Oscar-winning filmmaker, 76, discussed his decision to change the equipment shown in a scene in the film where federal agents approach kids from guns to walkie-talkies during the TIME100 Summit at the Lincoln Center in New York City.

"That was a mistake," Spielberg said of taking firearms out of the hit 1982 film, which he directed. "I never should have done that."

His reasoning? "Because E.T. is a product of its era, and no film should be revised based on the lenses we now are either voluntarily or be forced to peer through," Spielberg said.

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He added that while he was fine with his decision at first, his views have changed over the years.

"I should never have messed with the archive of my own work, and I don't recommend anybody do that," The Fabelmans director said. "All of our movies are sort of a measuring or side post of where we were when we made them."

Spielberg explained that he doesn't believe in editing out certain factors of a story to change the reality, citing taking "chocolate" out of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: "I do not believe in censorship in that way."

He previously admitted at a special 40th anniversary celebration of E.T. last year that his own experience with his parents' divorce inspired the story.

It got him thinking about the end scene from his 1977 film Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and "What if that little creature never went back to the ship?"

"What if the creature was part of a foreign-exchange program?" said Spielberg, of what would eventually become the general plotline of E.T.

"What if I turn my story about divorce into a story about children, a family, trying to fill the great need and creating such responsibility?" he added.

"A divorce creates great responsibility, especially if you have siblings; we all take care of each other," Spielberg continued. "What if Elliott, or the kid – I hadn't dreamed up his name yet – needed to, for the first time in his life, become responsible for a life form to fill the gap in his heart?"

"I had been working on an actual literal script about my parents' separation and divorce and I had been working on ideas about that and what it did to my sisters and myself," he said.