Tight writing requires a lot of things modern Hollywood doesn't have: respect for the audience's time, an understanding of what is essential, a humble lack of self-indulgence, and an understanding of pacing.
I remember when Peter Jackson's LoTR movies were considered long. I also remember holding my need to pee for the entirety of The Two Towers and still loving the film. These days, even without my bladder feeling ready to burst at any moment, I don't seem to enjoy movies.
@MrDj232 That's the difference, though. Jackson's LOTRs earned the runtime due to needing to cover the source material and making sure every minute counted, even with the extended cuts. My stance is that if you are going to do a long movie, fine, justify the run time. Make every scene, piece of dialogue, and character/ plot beat count. Because the moment you take your audience for granted, is when they check out.
Sometimes I'm mad at ol Peej for this, but he had no idea what corpos would do over the decades. LOTR was great, but goddamn was King Kong a SLOG, so maybe I don't forgive him lol
I'm glad I grew up under a rock, cuz it just means I can still watch old movies I've never seen. There's no reason for movies to be THIS long, it's insane.
@@FP194 I don't think that's what's she's saying. Clearly she stated that she grew up under a rock-therefore she doesn't know any of those films. Those are not modern film as this video essay is about. Those are stories that needed to be that long but they are exceptions to the rule. Amadeus is one of the best films ever made and it's 3 ish ours. But a simple Marvel movie or like the video said thr original Mermaid was 83 minutes and got the point across, why make the remake 2.5 hours? Ulimatley it's bad writing. Each page of a script represents a minute of screen time. That tells me "writers" don't know how to streamline their stories and remove what doesn't need to be there.
Film editing is a lost art that no one realized has been lost until it was already gone. When I was a kid, most movies were between 90 minutes and 2 hours. The only movies that went past that were usually dramas and historical epics. Most action and adventure movies don't need a long runtime. Nowadays, when attention spans are shorter than ever due to tiktoc and twitter, movies are longer than ever. No wonder little kids would rather watch people play fortnite on twitch than go see a movie.
A movie on screen has been told three times - once by the screenwriter, once by the director and finally by the editor. I'd argue TLM demonstrates failures on all three counts, so to blame the editor exclusively for a movie that's not as succinct as it could have been lets the other culprits off the hook.
Tone and other aspects of a film affects this. A lot of those long-run time epics didn't actually need to be so long, but they were grand in scale, spending ample time on establishing shots of locations, allowing for chunks of time carried first and foremost by music, etc. The length fit what the story was trying to do. 90-120 minutes is not a badge of honor for runtime, but decades of cinema have shown that that is a good target unless given convincing reason otherwise. We were let down when the studios hammered this range for filmmakers like Ridley Scott (whose longer runtime director's cuts are routinely superior), and we are now let down by the seeming mandate to make sure a movie is long enough to at least give off the impression of getting "enough" product out of the price of a ticket.
@@stoneymahoney9106 I'm not blaming the editor since editors have never had final say in the final cut. I am blaming everyone in the process; the director, primary producer and studio executives in particular.
@@redsoxu571 I will agree with that. And I never intended to sound like every movie should be 90-120 minutes. However, some kinds of movies do better with certain runtimes. Comedies are almost always at their best with a relatively short runtime because they are meant to be quick, escapist entertainment. On the other hand, historical epics tend to be best with a longer runtime because they want to tell a story that is grand in scale. Action and adventure movies are supposed to be exciting thrillrides. Pushing the runtimes to extreme lengths can wear out audiences. This is especially important when you don't have much (or very interesting of a) story.
Movies being no longer than just over 2 hours is not only beneficial for the consumer but the companies themselves and so it would make sense to give both parties what they want.
@@tyr3759 So shorter movies equal more potential screenings which means greater potential profits and it also helps engage younger audiences. As an adult i don't mind the film length but it definitely is negative for films with a much younger audience. Hope this clarifies that.
I grew up in a time where movies had an intermission and were longer that todays movies and there was only one screen per theater It’s not the length of the movie is the short attention span of the modern movie goer This is why movies have descended into the garbage bin
The generally accepted process for a narrative movie is simple: The screenwriters write the screenplay, then the directors take that screenplay and shoot footage the way they envisioned when they read it, and finally the editors take that raw footage and cut it up and put it back together into a coherent, continual movie. Animation works differently. The screenwriters write the screenplay, they get together with the directors, editors and voice actors to produce an animated storyboard vision of the screenplay that's going to be almost frame-for-frame identical to the final edit, then the animators do their thing and hand it off to the editors, who already know in advance pretty much exactly how the thing will go. Today's CGI-laden "process" goes something like this: A screenplay is handed down from a writing committee to a directorial team. That team of directors shoots a bunch of disparate footage based on the visualization they each think the writing committee expected, some of which is sent to the editors and some of which is sent to the CGI team. The editors then have to build a coherent, continual movie out of incompletely and unfinished footage while the directors with nothing better to do watch over their shoulders and reshoot a bunch of stuff when the editors don't like it, while the CGI team tries to guess which of their footage is actually going to get used to generate finals so they can actually work efficiently, and eventually the editors die of suffocation under an enormous pile of notes from the directors, writers, CGI team and any other useless executive idiot desperate to stick their oar in. And people wonder why so many movies today are a hideous, bloated mess.
I have seen enough super hero movies for the rest of my life. Sick of them, same story with the same bloated CGI effects over and over and over again 🤢
As someone who sat through Wagnerian operas, I find myself checking my phone in these new movies before the 50 minute mark. That disturbs me on multiple levels. They can't *hold* our attention either. Also, this is far and above the funniest commentary channel on our cultural descent into digital bread and circuses. Thank you!
I recently watched SovietWomble's three hour video essay detailed the narrative issues within the survival horror game "The Forest". I then watched it again with my girlfriend. I then watched it again with a gamer friend of mine on his day off. If Hollywood can't keep me engaged for an hour with all their writers, directors, photographers, stunt choreographers, actors, CG artists, editors and producers working for years, while one guy can hold my attention for 9 repeated hours talking about a semi-obscure video game, all those other people should just pack up and go home - they obviously have no clue what they're doing.
@@stoneymahoney9106 Exactly. I had a conversation with someone about storytelling;narrative devices the other day. At least in fiction, for entertainment purposes they supposed to be executed a certain way and contain certain elements bc they are MEANT to hold our attention and entertain us. This new movement that either discards those traditions without understanding them ("everything is toxic!") or because they don't reflect "real life" are missing the point of how and why fictional entertainment exists. CZcams streams and videos are more entertaining nowadays bc non-fiction is still less damaged than fictional storytelling at this point.
I sat through a Met performance of Wagner's "Meistersinger" opera, running from approximately 12 noon to 6 pm in the theater. With two intermissions. Delightful humor, gorgeous live music, talented cast and crew. Would definitely attend again. In contrast, Hollywood uses a copy machine to copy and recopy itself, until the degradation becomes painfully obvious. (Perhaps a result of STEM education without the arts?)
@@MarkLPriest I couldn't even make it through one episode of Ahsoka without checking the time and I once saw Tristan und Isolde. The lack of immersion feels like it comes from something human missing, ironically.
The 1960 movie Spartacus was over 3 hours long, but it was an epic that put the time to good use. Plus, it had an intermission, so the audience could go to the restroom, replenish snacks and just stretch.
Brevity is the soul of wit. Something modern writers lack. That being said: I don't mind long movies, but that time must be *meaningfully used* Often, it is not.
The length of films isn't even necessarily the problem. Seven Samurai is 3 1/2 hours long and earns every minute of it. It feels like it's only an hour long. Why? Sharp editing and pacing. Kurosawa knew which tedious scenes he didn't have to show and merely implied them in the way the scenes were cut together. He doesn't have to show us the scene where the villagers learn the bandits are coming back later to attack them. We see the bandits plan the attack, then see a scared villager come out of hiding and start to run. The scene changes to a quiet village, and we know from the magic of editing that he's already told them. We don't have to see him run all the way back and explain everything; instead, we understand that those events happened and can go on with the interesting parts of the story. Plus, the movie has everything you could want in a film: great characters, action, humor, dialogue, philosophy that's not overbearing, romance, cinematography, and varied locations. But the editing is why the film never slogs.
Yes! Was looking for a comment like this. I've got no issue with long Movies. The real problem is a lot of movies recently have no idea how to pace their runtime and often that can make the films feel longer than they are
Whoever it was who said "If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter", they could have easily said "If I had more talent, I would have written a tighter movie"
@@fattiger6957 This. All movies have the potential to be too long. It's the editors that save us. Compare "Aliens" to "Aliens Directors Cut" one is tight. With a relentless pace with no slack time. The other stalls out 1/2 way in and has a hard time picking up the pace again.
Exactly; the length of the movie doesn't matter; the movie is just bad, and it being 80 minutes would change nothing. A good movie is a good movie; the perfect run time is around 2 hours and 20 minutes, because then you get absorbed into the good movie I watch a movie for the experience... not for some short, one off nonsense
I genuinely don't understand why it took the new Little Mermaid over two hours to tell their story when it took the original 80 or so minutes. You want to know why people like the original Little Mermaid Disney? It was because it wasn't complicated. Its simplicity and tight story keeps you engaged without making anything more than being a story about a father and daughter learning to understand each other. And it worked because it was well animated, well acted, and had iconic music made by people who knew what they were doing. Stop trying to overcomplicate things and undermine animated movies. It's getting really annoying.
There's little added to this version of the story that would warrant so much extra runtime. The problem is that telling a story as tightly as the original did is a skill that no-one working at Disney (or generally in Hollywoodl) seems to possess these days, and it results in bloated, boring crap like TLM.
I 100% think it's a problem intrinsically associated with the death of genre movies. Remember the height of 90 minute comedy, action or even generally small budget movies twenty years ago? Now the majority of movies fall into 2 and a half hour Superhero movies, Fast and the Furious franchise, generic Netflix flavour of the month movies, Oscar baits and, the currently very prominent agenda bait. There's almost no room for escapism or easy going entertainment, often because it's at risk of being assassinated by word of mouth by the woke mob for one perceived non-issue or another. Everything has to be pushing some kind of social justice message or 'deconstructing' issues.
@@greenteabea Exactly, at the very least have the decency to be honest about it. But then, these are degenerates so there's no point asking any kind of self-reflection or perspective from them.
Disney makes their movies so long, so they can boost their viewing numbers on the streaming platforms. So it doesn’t matter if the movie is good, as long as it gets more minutes being watched on streaming, it will boost their viewership
@@aeoligarlic4024 Yes, you are right that not all movies have the woke poison embedded in them, and honestly I prefer that as at least then a movie fails attempting to draw from a vision, an idea, but it's not nearly as common any more. More often than not a movie is awful and filled with woke content nowadays.
GOTG3 and Across The Spider-Verse are remnants of a dying breed nowadays: watchable super-hero flicks. But dear god did they drag, you could cut out 20 minutes out of each of them and spare us of nothing but cringe dialogue.
I've been saying this for years. I remember seeing Close Encounters as a kid and there was an intermission where you could go the loo and get more popcorn to see you through the second half...and that film wasn't that long. The length of a film is now the main thing I look at before watching it. I'd rather watch Killer Mermaids on the horror channel than sit through 3 hours of sh*t I'd have cut myself.
Wasn't there a time when big studios actually demanded from the directors to shorten the runtime to increase the number of possible screenings in the cinemas? And people back then were annoyed about that as they saw this as big studios hindering the directors' artistic vision.
They did. But this was in the pre-multiplex era where a film was shown on one screen and thus could only realistically be shown four times a day, maybe five at a push. Now you have multiplexes with upwards of 10-12 screens and movies can be shown on three screens across the day. At my local cinema a new Marvel movie can have screenings twice an hour because of this. Another factor is related to how the movies are delivered. Because they are on a hard drive now and not a 35mm print, multiple screenings are now possible. Whereas before if you only had one print of Star Wars Episode VII The Force Awakens only one screen could show it. Now it's several because the movie just has to be put into a computer
On the other hand, we need to consider the genius that gave some extremely long films their epic majesty: Lawrence of Arabia, The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Godfather, Das Boot, Apocalypse Now. The connection with these epics is so profound that, after they are finished, moviegoers will continue to dwell in that imaginary world all the way home. Indeed, some of the longest movies are the ones that fans need to watch AGAIN every several years or so.
They don't understand that time is precious and you need to fill it wisely , because of tv series being binge by watchers they think you will do the same for a movie, but a movie is different from a tv series they need better structure and better plan. 😢
Bloated run time could be getting pushed by Disney to fill streaming service time. Although the contagion does seem to have spread to all movie studios.
Thank you so much for this. It's not just movies, it's shows, games and even youtube videos. Every single form of entertainment feels the need to bore the crap out of its audience nowadays, and of course the lifeless people online aren't capable of noticing any of this.
A good example is DC animation. They do a much more effective job in telling stories in less time. Yet with 3 hours, the DC comics live action films can't even tell a cohesive story.
My phone must really be spying on me because last night, my friend came over so we could watch the new(ish) Batman movie with Robert Pattinson. It was the longest movie I had EVER tried to sit through. And this was after I went to the theaters to see The Flash…which was half an hour shorter! My back hurt so bad, I annoyed the crap out of everyone because I was constantly fidgeting and stretching in my seat. I’m too old for these modern movies…and I’m only in my 30s!
Directors used to have to fight and prove their film was worth going over an hour and a half, because the longer the movie = less movie showings = less ticket sales. I think it changed due to directors' vain attempts to show they were making "serious" dramatic films, but I haven't seen ANY recent movie that deserved its 2 1/2 to 3 hour length.
Two things : 1. Show, dont tell. A few quick frames can replace many, many origin stories, expositions and introductions. 2. Tell only what pushes the story forward. Many characters get to much love and we know many irrelevant details and boring tidbits about them. Both are very important lessons none of which modern writers have any clue about or are too inexperienced to know how to incorporate them in their work. You do not pay properly for the writing that needs to be done ? You get what you pay for.
I am sorry but i 100% disagree this time around, the movie's length isn't at fault (even if now days people have the attention spawn and the patience of a toodler trying to play videogames, and some toodlers may be much better at concentrating and having patience on that setting) the issue is the movie's need for said amount of time. Basically, they don't actually need the time, they just put it in there thinking it is necessary when in truth it is just filler, if you don't need it then why would you put it? That's where the issue originates. I have seen movies so long they have something we don't use anymore, is called "intermission" and it was used to let people go to the bathroom because of how long some old time movies can be. People can, and will, sit through a movie for as long as it manages to keep them there, is like a videogame, or a book, or any other entertainment, if it remains 'entertaining' then it'll keep the person right there at its seat. I can 100% bet that if into the spiderverse had come out on full and people really really enjoyed it, they would watch both parts simultaneously right there and then, only thing stopping them is a need to go the bathroom and maybe having other things pending on their day. Long movies aren't bad, bad movies just think that they need more screentime than they actually do. That's my thought on the matter.
@@christopherkelley1664 i recognise brevity but i disagree that it is the issue with movies, there are things that can be enjoyed in long form, and i myself find long form movies quite fine, i am supporting what i myself enjoy, but i consider that movies do not use the extra time they try jamming in there and instead just create filler, which is why we try so hard to make things brief. However, there is space for long form, it can be good, genuinely, there is nothing wrong with letting something soak in for long times, is just Bad when it overstays its welcome because all things have limits to how long they can last, even long form content.
Nail right on the head. I also feel long run times are not a problem if you make the best of it. Just a matter of personal preference if it didn't do anything for you or not. Many say John Wick 4 was too long for what it was, but I enjoyed every minute of it because it kept things varied and felt like it was putting it's best foot forward for this "last" entry, so it earned some self-indulgence. Same with Spider-Verse, which I feel is going to have the best hook of all these "To Be Continued" films this year.
It is hard to fit a whole IDEOLOGICAL MESSAGE and PROPAGANDA within a shorter narrative... as you begin to 'nod off' your mind is most vulnerable (that's actually true)...
There are few movies that need to last more than 90-100 minutes. True, Fiddler On The Roof was very long but it also had an intermission (Hollywood needs to reintroduce that if they are going to keep making longer than need to be movies). This allowed movie goers to recharge and was profitable for theaters as people would refill on snacks.
I can think of two instances when longer movies are worth it in my opinion: Book adaptation of classics (bc less original source material can be cut out, which is what the readers want) and movies dealing with very heavy topics like Schindlers List. And even then pver 120 min intermissions would be advised.
@@catalayalafaye5337 agreed. And I still stand by the intermission as it benefits all. Attendance would increase because moviegoers would know there would be a break and theaters would no doubt see an increase in concession sales. The intermission need only be about 15 minutes. That is a win-win-win, especially for theaters as concessions are a cash cow and should be milked for all they can be.
There are films which can justify it, like Dune, but that is mostly for dense adaptations and the rare exception. Normal movies have no business being longer than 2hrs. Now I don't like John Wick in general, but an action movie being almost 3 hrs?? How do you not die of boredom.
great channel and topic! nice concise vid and answers a relevant, current topic! also all the contrasting vids and their sequels was amazing I liked 'the batman' a LOT. but I did watch it in segments, they could have made it a two-parter, I think. it was really engaging though, just, a lot.
Great, insightful video! I'm rwminded of thw "lefty's can't meme" quip and how they like to fill a picture with walls of text. Maybe this may help explain their movies, too, filling the movies with walls of text?
At one time movies had an intermission and were longer than movies today It’s not the length of the movie it’s the content. Because the modern movie goer has the attention span of a fly is why we get the garbage we have today
There's just something special about watching a film in the theatre. No distractions. Nobody talking. My neighbors aren't cutting their yard next door.
They think longer means better. I was watching my favorite movie Raiders of the Lost Ark and realized it's kind of short. It seemed longer when I was a kid. Point is, it's all about pacing and a good, tight story. Wow, I started writing this without knowing you would mention Raiders.
The Roaring Twenties (1939) tells a epic story in 106 minutes.Bad Day at Black Rock is about 80 minutes long(masterpiece) King Kong (1933) 101 minutes the 2005 remake 201 minutes twice as long half as entertaining
@the9thplanet768 that goes without saying, although the tide's starting to turn (Disney fired their head of diversity a couple days ago, although I think it's far too late to save the company so it's kind of pointless at this point). But almost all of the complaints I've seen about blockbusters have been primarily about bad cgi or bad character designs. It's not a good sign when the director of the Flash comes out and says the movie is supposed to look like that. There's a difference between a comic book style and cheaping out on vfx (or overworking and underpaying the artists). That's why all those crappy live action Disney remakes are so dark, they're trying to hide how bad everything looks. Not to mention the uncanny valley animals nobody likes, which I'm sure is going to go really well for the live action Lilo and Stitch movie.
This is exactly why I hesitate to even go to the movies anymore. Why watch a 3 hour movie that I probably wont even like when I can just watch it at home from the comfort of my living room.
I think to quite an extent, series done for release on the internet have surpassed films. It's almost like current commercial films are trying to compete with series.
For me it started with comedies and their DVD 'unrated cuts'. Every time I watched these, I could see why the shorter versions were better. But directors demand that their 'visions' be fully realized (when all it is, is pure ego). Longer movies is better for dramas. Genre fare, like sci-fi, action and fantasy, not so much. Avatar 2 was over 3 hours! At least Dune spilt their movie in half. Even horror movies are getting longer than they used to be. Some of these are still good, and I've been wanting to watch them again, but I haven't been able to set aside that kind of time. People have busy lives, and I think studios and filmmakers have begun to take that for granted.
i'm actually amazed it's gone this way. back int the silent film days, the cinemas started running the films at a faster framerate to get more performances in and make more money. now the studios are deliberately making the films 30-60 minutes longer for no reason. maybe they just wannt justify the fact that they pissed away 300 million on brainless cgi sludge.
A Martin Sorsese masterpiece like goodfellas or casino, or some war movies like a bridge too far or apocalypse now aproaching 3 hours long I get, some stories might just take long time to tell. But why must the little mermaid clock in at the same run time as the dark knight?
Funny thing: All you described is the EXACT reason why I seldon can watch a movie on streaming! When I look at the run time at 2:30 hours or 2:10 I get demotivated because that's generally on a weekend and I have to weigh in how much time I'll loose by watching that movie. I mean if I get a couple of 10 - 15 min videos on CZcams about an interesting subject, or an episode of a 20 min show I'm still left with time to do so much more, to fire up the PS4 and making some progress in a game, going out or even taking a nap. Lately I started watching some old classics just because when I look at the runtime is like 1:30 - 1:20, like a Robocop or Clint Eastwood. The reason for that, for me is that going to the movies is getting so expensive that studios might feel that if they don't deliver at least a 2:00 - 2:10 you might think it's not worth your money. Them I think to myself, why not consider a different price for length of movie? Maybe the tickets are getting more expensive because from 18:00 to 22:00 they can only put 2 screenings of a movie. If they maybe could put 3 they would earn more and lower the price, more people going equals to more money, and more people going is equal to making going to the movies something you do on your week, nowadays is an event at least for me.
This is a common complaint I see from the streaming generation. The problem is a lot of people who complain about movies being too long have no problem watching an entire season of a show in a single day. I have to roll my eyes at this. And don't tell me it's episodic because TV is anything BUT episodic these days. This is not in defense of recent movies as so much of it is crap....but I think most of the streaming world is pretty much crap too, and people spend all day watching Netflix.
You'd think that making shorter films would be in the studios interest. The shorter the screenplay, the less you have to film/animate and the lower the production costs. The lower the production costs the more chance there is of making a profit.
I'm fine with long movies as long as they have earned that right. Avengers Endgame was the culmination of a beloved decade long collection of movies. I'll happily watch the TV cut of 1978 Superman at 3 hours (over two nights). The Lord of the Rings films are epics that deserve it too. But when they just make any new movie almost 3 hours long, no way, not interested.
I was so disappointed by Endgame. I'd say it has so much fluff and filler. It definitely did not make every minute count, especially with all those stupid pointless jokes.
Echo Chamberlain you must be psychic or something, because I was thinking about the same thing recently. Whenever I decide to watch an older movie I'm always surprised to see how the runtime is almost always between 90 and 120 minutes. The other pleasant surprise being the snappy narrative, when the movie is 2 + hours long but you don't feel that way because the plot keeps moving forward (Empire strikes back and The Dark Knight are truly perfect examples ☝️). One of the main issues with current movies is length, whenever I see 180 or God forbid 200 minutes I go: 😭🤮. But my biggest issue with modern movies is the pointlessness and padding of those extra minutes. Pointless dragged out scenes where they literally feel the need to explain everything for the low I.Q. 'moder audience ', I mean God forbid to show them instead of telling (Visual medium? What's that? 🤪)...I mean they've literally made a 2 hour long movie about a 15 second scene from Star Wars referring to Rouge One and the schematics of the Death Star, despite the fact that it was almost put in as a throwaway line (which it probably was) and we all knew, even back in 1977 that everybody involved in that mission died. The other thing making modern barely watchable: pointless, lingering scenes with no/bad dialogue. In contrast: 'Once upon a time in Hollywood' was also 3 hours long but I sure as hell enjoyed every fu*king minute of it, because when there wasn't any action, there was some clever dialogue. I remember watching that movie and saying to my self: "Oh'my God, I'm actually watching a MOVIE! I'm... having FUN!" Can't say that about Avatar 2 though, or Babylon.
"The other pleasant surprise being the snappy narrative, when the movie is 2 + hours long but you don't feel that way because the plot keeps moving forward (Empire strikes back and The Dark Knight are truly perfect examples ☝)." I felt that way about White House Down from 2013 (that had Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx and Joey King; that was 2 hrs. 11 min.), and about The China Syndrome from 1979 (right at 2 hrs., maybe a minute over; w/Jane Fonda, Jack Lemmon and Michael Douglas), simply because the storyline of each progressed at a good pace and I got quickly from A to B in the time allotted (many modern films don't know how to do that).
Back then I loved "long movies", because usually the director had to fight very hard to get a longer than 90 minutes runtime into the cinemas, which meant they had good reason to do so. "Goodfellas" (2h 26min), "Once Upon a Time in America" (3h 47min) benefitted from their runtime because they had epic and decades long stories to tell, which explored a vast array of interesting characters. Only the greatest of directors were able to achieve that. These days it seems the studios are pushing these runtimes and the directors, some of them young and inexperienced having produced only a TV movie or Indie film before, struggle to fill the runtime. It is really baffling and weird, because in a world where Hollywood has to compete with games and social media for our attention, one would think it'd be best to give people the most concise and amazing experience and not bore them to death. Same goes for games btw. I come from a time where you could finish a game in sometimes 20 minutes (!) up to 6 - 8 hours, which was already considered to be long. Then came RPGs and even those were usually a very brisk 40 hours of gameplay. Now with game projects costing up to 200 million to develop, it seems the publishers want to give people "the most bang for their buck" by stretching the expected gameplay to be around 200 hours. Who the hell has time for that? Especially if it's a boring grind of fetch quests, crafting or other nonesense.
What if in an alternate timeline; movies, TV shows, and video games had always been under 1-hour long? Even for TV shows if they've always been only one-episode long with everything planned ahead of time and fast-paced storytellings. Had the laws forced companies to keep them short. While out of concerns for peoples' healths. Imagine growing up in that parallel universe. With altered memories, experiences, and POVs.
Modern movies are too long for the same reason rock CDs were too long...they could hold up to 80 minutes of music, so bands made 80-minute-long albums (even if they had only 20 minutes worth of good songs!)...
Nowdays I don't buy drinks in the cinema because if I drink during the movie, I know that by the ending my bladder will be so full, I will be pissing from my eyes
I could easily watch some old historical/bible epics and ask "why do audiences have adhd and cant focus for more than 2 hours" though tbf when the quality is as bad as modern quality,I can understand the desire for 40 min movies
From what I have read, Hollywood is making longer movies because tickets are more expensive then 90s or 80s, so Hollywood decided to add extra minutes as compensation. It's stupid to think like that, but most of those people also ruin some of the best franchises in the movie history.
Things move in cycles. When I was a young adult, I distinctly remember being able to tell that studios were pressing filmmakers to cap film length, with 90 minutes as the standard and anything more than 120 regarded dubiously. I was disappointed every time I took in an enjoyable film that I could tell had 15-45 minutes more of story to tell, pacing to slow a little, breaths to take, etc, only to let that finishes flourishes go. Now we're on the other end of the spectrum, as if studios feel that the run time needs to be of enough length to justify the price of the product - no matter the quality. Length is not bad! The gold standard for this is the original LOTR films, which hit 3 hours each except for a bonus 20 minutes in the final entry. The first one especially was a masterclass of efficient storytelling - the filmmakers took what could/should in ideal form be a 5-10 episode miniseries and distilled it to one feature length entry that never slogged and still left me feeling like "aww, it's over" at, again, the 3 hour mark! Truth be told, with the first two films coming in at nearly 3 hours on the dot, it seems like there was an understanding for that as a practical limit for any movie - which is probably why the equally-magnificent final film finally felt some drag at the very end. It wasn't because the quality dropped; it seems safe to say that physical fatigue and a loss of ability to focus had set in. Conversely, the trio of Hobbit movies averaged around 2.5 hours, and yet each one felt like more of a drag than any of the LOTR films. Could it be because the studio knowingly was stretching out source material that was at best 1/6 as much to work with to 5/6 of the run time of LOTR? Hmm...
Recently I watched Army of Darkness: Besides the comedy and action, the movie was quite short! (thing which I totally praise) coz at times, long movies, shows or games requires a LOT of your time (Rockstar games and Days Gone are an exception for me tho) and I’m more into short-length media (I mean I do enjoy short games like Cave Crawler). I also recently watched all LOTR trilogy but I don’t complain about the lenght.
I reckon it's at least party due to wanting to boost streaming figures. For example I watched the new Black Mirror episode beyond the sea yesterday, which is clearly a 0:50 minute story stretched out to 1:20 for no good reason
There needs to be some standards applied to film runtimes. For example, films aimed at children should be no longer than 1 hour. Standard films should never go beyond 2 hours 10 mins. Any writer who cannot tell a compelling 3 act story from beginning to end without significantly going past 2 hours is not an efficient writer. If the story requires a runtime that exceeds 2 hours it should be told over the course of separate movies.
I don’t think the run time is the primary issue with modern movies. Run time isn’t the secondary issue or even third. The primary issue with modern movies is the writing. To put it another way, if modern movies were shorter, would they suddenly be good? Or would they just be shorter and bad? I think the latter. The primary issue with modern movies is the writing and trimming some scenes will not address that.
Back in the day, a legit Oscar contender might be 2 1/2 - 3 hours but it was epic and grand storytelling with great purpose. Nowadays even some stupid horror movie is 2 hours and 15 minutes. And I too have recently watched classic originals from the 80’s and 90’s and they’re like an hour and a half to an hour forty-five at the most. Their recent remakes are well over two hours and not nearly as good either.
Tight writing requires a lot of things modern Hollywood doesn't have: respect for the audience's time, an understanding of what is essential, a humble lack of self-indulgence, and an understanding of pacing.
Well said
I don't think there is anything modern Hollywood respects.
@@keYserSOze2008 Status. That's probably it since they've even been denying themselves profit.
Summed up perfectly what most modern Hollywood movies lack
Please state the obvious more, we love it. 🙄🙄
I remember when Peter Jackson's LoTR movies were considered long. I also remember holding my need to pee for the entirety of The Two Towers and still loving the film. These days, even without my bladder feeling ready to burst at any moment, I don't seem to enjoy movies.
@MrDj232 That's the difference, though. Jackson's LOTRs earned the runtime due to needing to cover the source material and making sure every minute counted, even with the extended cuts. My stance is that if you are going to do a long movie, fine, justify the run time. Make every scene, piece of dialogue, and character/ plot beat count. Because the moment you take your audience for granted, is when they check out.
Sometimes I'm mad at ol Peej for this, but he had no idea what corpos would do over the decades. LOTR was great, but goddamn was King Kong a SLOG, so maybe I don't forgive him lol
They are long, if you consider marathoning them at once it would be done by sun down. But it was amazing nonetheless
These days you can take a bathroom break during most movies and really not miss anything worth missing
those movies had intermissions in their original theatrical runs, the return of the king had two intermissions if I'm not mistaken.
I'm glad I grew up under a rock, cuz it just means I can still watch old movies I've never seen. There's no reason for movies to be THIS long, it's insane.
So you would cut down movies like
Ice Station Zebra
Spartacus
The Ten Commandments
It a Mad,Mad,Mad World to suite short attention spans
@@FP194 Movies like Ten Commandments and Spartacus were made to have an intermission.
So the good the bad and the ugly ?
Once upon a time in the west ?
Lawrence of Arabia ?
Both Godfather movies ?
@@FP194 I don't think that's what's she's saying. Clearly she stated that she grew up under a rock-therefore she doesn't know any of those films.
Those are not modern film as this video essay is about. Those are stories that needed to be that long but they are exceptions to the rule.
Amadeus is one of the best films ever made and it's 3 ish ours. But a simple Marvel movie or like the video said thr original Mermaid was 83 minutes and got the point across, why make the remake 2.5 hours?
Ulimatley it's bad writing. Each page of a script represents a minute of screen time. That tells me "writers" don't know how to streamline their stories and remove what doesn't need to be there.
Film editing is a lost art that no one realized has been lost until it was already gone.
When I was a kid, most movies were between 90 minutes and 2 hours. The only movies that went past that were usually dramas and historical epics. Most action and adventure movies don't need a long runtime.
Nowadays, when attention spans are shorter than ever due to tiktoc and twitter, movies are longer than ever. No wonder little kids would rather watch people play fortnite on twitch than go see a movie.
They're longer than ever after reshoots and test audiences have hack n slashed the final product into an unwatchable slog. Just wretched.
A movie on screen has been told three times - once by the screenwriter, once by the director and finally by the editor. I'd argue TLM demonstrates failures on all three counts, so to blame the editor exclusively for a movie that's not as succinct as it could have been lets the other culprits off the hook.
Tone and other aspects of a film affects this. A lot of those long-run time epics didn't actually need to be so long, but they were grand in scale, spending ample time on establishing shots of locations, allowing for chunks of time carried first and foremost by music, etc. The length fit what the story was trying to do.
90-120 minutes is not a badge of honor for runtime, but decades of cinema have shown that that is a good target unless given convincing reason otherwise.
We were let down when the studios hammered this range for filmmakers like Ridley Scott (whose longer runtime director's cuts are routinely superior), and we are now let down by the seeming mandate to make sure a movie is long enough to at least give off the impression of getting "enough" product out of the price of a ticket.
@@stoneymahoney9106 I'm not blaming the editor since editors have never had final say in the final cut. I am blaming everyone in the process; the director, primary producer and studio executives in particular.
@@redsoxu571 I will agree with that. And I never intended to sound like every movie should be 90-120 minutes.
However, some kinds of movies do better with certain runtimes. Comedies are almost always at their best with a relatively short runtime because they are meant to be quick, escapist entertainment. On the other hand, historical epics tend to be best with a longer runtime because they want to tell a story that is grand in scale.
Action and adventure movies are supposed to be exciting thrillrides. Pushing the runtimes to extreme lengths can wear out audiences. This is especially important when you don't have much (or very interesting of a) story.
Movies being no longer than just over 2 hours is not only beneficial for the consumer but the companies themselves and so it would make sense to give both parties what they want.
How is that beneficial to each party? I don't see any benefits for either.
@@tyr3759less budget, more space for rooms in theaters
@@IAmTheEagleHTM Oh wait, I read it wrong, i thought he said making movies over 2 hours. But yes, you're both right
@@tyr3759 So shorter movies equal more potential screenings which means greater potential profits and it also helps engage younger audiences. As an adult i don't mind the film length but it definitely is negative for films with a much younger audience. Hope this clarifies that.
I grew up in a time where movies had an intermission and were longer that todays movies and there was only one screen per theater
It’s not the length of the movie is the short attention span of the modern movie goer
This is why movies have descended into the garbage bin
The generally accepted process for a narrative movie is simple: The screenwriters write the screenplay, then the directors take that screenplay and shoot footage the way they envisioned when they read it, and finally the editors take that raw footage and cut it up and put it back together into a coherent, continual movie.
Animation works differently. The screenwriters write the screenplay, they get together with the directors, editors and voice actors to produce an animated storyboard vision of the screenplay that's going to be almost frame-for-frame identical to the final edit, then the animators do their thing and hand it off to the editors, who already know in advance pretty much exactly how the thing will go.
Today's CGI-laden "process" goes something like this: A screenplay is handed down from a writing committee to a directorial team. That team of directors shoots a bunch of disparate footage based on the visualization they each think the writing committee expected, some of which is sent to the editors and some of which is sent to the CGI team. The editors then have to build a coherent, continual movie out of incompletely and unfinished footage while the directors with nothing better to do watch over their shoulders and reshoot a bunch of stuff when the editors don't like it, while the CGI team tries to guess which of their footage is actually going to get used to generate finals so they can actually work efficiently, and eventually the editors die of suffocation under an enormous pile of notes from the directors, writers, CGI team and any other useless executive idiot desperate to stick their oar in.
And people wonder why so many movies today are a hideous, bloated mess.
I cringe when I see a superhero film is over 2 hours, there's no need for it being that long.
This is why I give credit to the first ant man movie
99% of the time yes.
I have seen enough super hero movies for the rest of my life.
Sick of them, same story with the same bloated CGI effects over and over and over again 🤢
I agree although The Batman at just under 3 hours is easily rewatchable
GREAT ECHO CHAMBERLAIN, YOUR RIGHT MODERN MOVIES TOO LONG
A good film is never too long, and a bad one, never short enough.
My most common refrain coming out of a theatre these days is “it was about 30-45 minutes too long.”
As someone who sat through Wagnerian operas, I find myself checking my phone in these new movies before the 50 minute mark. That disturbs me on multiple levels. They can't *hold* our attention either.
Also, this is far and above the funniest commentary channel on our cultural descent into digital bread and circuses. Thank you!
I recently watched SovietWomble's three hour video essay detailed the narrative issues within the survival horror game "The Forest". I then watched it again with my girlfriend. I then watched it again with a gamer friend of mine on his day off. If Hollywood can't keep me engaged for an hour with all their writers, directors, photographers, stunt choreographers, actors, CG artists, editors and producers working for years, while one guy can hold my attention for 9 repeated hours talking about a semi-obscure video game, all those other people should just pack up and go home - they obviously have no clue what they're doing.
@@stoneymahoney9106 Exactly. I had a conversation with someone about storytelling;narrative devices the other day. At least in fiction, for entertainment purposes they supposed to be executed a certain way and contain certain elements bc they are MEANT to hold our attention and entertain us. This new movement that either discards those traditions without understanding them ("everything is toxic!") or because they don't reflect "real life" are missing the point of how and why fictional entertainment exists. CZcams streams and videos are more entertaining nowadays bc non-fiction is still less damaged than fictional storytelling at this point.
I sat through a Met performance of Wagner's "Meistersinger" opera, running from approximately 12 noon to 6 pm in the theater. With two intermissions. Delightful humor, gorgeous live music, talented cast and crew. Would definitely attend again. In contrast, Hollywood uses a copy machine to copy and recopy itself, until the degradation becomes painfully obvious. (Perhaps a result of STEM education without the arts?)
@@MarkLPriest I couldn't even make it through one episode of Ahsoka without checking the time and I once saw Tristan und Isolde. The lack of immersion feels like it comes from something human missing, ironically.
The 1960 movie Spartacus was over 3 hours long, but it was an epic that put the time to good use. Plus, it had an intermission, so the audience could go to the restroom, replenish snacks and just stretch.
Brevity is the soul of wit. Something modern writers lack.
That being said: I don't mind long movies, but that time must be *meaningfully used*
Often, it is not.
the Bard has spoken
The length of films isn't even necessarily the problem. Seven Samurai is 3 1/2 hours long and earns every minute of it. It feels like it's only an hour long. Why? Sharp editing and pacing. Kurosawa knew which tedious scenes he didn't have to show and merely implied them in the way the scenes were cut together. He doesn't have to show us the scene where the villagers learn the bandits are coming back later to attack them. We see the bandits plan the attack, then see a scared villager come out of hiding and start to run. The scene changes to a quiet village, and we know from the magic of editing that he's already told them. We don't have to see him run all the way back and explain everything; instead, we understand that those events happened and can go on with the interesting parts of the story. Plus, the movie has everything you could want in a film: great characters, action, humor, dialogue, philosophy that's not overbearing, romance, cinematography, and varied locations. But the editing is why the film never slogs.
Subtext is an extremely important editing tool, but Hollywood have completely forgotten how to use it
Yes! Was looking for a comment like this. I've got no issue with long Movies. The real problem is a lot of movies recently have no idea how to pace their runtime and often that can make the films feel longer than they are
So that everyone blames the length of the film for falling asleep and not the atrocious writing within their agenda driven script.
It doesn't work.
Whoever it was who said "If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter", they could have easily said "If I had more talent, I would have written a tighter movie"
Editing is an important art in the film making process. Just another thing that has been ruined by modern Hollywood.
Well said
@@fattiger6957 This. All movies have the potential to be too long. It's the editors that save us. Compare "Aliens" to "Aliens Directors Cut" one is tight. With a relentless pace with no slack time. The other stalls out 1/2 way in and has a hard time picking up the pace again.
Exactly; the length of the movie doesn't matter; the movie is just bad, and it being 80 minutes would change nothing. A good movie is a good movie; the perfect run time is around 2 hours and 20 minutes, because then you get absorbed into the good movie
I watch a movie for the experience... not for some short, one off nonsense
I genuinely don't understand why it took the new Little Mermaid over two hours to tell their story when it took the original 80 or so minutes.
You want to know why people like the original Little Mermaid Disney? It was because it wasn't complicated. Its simplicity and tight story keeps you engaged without making anything more than being a story about a father and daughter learning to understand each other. And it worked because it was well animated, well acted, and had iconic music made by people who knew what they were doing.
Stop trying to overcomplicate things and undermine animated movies. It's getting really annoying.
There's little added to this version of the story that would warrant so much extra runtime. The problem is that telling a story as tightly as the original did is a skill that no-one working at Disney (or generally in Hollywoodl) seems to possess these days, and it results in bloated, boring crap like TLM.
Extra tasteless music, more politics and stuff that nobody wanted to see.
I 100% think it's a problem intrinsically associated with the death of genre movies. Remember the height of 90 minute comedy, action or even generally small budget movies twenty years ago? Now the majority of movies fall into 2 and a half hour Superhero movies, Fast and the Furious franchise, generic Netflix flavour of the month movies, Oscar baits and, the currently very prominent agenda bait. There's almost no room for escapism or easy going entertainment, often because it's at risk of being assassinated by word of mouth by the woke mob for one perceived non-issue or another. Everything has to be pushing some kind of social justice message or 'deconstructing' issues.
@@greenteabea Exactly, at the very least have the decency to be honest about it. But then, these are degenerates so there's no point asking any kind of self-reflection or perspective from them.
Disney makes their movies so long, so they can boost their viewing numbers on the streaming platforms. So it doesn’t matter if the movie is good, as long as it gets more minutes being watched on streaming, it will boost their viewership
Why does it have to do with woke mob. Bad movie doesn't always have woke things in it, like moerbius
@@aeoligarlic4024 Yes, you are right that not all movies have the woke poison embedded in them, and honestly I prefer that as at least then a movie fails attempting to draw from a vision, an idea, but it's not nearly as common any more. More often than not a movie is awful and filled with woke content nowadays.
Compliments on an extremely tightly-written six minutes! Great show, point made elegantly and hilariously, if not overtly
Eh, it's probably twice as long as it has to be, as if to demonstrate what stretching out content for no gain feels like.
Absolutely spot on. Mind you, there’s plenty more wrong with modern films than just the run times.
Movies can be long and great, they just need good story and dialogue. I really like the new blade runner.
bad example lol
GOTG3 and Across The Spider-Verse are remnants of a dying breed nowadays: watchable super-hero flicks. But dear god did they drag, you could cut out 20 minutes out of each of them and spare us of nothing but cringe dialogue.
I've been saying this for years. I remember seeing Close Encounters as a kid and there was an intermission where you could go the loo and get more popcorn to see you through the second half...and that film wasn't that long. The length of a film is now the main thing I look at before watching it. I'd rather watch Killer Mermaids on the horror channel than sit through 3 hours of sh*t I'd have cut myself.
Wasn't there a time when big studios actually demanded from the directors to shorten the runtime to increase the number of possible screenings in the cinemas?
And people back then were annoyed about that as they saw this as big studios hindering the directors' artistic vision.
They did. But this was in the pre-multiplex era where a film was shown on one screen and thus could only realistically be shown four times a day, maybe five at a push.
Now you have multiplexes with upwards of 10-12 screens and movies can be shown on three screens across the day. At my local cinema a new Marvel movie can have screenings twice an hour because of this.
Another factor is related to how the movies are delivered. Because they are on a hard drive now and not a 35mm print, multiple screenings are now possible. Whereas before if you only had one print of Star Wars Episode VII The Force Awakens only one screen could show it. Now it's several because the movie just has to be put into a computer
@@reptongeek That makes a lot of sense. Thanks.
On the other hand, we need to consider the genius that gave some extremely long films their epic majesty: Lawrence of Arabia, The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Godfather, Das Boot, Apocalypse Now. The connection with these epics is so profound that, after they are finished, moviegoers will continue to dwell in that imaginary world all the way home. Indeed, some of the longest movies are the ones that fans need to watch AGAIN every several years or so.
But in the meantime, the inflation adjusted price of a movie ticket went up 2x, so it's all increased value, right? /S
"Leaving you barely any time left to die." You got me, well done sir!
They don't understand that time is precious and you need to fill it wisely , because of tv series being binge by watchers they think you will do the same for a movie, but a movie is different from a tv series they need better structure and better plan. 😢
Bloated run time could be getting pushed by Disney to fill streaming service time. Although the contagion does seem to have spread to all movie studios.
“Brevity is the height of wit…”
-Spock
Thank you so much for this. It's not just movies, it's shows, games and even youtube videos. Every single form of entertainment feels the need to bore the crap out of its audience nowadays, and of course the lifeless people online aren't capable of noticing any of this.
In my only local cinema in the town we have uncomfortable seats and every movie lasting more than 2 hours causes pain in the back and butt.
A good example is DC animation. They do a much more effective job in telling stories in less time. Yet with 3 hours, the DC comics live action films can't even tell a cohesive story.
My phone must really be spying on me because last night, my friend came over so we could watch the new(ish) Batman movie with Robert Pattinson. It was the longest movie I had EVER tried to sit through. And this was after I went to the theaters to see The Flash…which was half an hour shorter! My back hurt so bad, I annoyed the crap out of everyone because I was constantly fidgeting and stretching in my seat. I’m too old for these modern movies…and I’m only in my 30s!
Directors used to have to fight and prove their film was worth going over an hour and a half, because the longer the movie = less movie showings = less ticket sales. I think it changed due to directors' vain attempts to show they were making "serious" dramatic films, but I haven't seen ANY recent movie that deserved its 2 1/2 to 3 hour length.
Two things :
1. Show, dont tell. A few quick frames can replace many, many origin stories, expositions and introductions.
2. Tell only what pushes the story forward. Many characters get to much love and we know many irrelevant details and boring tidbits about them.
Both are very important lessons none of which modern writers have any clue about or are too inexperienced to know how to incorporate them in their work. You do not pay properly for the writing that needs to be done ? You get what you pay for.
I am sorry but i 100% disagree this time around, the movie's length isn't at fault (even if now days people have the attention spawn and the patience of a toodler trying to play videogames, and some toodlers may be much better at concentrating and having patience on that setting) the issue is the movie's need for said amount of time.
Basically, they don't actually need the time, they just put it in there thinking it is necessary when in truth it is just filler, if you don't need it then why would you put it? That's where the issue originates. I have seen movies so long they have something we don't use anymore, is called "intermission" and it was used to let people go to the bathroom because of how long some old time movies can be.
People can, and will, sit through a movie for as long as it manages to keep them there, is like a videogame, or a book, or any other entertainment, if it remains 'entertaining' then it'll keep the person right there at its seat. I can 100% bet that if into the spiderverse had come out on full and people really really enjoyed it, they would watch both parts simultaneously right there and then, only thing stopping them is a need to go the bathroom and maybe having other things pending on their day.
Long movies aren't bad, bad movies just think that they need more screentime than they actually do. That's my thought on the matter.
This post shows you don't understand the importance of brevity.
@@christopherkelley1664 i recognise brevity but i disagree that it is the issue with movies, there are things that can be enjoyed in long form, and i myself find long form movies quite fine, i am supporting what i myself enjoy, but i consider that movies do not use the extra time they try jamming in there and instead just create filler, which is why we try so hard to make things brief.
However, there is space for long form, it can be good, genuinely, there is nothing wrong with letting something soak in for long times, is just Bad when it overstays its welcome because all things have limits to how long they can last, even long form content.
Nail right on the head. I also feel long run times are not a problem if you make the best of it. Just a matter of personal preference if it didn't do anything for you or not. Many say John Wick 4 was too long for what it was, but I enjoyed every minute of it because it kept things varied and felt like it was putting it's best foot forward for this "last" entry, so it earned some self-indulgence. Same with Spider-Verse, which I feel is going to have the best hook of all these "To Be Continued" films this year.
@@andresf.7563 Oh I get it, these are joke comments that are intentionally ultra-lengthy.
It is hard to fit a whole IDEOLOGICAL MESSAGE and PROPAGANDA within a shorter narrative... as you begin to 'nod off' your mind is most vulnerable (that's actually true)...
There are few movies that need to last more than 90-100 minutes.
True, Fiddler On The Roof was very long but it also had an intermission (Hollywood needs to reintroduce that if they are going to keep making longer than need to be movies). This allowed movie goers to recharge and was profitable for theaters as people would refill on snacks.
I can think of two instances when longer movies are worth it in my opinion: Book adaptation of classics (bc less original source material can be cut out, which is what the readers want) and movies dealing with very heavy topics like Schindlers List. And even then pver 120 min intermissions would be advised.
@@catalayalafaye5337 agreed. And I still stand by the intermission as it benefits all. Attendance would increase because moviegoers would know there would be a break and theaters would no doubt see an increase in concession sales. The intermission need only be about 15 minutes. That is a win-win-win, especially for theaters as concessions are a cash cow and should be milked for all they can be.
Thank you for finally putting into words, and video, this feelijg i have had at almost all my recent, infrequent cinema experiences.
Even 2 hours is a little too long for most stories. A lot of great movies still suffer from unnecessary padding.
The texts from the girlfriend are priceless 😂
I really liked A LOT of aspects of The Batman…
The runtime was NOT one of those aspects.
Like did we really need the whole flood sequence ?
@@Nio744 I do feel there should have been some 3rd act catastrophe, but that didn’t really hit home for me.
There are films which can justify it, like Dune, but that is mostly for dense adaptations and the rare exception. Normal movies have no business being longer than 2hrs. Now I don't like John Wick in general, but an action movie being almost 3 hrs?? How do you not die of boredom.
It's honestly a miracle they were able to make a great dune adaptation.
great channel and topic!
nice concise vid and answers a relevant, current topic!
also all the contrasting vids and their sequels was amazing
I liked 'the batman' a LOT. but I did watch it in segments, they could have made it a two-parter, I think. it was really engaging though, just, a lot.
Great, insightful video!
I'm rwminded of thw "lefty's can't meme" quip and how they like to fill a picture with walls of text. Maybe this may help explain their movies, too, filling the movies with walls of text?
At one time movies had an intermission and were longer than movies today
It’s not the length of the movie it’s the content. Because the modern movie goer has the attention span of a fly is why we get the garbage we have today
Imagine still going to the theater and supporting these companies, watch stuff at home at your leisure on your own couch.
There's just something special about watching a film in the theatre. No distractions. Nobody talking. My neighbors aren't cutting their yard next door.
Remember when it was crazy how long TLOTR films were?
I miss the 90 minute movie.
They think longer means better. I was watching my favorite movie Raiders of the Lost Ark and realized it's kind of short. It seemed longer when I was a kid. Point is, it's all about pacing and a good, tight story. Wow, I started writing this without knowing you would mention Raiders.
So many movies these days I skip or wait for video based solely on length. Kids movies pushing 2 hours is especially egregious.
It's like a bag of potato chips - bigger bag, more air, less content...
Why do modern Hollywood movies not have intermissions, like we still get with Broadway shows?
Subbed 3 seconds into the Indy segment - this is the courtship, but I'm feeling positive about our future Marriage
The Roaring Twenties (1939) tells a epic story in 106 minutes.Bad Day at Black Rock is about 80 minutes long(masterpiece) King Kong (1933) 101 minutes the 2005 remake 201 minutes twice as long half as entertaining
Quantity over quality will be Hollywood's downfall
Nah wokeness will do that.
@the9thplanet768 that goes without saying, although the tide's starting to turn (Disney fired their head of diversity a couple days ago, although I think it's far too late to save the company so it's kind of pointless at this point).
But almost all of the complaints I've seen about blockbusters have been primarily about bad cgi or bad character designs. It's not a good sign when the director of the Flash comes out and says the movie is supposed to look like that. There's a difference between a comic book style and cheaping out on vfx (or overworking and underpaying the artists). That's why all those crappy live action Disney remakes are so dark, they're trying to hide how bad everything looks. Not to mention the uncanny valley animals nobody likes, which I'm sure is going to go really well for the live action Lilo and Stitch movie.
@@CinnamonGrrlErin1 I forsee stitch sales dropping in the future.
This is exactly why I hesitate to even go to the movies anymore. Why watch a 3 hour movie that I probably wont even like when I can just watch it at home from the comfort of my living room.
Or just watch something else
I think to quite an extent, series done for release on the internet have surpassed films. It's almost like current commercial films are trying to compete with series.
For me it started with comedies and their DVD 'unrated cuts'. Every time I watched these, I could see why the shorter versions were better. But directors demand that their 'visions' be fully realized (when all it is, is pure ego).
Longer movies is better for dramas. Genre fare, like sci-fi, action and fantasy, not so much. Avatar 2 was over 3 hours! At least Dune spilt their movie in half. Even horror movies are getting longer than they used to be.
Some of these are still good, and I've been wanting to watch them again, but I haven't been able to set aside that kind of time. People have busy lives, and I think studios and filmmakers have begun to take that for granted.
Avatar 2 was terrible.
i'm actually amazed it's gone this way. back int the silent film days, the cinemas started running the films at a faster framerate to get more performances in and make more money. now the studios are deliberately making the films 30-60 minutes longer for no reason. maybe they just wannt justify the fact that they pissed away 300 million on brainless cgi sludge.
Amen man. Tell, not show, is the biggest reason for these long and dull monstrosities.
Runtime alone does not an epic make.
Apart from the lord of the rings trilogy, I haven't seen any epic movie after that. And before... maybe Gladiator and Aliens, but not much else.
Great that you got your voice back. :)
A Martin Sorsese masterpiece like goodfellas or casino, or some war movies like a bridge too far or apocalypse now aproaching 3 hours long I get, some stories might just take long time to tell. But why must the little mermaid clock in at the same run time as the dark knight?
Movie length is less problem, modern movie crapness is bigger
I don’t mind a long movie. What I do mind is being taken for a ride.
I watched the film Nobody recently. It was 90 minutes and was the best film i had seen in years. Why can't more cinema be like this?
I love that animation at 1:06. Lol
Agreed. As it pains me to say, so did John Wick 4. Perhaps someone should remind them, film makers, that Less is More.
They use time instead of actual substance
Funny thing: All you described is the EXACT reason why I seldon can watch a movie on streaming! When I look at the run time at 2:30 hours or 2:10 I get demotivated because that's generally on a weekend and I have to weigh in how much time I'll loose by watching that movie. I mean if I get a couple of 10 - 15 min videos on CZcams about an interesting subject, or an episode of a 20 min show I'm still left with time to do so much more, to fire up the PS4 and making some progress in a game, going out or even taking a nap. Lately I started watching some old classics just because when I look at the runtime is like 1:30 - 1:20, like a Robocop or Clint Eastwood.
The reason for that, for me is that going to the movies is getting so expensive that studios might feel that if they don't deliver at least a 2:00 - 2:10 you might think it's not worth your money. Them I think to myself, why not consider a different price for length of movie? Maybe the tickets are getting more expensive because from 18:00 to 22:00 they can only put 2 screenings of a movie. If they maybe could put 3 they would earn more and lower the price, more people going equals to more money, and more people going is equal to making going to the movies something you do on your week, nowadays is an event at least for me.
This is a common complaint I see from the streaming generation. The problem is a lot of people who complain about movies being too long have no problem watching an entire season of a show in a single day. I have to roll my eyes at this. And don't tell me it's episodic because TV is anything BUT episodic these days. This is not in defense of recent movies as so much of it is crap....but I think most of the streaming world is pretty much crap too, and people spend all day watching Netflix.
You'd think that making shorter films would be in the studios interest. The shorter the screenplay, the less you have to film/animate and the lower the production costs. The lower the production costs the more chance there is of making a profit.
You'd think but apparently not. I wonder why
The 00s LoTR trilogy and spiderverse are more than 2 hours. But it was 2+ hours that felt fast and beautifully done
I'm fine with long movies as long as they have earned that right. Avengers Endgame was the culmination of a beloved decade long collection of movies. I'll happily watch the TV cut of 1978 Superman at 3 hours (over two nights). The Lord of the Rings films are epics that deserve it too. But when they just make any new movie almost 3 hours long, no way, not interested.
I was so disappointed by Endgame. I'd say it has so much fluff and filler. It definitely did not make every minute count, especially with all those stupid pointless jokes.
Echo Chamberlain you must be psychic or something, because I was thinking about the same thing recently. Whenever I decide to watch an older movie I'm always surprised to see how the runtime is almost always between 90 and 120 minutes. The other pleasant surprise being the snappy narrative, when the movie is 2 + hours long but you don't feel that way because the plot keeps moving forward (Empire strikes back and The Dark Knight are truly perfect examples ☝️). One of the main issues with current movies is length, whenever I see 180 or God forbid 200 minutes I go: 😭🤮. But my biggest issue with modern movies is the pointlessness and padding of those extra minutes. Pointless dragged out scenes where they literally feel the need to explain everything for the low I.Q. 'moder audience ', I mean God forbid to show them instead of telling (Visual medium? What's that? 🤪)...I mean they've literally made a 2 hour long movie about a 15 second scene from Star Wars referring to Rouge One and the schematics of the Death Star, despite the fact that it was almost put in as a throwaway line (which it probably was) and we all knew, even back in 1977 that everybody involved in that mission died. The other thing making modern barely watchable: pointless, lingering scenes with no/bad dialogue. In contrast: 'Once upon a time in Hollywood' was also 3 hours long but I sure as hell enjoyed every fu*king minute of it, because when there wasn't any action, there was some clever dialogue. I remember watching that movie and saying to my self: "Oh'my God, I'm actually watching a MOVIE! I'm... having FUN!" Can't say that about Avatar 2 though, or Babylon.
"The other pleasant surprise being the snappy narrative, when the movie is 2 + hours long but you don't feel that way because the plot keeps moving forward (Empire strikes back and The Dark Knight are truly perfect examples ☝)."
I felt that way about White House Down from 2013 (that had Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx and Joey King; that was 2 hrs. 11 min.), and about The China Syndrome from 1979 (right at 2 hrs., maybe a minute over; w/Jane Fonda, Jack Lemmon and Michael Douglas), simply because the storyline of each progressed at a good pace and I got quickly from A to B in the time allotted (many modern films don't know how to do that).
Fell asleep at Oppenheimer ngl
Ask your doctor about your narcolepsy.
Back then I loved "long movies", because usually the director had to fight very hard to get a longer than 90 minutes runtime into the cinemas, which meant they had good reason to do so. "Goodfellas" (2h 26min), "Once Upon a Time in America" (3h 47min) benefitted from their runtime because they had epic and decades long stories to tell, which explored a vast array of interesting characters. Only the greatest of directors were able to achieve that.
These days it seems the studios are pushing these runtimes and the directors, some of them young and inexperienced having produced only a TV movie or Indie film before, struggle to fill the runtime. It is really baffling and weird, because in a world where Hollywood has to compete with games and social media for our attention, one would think it'd be best to give people the most concise and amazing experience and not bore them to death. Same goes for games btw. I come from a time where you could finish a game in sometimes 20 minutes (!) up to 6 - 8 hours, which was already considered to be long. Then came RPGs and even those were usually a very brisk 40 hours of gameplay. Now with game projects costing up to 200 million to develop, it seems the publishers want to give people "the most bang for their buck" by stretching the expected gameplay to be around 200 hours. Who the hell has time for that? Especially if it's a boring grind of fetch quests, crafting or other nonesense.
What if in an alternate timeline; movies, TV shows, and video games had always been under 1-hour long? Even for TV shows if they've always been only one-episode long with everything planned ahead of time and fast-paced storytellings. Had the laws forced companies to keep them short. While out of concerns for peoples' healths. Imagine growing up in that parallel universe. With altered memories, experiences, and POVs.
Modern movies are too long for the same reason rock CDs were too long...they could hold up to 80 minutes of music, so bands made 80-minute-long albums (even if they had only 20 minutes worth of good songs!)...
In the old days there was an intermission...
Nowdays I don't buy drinks in the cinema because if I drink during the movie, I know that by the ending my bladder will be so full, I will be pissing from my eyes
The longer time is also explained because people takes longer to move in real life than animation.
You are severely, SEVERELY autistic.
I could easily watch some old historical/bible epics and ask "why do audiences have adhd and cant focus for more than 2 hours" though tbf when the quality is as bad as modern quality,I can understand the desire for 40 min movies
We'll probably never have something like Lawrence of Arabia, Ben Hur or Ten
Commandments.
From what I have read, Hollywood is making longer movies because tickets are more expensive then 90s or 80s, so Hollywood decided to add extra minutes as compensation.
It's stupid to think like that, but most of those people also ruin some of the best franchises in the movie history.
Brevity is the soul of wit. - Shakespeare. [It means don't waste my time]
Things move in cycles. When I was a young adult, I distinctly remember being able to tell that studios were pressing filmmakers to cap film length, with 90 minutes as the standard and anything more than 120 regarded dubiously. I was disappointed every time I took in an enjoyable film that I could tell had 15-45 minutes more of story to tell, pacing to slow a little, breaths to take, etc, only to let that finishes flourishes go.
Now we're on the other end of the spectrum, as if studios feel that the run time needs to be of enough length to justify the price of the product - no matter the quality.
Length is not bad! The gold standard for this is the original LOTR films, which hit 3 hours each except for a bonus 20 minutes in the final entry. The first one especially was a masterclass of efficient storytelling - the filmmakers took what could/should in ideal form be a 5-10 episode miniseries and distilled it to one feature length entry that never slogged and still left me feeling like "aww, it's over" at, again, the 3 hour mark! Truth be told, with the first two films coming in at nearly 3 hours on the dot, it seems like there was an understanding for that as a practical limit for any movie - which is probably why the equally-magnificent final film finally felt some drag at the very end. It wasn't because the quality dropped; it seems safe to say that physical fatigue and a loss of ability to focus had set in.
Conversely, the trio of Hobbit movies averaged around 2.5 hours, and yet each one felt like more of a drag than any of the LOTR films. Could it be because the studio knowingly was stretching out source material that was at best 1/6 as much to work with to 5/6 of the run time of LOTR? Hmm...
That's why I never go to the movies anymore. I remember when the average movie running time was 90 to 100 minutes.
On the bright side, they probably won't be making a sequel to "Lawrence of Arabia".
Hahahahaha
Recently I watched Army of Darkness:
Besides the comedy and action, the movie was quite short! (thing which I totally praise) coz at times, long movies, shows or games requires a LOT of your time (Rockstar games and Days Gone are an exception for me tho) and I’m more into short-length media (I mean I do enjoy short games like Cave Crawler).
I also recently watched all LOTR trilogy but I don’t complain about the lenght.
I reckon it's at least party due to wanting to boost streaming figures.
For example I watched the new Black Mirror episode beyond the sea yesterday, which is clearly a 0:50 minute story stretched out to 1:20 for no good reason
There needs to be some standards applied to film runtimes. For example, films aimed at children should be no longer than 1 hour. Standard films should never go beyond 2 hours 10 mins. Any writer who cannot tell a compelling 3 act story from beginning to end without significantly going past 2 hours is not an efficient writer. If the story requires a runtime that exceeds 2 hours it should be told over the course of separate movies.
I disagree. A movie can be over 2 hours as long as its efficient with it's time.
Is it possible that the popularity of director's/extended cuts contributed to the idea that "longer film = better film"?
I don’t think the run time is the primary issue with modern movies. Run time isn’t the secondary issue or even third. The primary issue with modern movies is the writing. To put it another way, if modern movies were shorter, would they suddenly be good? Or would they just be shorter and bad? I think the latter. The primary issue with modern movies is the writing and trimming some scenes will not address that.
Nah, you guys are wrong, the 40s movies were 4+ hours long.
Look at the 1949 Batman movie.
Back in the day, there were very long movies but at least there were intermissions.
Any movie over 2 hours 15 minutes is a akin to a flight to the nearest city.
I remember watching Let There Be Carnage and thinking it sucked, but one thing I liked about it was that it ended quick!
Giant conspiracy between Disney American Urology Association.
Back in the day, a legit Oscar contender might be 2 1/2 - 3 hours but it was epic and grand storytelling with great purpose. Nowadays even some stupid horror movie is 2 hours and 15 minutes. And I too have recently watched classic originals from the 80’s and 90’s and they’re like an hour and a half to an hour forty-five at the most. Their recent remakes are well over two hours and not nearly as good either.
Everybody fired their editors
15-20 Hour long books: 👁👄👁