What I don’t understand about some people, is their short attention spans when it comes to movies. Sometimes, they aren’t meant to be fast paced like EVERY OTHER HOLLYWOOD MOVIE. Same goes for long ones, where most go “It’s three hours? That sounds boring”. But What I’ve found, is sometimes these are the best types, and that deviation lets you fully explore the movie’s scope. So first, let’s talk pacing.
So for each of these explanations, I’ll be using two more recent movies to show good and bad examples of these properties. 10,000 B.C. and Benjamin Button (which I’ll use again) are both excellent examples of this. 10,000 B.C. is what people dread when it comes to boring movies. With all the cliches they try to throw at you, and the horribly done action make this seem like it goes on forever. Don’t forget the play by numbers action script, and we have a wanna be epic that just goes ON AND ON. Its the type that we just wish it could speed up, and move faster than a slug. More examples of this are The Last Legion, License to Wed, and The Astronaut Farmer. Then, we have Benjamin Button, which is the story of a man who ages in reverse. It’s slow, but if you can appreciate what its about, then that just lets you think of how Benjamin is about life as a whole. But this one has a reason for the pacing, it spans 70 years, and those really don’t go by too quickly, so this gives the sense that we did watch his whole life. Some of these are Assassination of Jesse James, The Wrestler, and Apocalypse Now.
Now, we have the lengthy ones. Most of my favorite movies are those that exceed 2 hours, and this is because most long movies have a larger meaning that couldn’t fit into the usual one and a half hours. These examples will be Australia and, again, Benjamin Button. Australia could have been much better, if they had kept to one storyline. From the beginning to the half-way point, its all about Kidman and Jackman’s blooming love, which was, actually pretty enjoyable. These scenes were funny, dramatic, and the usual chick-flick. But then, when it could have just ended, they had to start the movie up again just as we were winding down, and make it go on for another 1 and a half hours or so. From then on, most of the audience wasn’t very happy, and when the ending came, everyone winded up in the same exact spot, leaving us wondering why they couldn’t have just left it as it was. Some other bad examples are the last two Pirates of the Caribbean, and Star Wars Attack of the Clones. Then again, Benjamin Button needed these 3 hours, and could have used more if you asked me. This is a whole man’s life, and to get all the struggles, and moments of it was to keep it going. I’m fine with a short movie for a film that spans 10 days, but one that goes at least 70 years has got to have this length to capture most of the time periods. And unlike Australia, it doesn’t just tack on scenes to make it seem epic, it didn’t need to. From what I’ve seen, most movies that are over two and a half hours are excellent, and here are just a few. Once Upon a Time in America (4 hours), The Godfather (3 hours), Lord of the Rings Return of the King (3 and a half hours), and Braveheart (3 hours).