Why are movies so LOOOOONG? - Page 5

Who exactly do you think the Transformers movies or Battleship were made for?

A lot of things were a huge hit in the 80's. Things that many of us here have tried very hard to forget.

According to the MPAA's 2011 Theatrical Market Statistics report, the age group 25 to 39 ranks first for both % of the population that goes to the movies and also % of frequent movie goers.

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http://www.mpaa.org/policy/industry

For me, a movie that is 1 hour and 30 min is perfect. Especially at the cinema after watching 20 min of previews and having already been sitting there 15 to 20 min to get a good seat. At home is different. We usually pause half-way thru to freshen up drinks and the like. Long movies are great in the comfort of my own home theater. I believe any movie longer than 2hrs should have an intermission at the Cinema. Also to Michal Bay, please shorten your next movies by about 20 minutes.

^^^

actually, just cut out everything other than megan's bare midriff...

fortunately, all pictures from that time period have been destroyed...

I don't even know why I agree with this statement, but yeah, I agree, fox is easy on the eyes.

Yep, I can remember buying Transformer toys for my son.....

I am of late 80's and big fan of transformers when it was still in aminated cartoon pictures back to my childhood, and now as in big silver screen. Well, to some extent, I just love transformer itself not the way it shows or so.
BTW, I do not really care much about duration time of the movies. Good movies may probably never be thought of being too long to bear.
As someone above said, a movie is bad just because it is bad, not about the time it lasts, I suppose that right as well.
Optimus!

Hey, actually, it doesn't matter if this movie is a classical and wonderful movie. We can also enjoy it if it is worth to watch. From my point of view, it is very normal that a movie is very long, we just should accept it and enjoy it .

I like movies when I care for characters, that usually needs some time. Otherwise the movie just becomes a roller coaster ride.

So basically it's good movies vs. bad movies. The title of the thread makes it sound like "all movies" are too long, which they're not. What might be too long for you is not for me, and vice versa. When we find a movie too long, that's because something went wrong somewhere, otherwise it shouldn't be a concern. Battleship has been mentioned more than once in this discussion and it's really a bad example, cause this movie just plain sucks, regardless of its length. Is Gone With The Wind too long? Is Titanic too long? Is Lawrence Of Arabia too long? Ben-Hur? Schindler? etc...

The thing about the OP's first post is that it is too general. Bad movies would be more tolerable if they were short, but the way it was worded was ALL movies could be better if they were shorter. That is simply not the case. I'm sure a re-edit of some crappy movies could make them marginally better, but I don't think it would be worth it.

One point I'm surprised nobody has made is when they make movies from books. There are very few (if any) movies based of a novel that I don't feel that something was missing. Maybe it's fluff, maybe not. They don't ever seem to be anywhere near as engaging as the novel they are based on. Granted, I wouldn't read a book that takes me 2hrs to read (not a short story) just because there wouldn't be a whole lot of depth to it.

But, as lots have said, a bad movie is a bad movie no matter what the length. Cutting out some of the more pointless scenes may make it "better", but it will still be a bad movie. You'll never be able to convince me that you could re-cut a movie and make it fantastic when the original cut was terrible. Alexander is a great example of this. I went to the theater to see it. Wish I hadn't. The ultra mega long director's cut couldn't make that movie better by adding more. Cutting it wouldn't have been better because they focused on the wrong parts of his story (IMHO). A total rewrite would have made the movie better, nothing else.

EDIT:

I should learn to type faster.

+1

A bad movie is too long beginning with the title sequence Unfortunately, sometimes it's tough to tell whether you will find a movie to be bad based on someone else's reviews. Sometimes the only way to find out is to just watch it and see what you think.

I quit listening to other people's opinions a long time ago.

yep, a bad movie is a bad movie regardless of how long it is. but there are movies that are pretty good that could be made better if they were shorter. and probably a few movies that would be better if they were longer. in my experience, there are many more movies that could be made better by shortening the run time...especially comedies and action movies.

The Transformers movies are not made for people who actually grew up with Transformers in the '80s. They're made for those people's children.

Who says those people aren't still children?

I didn't care for the Transformers as a kid but I like the movies... I'm a child in disguise!

Growing up is terribly over-rated....just look at Josh.

Actually Transformers is made for both nostalgic parents and their kids. Thats why they make the big money.

You can always pick out the drinkers from the non-drinkers here.

Not yet, my kids are only 4 and 7, I was partial to the Gobots anyway , but If I recall they were spun in, not off, into the transformers cartoons series.

Update,

Ah, you have to love wikipedia, seems Hasbro acquired the company that made the Gobots, now it all make sense.

You can only say, "WTF?" so many times a day, until you just decide to start drinking....

mine came today and i popped in the first disk...

transfer is of vhs quality, watching on my pj... however, after the first 3 or 4 minutes, i completely forgot about the quality of transfer...

not that i'd decline a pristine transfer to blu... but this is "good enough"...

have a box of kleenex nearby... i'm a bit "leaky" to begin with, and this has gotten me 3 times in the first 45 minutes...

Mine came today too.

It looked poor way back when on the PBS SD broadcasts.
However, alot of that has to do with the equipment used to film it.

No doubt a new HD master would help.
I am very surprised (considering its reputation) there hasn't been effort to do this...kind of a mystery...

You have it all backwards. You start drinking first, then you never have to say "WTF?" again. I have it down to a fine art, my friend.

Lol yes!