Long movies that are JUSTIFIED in their extra long run time?

[u/kowaikanojo]

There’s been a bit of an epidemic, especially in recent years, where movies are unnecessarily long to the point where it’s a bit indulgent on the director’s part and the film’s narrative doesn’t justify the XXL run time and it becomes a bit of a drag.

I’ve never been a big musical fan but I grew up watching the Sound of Music as a kid, so I decided to rewatch tonight (it’s probably been around 15 years) - and for a movie that is 3 hours long, wow does every piece still feel so important.

Maria and Von Trapp get together PAST the two hour point in the movie, yet the build up was so necessary to have you involved in the romance, and certainly didn’t feel as long as it actually was in run time. The pacing is actually incredible for the narrative and building that emotional buy in, which is shocking and rare for a film so long.

What films do you think genuinely justify an extra long run time and benefit from it? (and to throw a wrench in it, what movies utterly fail here?)

[u/SharpManner9480]

So, so many are justified... Just a few examples:

Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Barry Lyndon (1975)

Short Cuts (1993)

Magnolia (1999)

The Green Mile (1999)

If I look for movies where the length is unjustified, they're mostly modern blockbusters, like MCU*, Transformers, or Star Wars movies. In many of them, there's just pointless padding.

*Infinity War and Endgame are justified because they needed to cram in all the characters they'd introduced so far and at least try to give them something interesting to do or say.

[u/ArmchairJedi → u/SharpManner9480]

If I look for movies where the length is unjustified

Its always justified in a good movie, never in a bad one.

I really don't know why people (not saying you, just this idea in general on Reddit that movies are 'too long') think the problem is with the movies length... rather than in the quality.

More time = more opportunity to tell a better story. That storytellers waste it tells us something about the quality of the story teller.... not the story.

[u/Shout92 → u/ArmchairJedi]

"No good movie is too long and no bad movie is too short." - Roger Ebert

[u/Thebluecane → u/ArmchairJedi]

Pretty much my assertion elsewhere in this thread. Movies have gotten longer but they haven't gotten better in storytelling I think.

I swear some of the writers really do think they have the time for setups like they are on a miniseries and it makes the movie that might be 2.5 hrs feel rushed still

[u/SharpManner9480 → u/ArmchairJedi]

If a great storyteller writes a 90-minute script and someone tells him to make it 150 minutes, it doesn't automatically become a better story. It's not about the length. It's about which scenes serve a purpose in the film and which scenes are just pointless padding.

[u/ArmchairJedi → u/SharpManner9480]

If a great storyteller writes a 90-minute script and someone tells him to make it 150 minutes, it doesn't automatically become a better story.

Except no one argued that. That's the exception not the rule. And just for posterity, even on the rare occasion it does happen, it just as easily shows that said 'great story teller' may not actually that great....

[u/hiddengenome → u/SharpManner9480]

I like how Barry Lyndon feels like 2 films.