Bye Bye Blogger (THIS BLOG IS MOVING)

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The Aversion Towards Long Films - Does It Actually Exist?

It seems to me that the English-speaking cinemagoers and critics seem to believe that an aversion to films longer than two hours is prevalent in society. You often hear reviews beginning with, "It's a very long one, this, but ...", while the film in question is barely two and a half hours long, as if the film's length was a deterrent to audiences.

The immediate guess as to why this is would be that either long films are not popular (often accredited to the public's supposed limited attention span) or that they are critically unsuccessful. Looking at actual figures, though, this presumption is pretty much plain wrong.


THE POPULARITY FACTOR

Let's take a look at the top-grossing films worldwide of the last twelve years:

2008 - The Dark Knight - 152 minutes
2007 - Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End - 169 minutes
2006 - Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest - 151 minutes
2005 - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - 157 minutes
2004 - Shrek 2 - 93 minutes
2003 - The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King - 201 minutes
2002 - The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers - 179 minutes
2001 - Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - 152 minutes
2000 - Mission: Impossible II - 123 minutes
1999 - Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace - 133 minutes
1998 - Armageddon - 150 minutes
1997 - Titanic - 194 minutes

With the exception of Shrek 2 in 2004, every single one of those films is more than two hours long. The average length clocks in at 2 hours 35 minutes!


WHAT THE CRITICS THINK

Here are the past seven years' Best Picture winners at the Oscars:

2007 - No Country For Old Men - 122 minutes
2006 - The Departed - 151 minutes
2005 - Crash - 112 minutes
2004 - Million Dollar Baby - 132 minutes
2003 - The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King - 201 minutes
2002 - Chicago - 113 minutes
2001 - A Beautiful Mind - 135 minutes
2000 - Gladiator - 155 minutes

All of those films except Crash are over 2 hours long. I can already hear you screaming that the Oscars are not a fair representation of critics' views, so here are the top three English language films of the year according to RottenTomatoes.com (wide release only):

2008
WALL-E - 98 mins
The Dark Knight - 152 mins
Iron Man - 126 mins
2007
Ratatouille - 110 mins
No Country For Old Men - 122 mins
There Will Be Blood - 158 mins
2006
Casino Royale - 144 mins
The Departed - 151 mins
Borat - 84 mins
2005
Wallace & Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit - 85 mins
Harry Potter and the Golbet of Fire - 157 mins
Batman Begins - 141 mins
King Kong - 187 mins
2004
The Incredibles - 115 mins
Spider-Man 2 - 127 mins
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind - 128 mins
2003
Finding Nemo - 100 mins
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King - 201 mins
Lost in Translation - 102 mins

Ignoring critics' apparent weakness for Pixar films, most of the films on that list are pushing the 2-hour limit, and there are a sizable number of films that are well over two hours long.


THEN WHY?

Now that we've established that long films are not shunned by critics or audiences, let's return to the question at hand: why is there a common perception that long films are not well-received?

I believe that this perception is an offshoot of yet another unproven perception that the attention span of the general public is decreasing. From newspapers to literary critics, we hear people lamenting the inability of the general public to pay attention to anything that is longer than 30 minutes or an hour. This purported decline is often attributed to the rise of television.

Is it really that simple? I think so, but this is definitely a topic to revisit in the future.


THE EFFECT OF A NON-EXISTENT PHENOMENON

Unfortunately, Hollywood has responded to this non-existent phenomenon. Most films that are released every week range from 90 minutes to two hours at most. Just go to IMDb and check the length of this week's and last week's releases, and you'll understand what I mean. It could be argued that this is because it is cheaper to make shorter films, but having twenty explosions in 90 minutes is not that much cheaper than having twenty-five explosions in 140 minutes.

What makes it all even worse is that as people go more often to see shorter films, Hollywood continues thinking shorter is better - despite the fact that the most successful films are almost always much longer than two hours!


THE PERFECT SPOT

In my opinion, the optimum length for an average film is two to three hours. Of course, the content of the story dictates the length of the film, but two hours is usually enough time to flesh out one's characters and smoothly complete one's story arc.


I would be very interested to hear your views - do you think this phenomenon actually exists? What is the perfect length for an average film? Leave a comment.

Avatar Casting Changes - Hallelujah ... ?

As I wrote about earlier, M Night Shyamalan's film adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender, is currently in its casting stage. When I was writing that post, Jesse McCartney was in talks to take on the character of Zuko, prince of the fire nation (read my previous post for more details on his character). It seems that McCartney has dropped out now. In a move that startled pretty much everyone, Dev Patel of Slumdog Millionaire fame is now slated to play Zuko.

There has been much controversy over the fact that all four major characters, who are clearly of Asian descent, were going to be played by Caucasians. This announcement has done something to placate that anger, but we should not forget that the other three, including the protagonist, are still being played by Caucasians. Honestly, for the characters of Sokka and Katara, I don't really mind. Their culture is derived from a mixture of various Asian and Inuit cultures, and good actors should be able to pull off the role without seeming too out of place, if they based their performance more around the behaviour and culture of the characters rather than the ethnicity. For the protagonist, Aang, however, I would much much much rather see an East Asian, preferably Chinese actor taking on the role.

Another thing to note is that while Dev Patel of Asian descent, Zuko is far more East Asian than South Asian. Having said that, Patel seems like the actor who can make the role his own. I haven't seen Slumdog Millionaire yet, and I have never seen him before, so I cannot really judge his acting ability. I will be seeing Slumdog in a week or so, and I'll be updating this post then.

I'm still highly doubtful, but I won't deny that the addition of Patel has added some credibility to the film in my eyes. Like I said earlier, this could easily go either way. Well, we'll find out eventually ...

Read more:

http://www.slashfilm.com/2009/02/01/slumdog-millionaire-star-joins-the-last-airbender/

http://snarkerati.com/movie-news/dev-patel-make-last-airbender-cast-slightly-more-tolerable/

Short Film: Neighbours

Recently, the National Film Board of Canada made their collection available for free online for people in any country (take that, Hulu!). One of the many short films they have on their website is the 1952 Oscar-winning short Neighbours. Before I go any further, I must thank Weathereye for introducing me to the website and recommending this particular film.

You can watch the film at this link or see it embedded below.

(Warning: This film contains some violent images and may be NSFW.)

SPOILERS FOR THE FILM FOLLOW. PLEASE WATCH THE FILM FIRST BEFORE READING.

Before get into actually reviewing the film, let's talk about when it was made - the year was 1952, and it was a very tense period for the world. Not a decade had passed since the Second World War had ended, and tensions were mounting between the capitalist and communist blocs. Just over three years ago, the Soviet Union and the United States had come head to head during the Berlin Blockade. The US, under the guise of the UN, was now fighting a bloody war in Korea. Although the threat of fascism had ended, it looked like the allies with different ideologies were turning on themselves.

When the film begins, it immediately using techniques of animation (stop-motion and otherwise), although the two characters are played by real people. There is no dialogue, but the hypnotic music more than makes up for it. The two men sit outside their houses, sharing a lighter and reading the paper. But as a small but beautiful flower pops up right between their homes, they turn violent and destructive.

The second part of the film is astonishing, considering the history that has taken place since 1952 - the two men continue to destroy each other until the flower itself is ruined, and their women and children are killed, their houses destroyed.

Neighbours could be taken as a metaphor for the Cold War, or just war in general. Indeed, it seems that McLaren predicted the vicious outcome of the war, what with the Soviet Union no longer existing and the US in serious debt and not to mention millions dead on either side and millions more in-between, but in fact McLaren is referring back to the wars that have ended already, for they all result in generally the same way, do they not?

The cinematic techniques used by McLaren are something to behold. Using methods usually reserved for puppetry and animation, he demotes both the men to the status of puppets, hence making it easier for us to identify them later on as nations of peoples rather than just two men. The music gets increasingly wilder as the two men go at it, and as I mentioned earlier, the hypnotic nature of the strange (but alluring) music puts the viewer in a kind of trance.

The violence that each man rages upon the other seems to come from nowhere; an action that is ultimately contrary to what they are fighting for - the beauty and simplicity of the small flower. Even after the flower is destroyed, they continue their fight, killing the other man's wife and child. To the viewer, this part is particularly shocking. In fact, it was censored in some places for a long time. But to me, this section of the film is the crucial part, the moral conclusion. As the two men die and their graves are covered with flowers, McLaren leaves us with one final message, and it is a message that even today, 57 years after this short was made, we should heed.

9/10


Did you like the short? Did you like it as much as I did, or did you think it was terrible? Leave a comment either way.

Short Film: I Live In The Woods

Shown at this year's Sundance Film Festival, Max Winston's I Live in the Woods has been creating some buzz lately. It is available for download at the iTunes US Store in the Sundance section.

Now, if you don't have a US iTunes account because you don't have a credit card or live in another country, it is in fact very easy to get one - all you need is an email address that you haven't used to sign up for any account from Apple previously. Instructions on how to get an account (no credit card necessary) are here. Once you get an account, you'll find all sorts of free goodies on there apart from the ten Sundance short films as well.

Get these films NOW, because they will only be available until Jan 25 - that means there's just TWO DAYS left! I recommend you to get them all, there's some really good quality in there. I'll be reviewing/analysing some more of them soon.

SPOILERS FOR THE FILM FOLLOW THIS REVIEW. PLEASE WATCH THE FILM FIRST BEFORE READING (It's only three minutes!)

In an age of CG animation, it's always refreshing to see a good old-fashioned stop motion piece every now and then - but a lot of critics often laud stop motion animation films simply because of their nature. I'd read a couple of good things here and there about I Live in the Woods, but as I started to watch it I feared it was going to be one of those films. It starts out with the Woodsman frolicking about and singing about his love of the woods and woodland creatures, like in something you'd see on Sesame Street.

As the Woodsman goes on about loving "the little critters", he suddenly begins to tear them apart - literally! This kid-friendly happy-go-lucky song and dance routine suddenly becomes a violent exposition of cruelty, as the Woodsman rips apart the jaws of deer and smashes in the faces of flying piranha. He then proceeds to challenge the only person who tells him what to do, the Man in the Clouds. In a logical but strange procession of the story, the Woodsman attacks and murders the Man in the Clouds.

I Live in the Woods is the story of a man who claims to love the nature around him, but in a fit of happiness goes on slaughtering all around him, leading to a final confrontation with God - whom he also slaughters. The first shock of seeing the Woodsman rip the woodland animals to pieces was a disgusting sight, but I think it's an excellent way to tell the story. From shock to shock, Winston takes you further into taboo situations, asking uncomfortable questions.

The film can be interpreted in many ways, but I saw it as an exposure of the hypocrisy of our (or maybe specifically America's) perception of God and winner-take-all mentality. In all his gory actions, the Woodsman is still singing in verse (albeit the switching of the background music to heavy metal) and taking ultimate joy in his dominance and control of the woods around him. Our idea of living in the woods is one of being in phase with nature and living off the earth, but the film takes the opposite direction in showing us a character who asserts sheer human dominance and power on all.

And then there is the topic of god. The man, having asserted his dominance over the woods he loves, challenges the moral authority, seeking to overpower god himself. That he achieves it comes as no surprise, as he continues on his happy rampage of victory and carnage. I interpreted this section as the continuation of human hypocrisy; we ordain a moral authority for ourselves, only to usurp it whenever we feel it is necessary. Of course, this viewpoint is conditional of the idea god is a human creation.

The last line of the film as the Woodsman takes God's place is a particularly interesting one: "Not that this should make anyone feel weird ... just another white guy with a different coloured beard." This line makes this short film a great one for me. I see it as showing the winner-take-all instinct of people in general.

8/10


Am I over-analysing this three and half minute film? Do you have a totally different idea of what it's about? Leave a comment ...