MovieChat Forums > The Deer Hunter (1979) Discussion > The Two Things That Destroyed This Movie...

The Two Things That Destroyed This Movie.

posted 9 years ago by Hamasaurus68
8 replies | jump to latest

1) Too long. To much extraneous unnecessary crap that could have been edited out and made a much better movie in a shorter time frame. The wedding scene comes to mind, that scene alone should have been better than half the length it was.

2)One has to suspend disbelief that three friends go to vietnam and all end up together as prisoners in the same 'river shack'.

At its long run time, the acting saves this movie. A great performance by DeNiro...its amazing how he portrays a man affected by vietnam before he even goes there (the 'boots' scene where even his friends realize that he is ultimately out of line and out of his normal character).

[–] rtw416 9 years ago

You need to add-the 2 things that destroyed the movie for YOU.
The film did win best picture that year and is on many peoples top ten list.
Your opinion is a minority view of the film.

[–] matt72582 9 years ago

Maybe the three friends ending up together isn't very believable, but that's the point of a story, but I understand.

The wedding was too long, too much emphasis on meaningless stuff. It would be like watching an old wedding VHS - it's all real, but it's not necessary. That's another part of film-making - you only have a short time to put every thought into a movie, why waste it?

[–] RobbieCalifornia 9 years ago

I liked it the way it is. So did millions of other people.

Now we have posters who know how to improve on the original.

It's sickening, because Deer Hunter is an important movie. Especially for those of us who remember Vietnam, painfully.

[–] fredwhite-87744 9 years ago

"It's sickening, because Deer Hunter is an important movie. Especially for those of us who remember Vietnam, painfully"

Are you talking about the vets or the hippies?

http://www.vvaw.org/veteran/article/?id=1728

Read especially what he says about Russian Roulette.

Fred

[–] Sanpaco13 9 years ago

I don't think this is a minority view of the film (that its too long). I've seen numerous posts on here saying the exact same thing and they all point to the overly long wedding scene as the primary example. I saw this for the first time last night and the movie deeply affected me. I was near tears for most of the movie because of how the acting and story were protrayed. But I agree, the wedding scene almost kept me from watching the movie. It was long and awful and boring. That said, I completely understand what its purpose in being there was and I agree that it should have been there but it needed to be much shorter and possibly have more plot to move the story along rather than simply drunk people yelling oopah for 30 minutes. I get it, the scene was meant to show how happy the group of friends were at that time in their lives and it represented how everyone at that age believes they are going to go out and change the world. It also serves as the contrast to the ending of the movie.

The best way I can put it is that the wedding scene was like Bilbo's overly long birthday party from Lord of the Rings. It ultimately served no purpose other than to show that Bilbo still had the ring and to lead into the rest of the story. It is over 100 pages in the book. Just about anyone who is a fan of The Lord of the Rings will acknowledge that Bilbo's birthday was too long and serves no purpose. Doesn't detract from the fact that LOTR is one of the best books ever and it doesn't keep its diehard fans from being diehard fans.

"Is that your IQ or the number of dipwads your mother had?" - Car Pool Man

[–] rtw416 9 years ago

The wedding scene in my opinion was essential.
It showed the camaraderie among the whole group of men.Some would say the hunting trip does that,but Steven wasn't there.The wedding scene also shows how much of a tight knit community the men are coming from.

[–] Pervy_Grin 9 years ago

Watching this movie now on TCM. The first hour goes by a lot faster if you read the message boards here at the same time.

[–] Critomaton 9 years ago

Haha, classic response. I was just going to say that the wedding scene seems even longer this way because I've been surfing the net with the movie on in the background for what seems like a really long time and that damned wedding scene is still going! But I always have to start at the beginning when this comes on because I love the gritty scenes with the trucks and the steel mill at the beginning.