360 minutes? I doubt it...
The time given for this miniseries is 360 minutes, but I assume that includes commercials. By my estimate, it's about 293 minutes. Or is there really a 360-minute version?
shareMy guess is that it is 360 with the commercials added in. In an average hour of TV only 45 minutes are the actual program. The other 15 minutes are the ads and other things that are shown. 360-293 = 67 minutes / 15 = 4.46 so 15 minutes * 4.46 hrs = 67 minutes of commercials, etc. and accounts for the difference in times. They had the same sort of difference in the mini-series of Centennial when it came out on DVD a few yrs back. In that case it was 19.5 hrs vs. 26 hrs (if I remember correctly) and the 6.5 hrs difference is accountable for due to commercial breaks (it aired on regular TV back in the 70's).
CENTENNIAL run time vs. actual time (for comparison)
60 min* 26 hrs = 1,560 minutes
15 minutes *26 hrs = 390 minutes/60 min = 6.5 hrs
So 26 hrs - 6.5 hrs = 19.5 hrs which is the length of time the DVD version plays at. For some reason when mini-series go from TV to DVD those who produce the DVD's seem to forget that the original running time includes commercial breaks etc. I don't know why. Incidentally the 293 minutes of the DVD version is longer than I remember the Martian Chronicles Mini-series as being when I saw it on TV because whomever put it on the air (I don't remember which station it was) cut large chunks out of it.
he average 1hr show was 48-50 minutes back then. I remember TMC being a bit longer wwhen it aired in 1980, than the dvd I have. But I can't recall any missing scenes.
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