Was expecting a solid 4/5 Scorsese movie but no. 3 or 3,5 at best.
The Irishman managed to pull off the 3,5 hour running time, but this one not so much.
"Martin Scorsese is crediting Ari Aster's Midsommar for inspiring the pacing and running time of Killers of the Flower Moon."
Ironically, Ari Aster did a movie that was an hour too long this year as well.
I didn't think Killers of the Flower Moon was too long. I simply thought it WAS long and my belief on "long movies" -- be they Wolf of Wall Street, The Irishman, Killers of the Flower Moon...or Barry Lyndon...or Doctor Zhivago...is that they are EXACTLY long enough, which is to say: as long as the filmmaker wanted them to be. So its our job to decide: do I want to sit through this?
Movies now have an "out" however: Soon KOFM will be on Apple and you can "turn it into a mini-series" and watch it over three nights or more. Moreover, Ridley Scott has a two and a half hour Napoleon in theaters right now that will be expanded into a four hour plus version on Apple as well.
And THAT brings up another point. Leone's "Once Upon a Time in America" was thrashed by Roger Ebert over the two hour plus version released to theaters in 1984 but later called a masterpiece by Ebert when a three hour "original version directors cut" was release. And The Godfather famously escaped being cut down to two hours for release -- it would have been pretty minor at that length.
But back to Killers of the Flower Moon. It was long but I cannot think of any scene that should have been cut given that I saw every scene and I "its too late now" -- that's the Killers of the Flower Moon I saw, I don't WANT it shorter.
But that's just me.
Maybe i just wasn't in the mood for KOTF when i watched, maybe i'll like it the second time. I Liked The Irishman lot more the second time.
I certainly dont mind a long movie: Barry Lyndon, The Seven Samurai, Schindler's List, Lawrence of Arabia...all good.
"No good movie is too long and no bad movie is short enough." As Ebert put it.
"No good movie is too long and no bad movie is short enough." As Ebert put it.
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I agree with Ebert's famous assessment there but I think my point is -- as developed over a long time of watching long movies -- that if a director delivers a "very long movie" and basically tells us "I'm not cutting a frame out of this..this is my vision..take it or leave it" ...then that's the movie we have to accept. We can't say "it would be better if a half hour was cut out," because the director didn't WANT to cut a half hour out. Its his/her vision.
However, I've read this story that might indicate sometimes the director really didn't WANT to send out an overlong movie:
Star Trek the Movie(1979.) On deadline for a Christmas release date, the movie was evidently sent out to theaters without a full "final cut" for time. Thus you have this ENDLESS scene of Kirk being flown around the Enterprise to gawk at it. With more time to prepare the film, that scene would have been cut down...ithe movie WOULD have been shorter, we are told.