Oscar Voters Have Recently Favored Longer Movies — They Shouldn’t
The Hollywood ReporterStory by Lexy Perez
scrn logline
As Oscar voters increasingly favor longer films, one critic argues that runtime alone doesn't make a movie great, championing quality over quantity on the big screen.
beat sheet
- The majority of current Best Picture contenders clock in at over 2 hours and 10 minutes, with some like 'The Brutalist' even including an intermission, challenging the modern attention span.
- Filmmakers' clout and the streaming era's binge-watching conditioning have contributed to the trend of longer films being Oscar-worthy, though not every epic runtime is warranted according to the critic.
call sheet
Roger Ebert, Adrien Brody, Felicity Jones, Cynthia Erivo, Ariana Grande, Ridley Scott, Marc Platt, Brady Corbet, Steven Soderbergh, A24, Universal Pictures, Dune: Part Two, Wicked, The Brutalist, Nobody Wants This, The Irishman, Emilia Pérez, Titanic, Schindler's List, Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, Che