The Dark Knight Rises (2012)
Length: 165 mins
Why That's Too Long: Ok, so Christopher Nolan’s take on Batman is as far removed from ‘comic-book’ as you can get, but c’mon - kids are still going to see this film too.
How We'd Fix It: It takes almost an hour before we even see Batman on screen and that’s far too long in our book. Maybe the film should just start from there?
The Da Vinci Code (2006)
Length: 149 mins
Why That's Too Long: Dan Brown’s book is such a page turner, you could probably read it in less time.
How We'd Fix It: The whole final sequence in Scotland feels a lot like overkill, especially as there's no real adventure left.
American Gangster (2007)
Length: 157 mins
Why That's Too Long: When you have a crime drama between two people on opposite sides of the law, the lack of other main characters usually means that there’s not a lot of other things to explore.
How We'd Fix It: We’d end the film on Lucas’s arrest. As enjoyable as it is to see Crowe and Washington go head to head in an interrogation scene, by this point, Roberts has already ‘won’.
The Master (2012)
Length: 144 mins
Why That's Too Long: We were all expecting a film exploring the question “Why Scientology be crazy”? and we figured there’d be a simple answer like: “Because all Scientologists be crazy”.
How We'd Fix It: The film really only hits its stride when Freddie meets Lancaster Dodd, so all of the scenes at the start establishing his fragile state of mind can be cut down. It’s already immediately obvious that he’s not quite stable.
Braveheart (1995)
Length: 177 mins
Why That's Too Long: It’s just cruel asking Mel to keep up his accent for that length of time.
How We'd Fix It: The story really ends with Wallace’s fate. We don’t really need the tacked-on epilogue scene featuring Scotland’s new king.
Les Misrables (2012)
Length: 158 mins
Why That's Too Long: That’s a whole lot of shouty-cry-singing.
How We'd Fix It: We’re just going to say this: Do ALL of the songs need to be in there? Really though? No, but really?
The Green Mile (1999)
Length: 189 mins
Why That's Too Long: There was a time when most Stephen King adaptations were just 90-minute horror flicks.
How We'd Fix It: The framing device featuring an aged Tom Hanks can be cut out almost altogether (we’d keep his age reveal) with little effect on the overall story.
Transformers: Dark Of The Moon (2011)
Length: 154 mins
Why That's Too Long: It’s a film about robots who turn into cars and fight each other. There’s not a whole lot of epic existential themes that need to be explored to make this a fun movie.
How We'd Fix It: Trim down all the battle sequences. We’ll let you in on a little secret, Bay – we can’t tell what’s going on anyway.
Saving Private Ryan (1998)
Length: 169 mins
Why That's Too Long: We get that war epics are, by their very nature, long but, for a mainstream audience, 169 minutes is a little “bum-achey”.
How We'd Fix It: There are so many famous faces in this film – all of whom would now be considered cameos had the movie been released today – that it makes you realise just how many characters there are. We reckon that the cast, and therefore some of the dialogue, can easily be trimmed.
Skyfall (2012)
Length: 143 mins
Why That's Too Long: In the recent tradition of making Bond a more relatable, grittier secret agent with problems and concerns, we really just want to see him back at his best badass self.
How We'd Fix It: A little too much time spent at Bond’s Scottish home for the Home Alone -style ending. Given the spectacle of some of the earlier stunts, this ending already seems a little anticlimactic anyway.
