Ryan Bridge: Make movies short again

The Oscars nominations have come out and guess what? Wicked the Musical with Ariana Grande is on the list for Best Picture.  

It's two hours and 40 minutes long. It doesn't have an ending because there's two parts. So you get half a story, and it takes half your life to watch. We should not be encouraging this type of time wasting. Cinemas are not comfortable places. I've got a bad back, I've got a low tolerance for people bursting into song – sitting in a cinema seat for almost 3 hours, listening to Ariana Grande singing her feelings is like, well, it's like being held in a small torture chamber.  

In three hours you can achieve many things. You can fly to Australia, you could run a marathon, hell, you can even get an operation in three hours. My grandma's knee replacement she had done recently took less than three hours. Actually, I would rather get my knee replaced than listen and watch Wicked. Because it's a two-parter, you could actually get both knees done.  

And it's not just Wicked that's dragging on - Dune. Did you see that the sci-fi space thriller that’s approximately 600 hours in length?  

And I know what you're thinking: If you don't like a movie, Ryan, just don't go and see it. Ah. I never wanted to see Dune – my partner did. And as a married man, as you will know if you're married, some things you do even though you don't want to, and directors arrogant, self-indulgent Hollywood types, don't think about us. 

They just think about themselves. They just think about this amazing emotional movie that they've created, inspired piece of art that they'll happily dump on the world's cinemas and expect everybody else to love.  

The Brutalist. That's also on the list – three and a half hours long, nominated for Best Picture. Poke me in the eyes, Brutalist by name and brutalist by nature. I estimate half of cinemas are filled with people who don't want to be there, trapped in their own little torture chambers, battling through musicals and romcoms and war biopics, all for the sake of their marriage or to please a friend.  

Our attention spans are far too short for this now. We have TikTok, we have Instagram, we have small brains, we have Twitter. What used to be a novel is now 140 characters. People abbreviate their speech because we can't be arsed with full sentences.  

Hollywood and today's Oscars nods have totally missed the public mood. I propose a new category: Best Picture in under 90 Minutes. 

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