【每天一篇经济学人】Movie marathons 电影马拉松（2023年第56

文章来源：《经济学人》Oct 21th 2023 期 Culture 栏目 Movie marathons 电影马拉松

为什么电影变得这么长？

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Want to know what is coming soon to a cinema near you? Probably not an hour-and-a-half-long movie, as in the old days. This year audiences have endured the longest instalments yet in the “Indiana Jones”, “John Wick” and “Mission: Impossible” franchises. “Oppenheimer”, Christopher Nolan’s three-hour blockbuster, required 11 miles (18km) of film stock for IMAX showings.

想知道你家附近的电影院即将上映什么电影吗？可能已经没有以前那种1.5小时的电影了。今年，观众们观看了《夺宝奇兵》、《疾速追杀》和《碟中谍》系列大片中最长的一部。克里斯托弗·诺兰执导的《奥本海默》时长达3小时，IMAX放映胶片长达11英里（18公里）。

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On October 20th comes “Killers of the Flower Moon” (pictured), a grisly western from the director Martin Scorsese. At nearly three and a half hours, its length is nearly double that of the average film last year. Even movie buffs struggle to concentrate for that long. During the premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in May, some viewers dozed off. Afterwards there was a mad dash (and long queue) for the toilets. When did watching a film become such a slog?

10月20日，马丁·斯科塞斯执导的西部惊悚片《花月杀手》（如图）上映。电影时长近3.5小时，几乎是去年平均电影时长的2倍。就连电影迷也难以集中注意力这么长时间。5月戛纳电影节首映期间，一些观众打起了瞌睡。观影后，人们飞奔进厕所（排起了长队），从何时起观影变得如此辛苦呢？

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The Economist analysed over 100,000 feature films released internationally since the 1930s, the start of Hollywood’s golden age, using data from IMDb, a movie database. The average length of productions has crept up by around 24%, from one hour and 21 minutes in the 1930s to one hour and 47 minutes in 2022. Blockbusters are the worst offenders. For the ten most-popular titles (measured by how many reviewers rated the films on IMDb) average lengths stretched to around two and a half hours in 2022, nearly 50% higher than in the 1930s.

《经济学人》使用电影数据库 IMDb 的数据，分析了自1930年代好莱坞黄金时代开始以来在全球上映的10多万部剧情电影。电影平均时长增加了24%左右，从 1930 年代的1小时21分钟增加到2022年的 1 小时 47 分钟。大片是“超长重灾区”。2022 年，十大最受欢迎的影片（根据IMDb上的影评人数）的平均时长至2.5小时左右，比1930年代高出了近 50%。

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Film-makers began churning out protracted pictures in the early 1960s. Cinema was booming and auteurs wanted to distinguish their art from television. Epics graced the silver screen, including “Lawrence of Arabia” (1962), which surpassed the three-and-a-half hour mark, and “Cleopatra” (1963), which originally exceeded four hours but was later cut down. Back then, audiences enjoyed an intermission while the projectionist prepared the reels for the next act. Runtimes of popular films ebbed and flowed over subsequent decades (and stretched long in some countries, such as India, known for its Bollywood sagas). But they have ballooned since 2018.

1960年代初，电影制片人开始大量制作长篇电影。电影行业蓬勃发展，导演们希望将电影与电视区分开来。屏幕上出现了史诗巨制，包括《阿拉伯的劳伦斯》（1962 年），片长超过3.5小时，以及《埃及艳后》（1963 年），最初片长超过4个小时，后来被删减。当时，放映员在准备下一幕的影片时，观众可以中场休息片刻。随后几十年，大片的时长有所波动（在一些国家，比如以宝莱坞史诗片著称的印度，放映时间也很长）。但自 2018 年以来，大片时长不断增加。

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Franchises are one driver of this trend. Studios want to squeeze the most out of their costly intellectual property, but they are competing with streaming platforms for eyeballs. The hope is that a spectacular, drawn-out “event” movie will tempt audiences away from the small screen and into cinemas. This approach has often paid off: “Avengers: Endgame” (2019), Marvel’s three-hour superhero extravaganza, was the highest-grossing film in 2019. Last year long franchise movies made up most of the highest-grossing films in America.

版权是这一趋势的驱动因素之一。电影制片厂希望最大限度地利用自己昂贵的知识产权，但他们又要与流媒体平台争夺观众。电影制片厂希望通过一部精彩、冗长的 "剧情 "电影让观众离开小银幕，吸引他们走进电影院。这种方法往往很有成效：漫威出品的3小时超级英雄大戏《复仇者联盟：终局之战》（2019 年）是 2019 年票房最高的电影。去年，美国票房最高的电影以长篇系列大片为主。

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Anything that lures people off their couches to see a film in theatres is good news for cinemas. But protracted runtimes also pose a “fundamental problem”, complains Clare Binns, managing director of Picturehouse, a British cinema group and film distributor. Long movies can mean forgoing two showings per night, which hurts ticket sales and profits.

任何吸引人们离开沙发去电影院看电影的消息，对电影院来说都是好消息。但英国影院集团和电影发行商 Picturehouse 的总经理克莱尔·宾斯抱怨道，冗长的电影也带来了一个“根本问题”。长时电影可能意味着每晚要放弃2场放映，这会影响票房销售和利润。

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Another explanation for longer films has to do with directors’ growing clout. Who would dare tell the likes of Mr Nolan to trim his masterpieces? Streamers, which do not have to worry as much about concision because viewers can pause whenever they like, may lure big names with deep pockets and promises of creative freedom. “Killers of the Flower Moon” will debut on AppleTV+ after its theatrical run. Netflix funded and released Mr Scorsese’s equally long “The Irishman” in 2019, a film that would have benefited from a decisive editor, Irish or otherwise.

电影越来越长的另一个解释与导演们日益增长的影响力有关。谁敢让诺兰这样的大导演去删减他的杰作呢？流媒体平台不必太担心影片的简洁性，因为观众可以随时暂停，这也可能会吸引财力雄厚并承诺创作自由的大牌导演入驻。《花月杀手》上映后也将在 AppleTV+ 上线。网飞在2019 年投资并发行了斯科塞斯同时长的电影《爱尔兰人》，如果有一位果断的剪辑师（无论是爱尔兰人还是其他人），这部电影将会获得更好的效果。