MCU's 'Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness' Is Another Movie With An All Too Long Runtime.
Because Hollywood thinks we have all the time in the world to spend half a day in a movie theater, another major tent-pole film has revealed its runtime. We suggest not buying the large soda for this one.
Following in the footsteps of MCU predecessors Avengers: Endgame (3hrs. 1 min.), Infinity War (2hrs. 29 mins.), and Eternals (2 hrs. 36 mins.), Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness will be clocking in at 2 hours and 28 minutes, which is the equivalent to Spider-Man: No Way Home from last year. Understandably, comic book movie storylines have a rich history and a vast story to tell, though this trend has to be a tough pill to swallow given how many parents bring their fidgety children to see these event films while hoping to keep them in their seats for the duration.
One of the most recent examples of a massively sprawling run-time was Matt Reeves' The Batman which clocked in at a whopping 2 hours 56 minutes. Mind you, the film had an engaging, well-plotted narrative that benefited from being so long, but I'm sure there are plenty of moviegoers who might have forgone the theater experience simply because it becomes more of an excursion than a simple trip to the cinema. Considering theaters play copious pre-film commercials, a half-hour of previews, then tacking on the length of the feature, you are looking at a nearly four-hour day at the movies.
Thankfully, the advent of preselected seating might take away some of the burdens of getting there early to get a good vantage but spending the equivalent of half a workday to see a movie is starting to feel like a slog. Even Lawrence of Arabia gave audiences an intermission back in the day.
Overly long films not only bite into the theater's bottom line, what with most of these flicks hitting streaming a mere couple of months after their theater run, but it makes planning a simple trip to the movies into an all-day event.
