5 Films That Should’ve Been 90 Minutes (But Thought They Were Shakespeare)

I love a long movie when it earns it. You give me Lawrence of Arabia or The Godfather Part II, and I’ll gladly skip lunch and stay hydrated. But somewhere along the way, Hollywood decided every movie needed to be a two-and-a-half-hour “statement.” Not everything’s an epic, folks. Sometimes, it’s just a story that forgot to go home.

Here are eight films that could’ve hit classic status if someone in the editing bay had the guts to shout, “Cut!”

1. Babylon (2022)

Damien Chazelle’s cocaine-dusted love letter to Old Hollywood runs over three hours — and you feel every single champagne-soaked minute. The first hour? Brilliant chaos. By the third, it’s like watching a jazz solo that won’t end because the trumpet player fell into existential despair. Trim half an hour, and it’s a masterpiece about excess. Leave it as is, and it’s a case study in excess.

2. Eternals (2021)

Look, I admire ambition. I admire diversity. I even admire that Marvel tried to do something “different.” But Eternals feels like a philosophy lecture that keeps getting interrupted by PowerPoint slides of space gods. It’s two and a half hours of characters explaining who they are, why they matter, and how they’re sad about it. There’s a great 95-minute movie buried in there — probably hiding between the exposition dumps and the drone shots of sand.

3. Elvis (2022)

Baz Luhrmann directs like he just drank six Red Bulls and jumped into a glitter cannon. Elvis is no exception. Austin Butler is magnetic, but the film spins like a Vegas slot machine — lights, noise, spectacle, all fighting for attention. The result? A biopic that exhausts more than it enlightens. Cut 45 minutes, and it’s electric. Keep it all, and it’s a rhinestone fever dream that overstays its welcome by a full encore.

4. Blonde (2022)

Andrew Dominik’s Blonde is the cinematic equivalent of staring into a mirror and crying for three hours. Ana de Armas is phenomenal, but the movie mistakes repetition for depth. Every emotional beat gets replayed in slow motion, like the director’s allergic to brevity. A tight 90-minute character study could’ve been devastating. Instead, we got trauma porn with prestige lighting.

5. Oppenheimer (2023)

Now, don’t throw your popcorn yet. Oppenheimer is a towering achievement — historical, haunting, and beautifully crafted. But even masterpieces can drag. The first two hours are electric; the last forty minutes feel like post-game analysis. Nolan’s obsession with chronology turns brilliance into homework. Trim the final courtroom theatrics, and you’ve got perfection. Keep them all, and it’s genius wearing a wristwatch that doesn’t know when to stop ticking.

The truth is, most movies don’t need to be short — they just need to know why they’re long.Three hours of emotion? Fine. Three hours of editing-room insecurity? That’s a sin.

Next time you’re in a theater and your soda’s gone flat, just remember: you’re not tired of movies. You’re tired of directors trying to prove they’re poets.

Stay kind, stay curious, and for the love of all that’s cinematic — respect the 90-minute mark.— Pappy Hull, The Popcorn Philosopher