davidfrank said: Anyways, I'm not expecting very long denouements for either Indy 4 or Dark Knight. Just kickass movies.

True, they won't have that problem.
But come on, happily ever after used to be enough.
We didn't need to know if Chewie went home after evil had been defeated. How the twins restarted the jedi club. We were just happy that evil was slain, party time. The rest would be ok.

Getting back to the length thing tho it's a tricky process called editing.
With some movies you get bits that'll have you stab yourself out of boredom, others have to be cut back to 90mins leaving you with a lot of questions and a crap movie. Think Deep Blue See where all the scenes containing good acting and storyline ended up in the deleted scenes section.

RaTTleR_NL said: Well what about the third Lord of the Rings with its 32 endings?
It was a good movie except for that, and as a side effect added length.

I've never understood the complaint about the last 20 minutes of ROTK. It's wrapping up an 11 hour story (if you go by the extended editions) so of course the denouement is going to be longer than your average film. To me, the film has one ending, and the rest is just giving closure to the gigantic cast of characters. If the last 20 minutes of ROTK had happened in any other way (ending at the coronation for instance) I would have felt cheated.

Anyways, I'm not expecting very long denouements for either Indy 4 or Dark Knight. Just kickass movies.

bradbrevet said: They seem to think the running time on these two movies is a bad thing, I however think it's great… of course, the movie has to also be good.

I agree. I'd rather have a movie be overlong or indulgent rather than half-baked. But as Ebert says no good movie can be too long and no bad one can be too short. A 3 hour batman movie makes me quite excited that they'll do the story and characters justice. Personally, i think spider-man 3 would have been much better if went the longer route. we would have ended up with full villains instead of the half-baked ones we were served.

Not sure if you guys noticed, but CHUD is reporting The Dark Knight may end up being almost 3 hours long. They seem to think the running time on these two movies is a bad thing, I however think it's great… of course, the movie has to also be good.

Sure, Indiana Jones tries to put Indy into those situations, but he isn't too thrilled. Indy gets tired of running and gives up. He groans and rolls his eyes at jumping across a chasm. Another huge muscular goon to fight? [Sarcasm]Great[/Sarcasm]. This mine cart goes where? They barely escaped with their lives, and he's worried about his hat?

Some movies manage to pull off the unlikely action sequences while still being serious about the whole thing. The Indy movies don't try to take themselves too seriously. They are just plain fun. Which, in the end, is the whole point, right?

That said, while I agree that Temple of Doom is overall the lesser of the three, I'd argue it has some of the best individual set pieces and moments. The mine cart chase, the sequence on the rope bridge, both are priceless. Absolutely priceless.