what's wrong with long films?

I've lost track of the number of times I've heard, whether it's in reviews or on people's lips, complaints relating to the latest blockbuster than run something along the lines of "But did it really have to be so long?".

I must confess I find myself somewhat baffled by these comments. Surely, when it comes to these entertainment spectacles, the longer I am entertained, the better. If a film can give me three and a half hours of entertainment for my money, then that is better than if it gives me ninety minutes. It's like walking up to a greasy beach-side kiosk and complaining that your 50c buys you an enormous tub of chips, rather than the microscopic little bag you expected.

There's also the fact that you can just do more in three hours than you can do in one-and-a-half. The modern kind of fantasy/adventure blockbuster (Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Pirates of the Caribbean, etc., but also Star Wars, the Indiana Jones films, and so on) are, on their most basic level, about escaping into a fantastical and wonderful world inhabited by larger-than-life characters and anchored by simple but resonant mythic narratives. For this kind of thing, ninety minutes simply isn't enough to create a coherent sense of the world and feel at home in it. This is why blockbusters have been getting longer and longer, or spilling over into trilogies or even longer series.

If I want a movie to end, then it's probably because I'm not enjoying it, in which case, the length of the movie is not in itself a problem, but becomes one due to the film's other issues. Of course, I cannot deny that some films feel padded out and could benefit from a shorter running time. But when I hear people saying, for instance, that Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End had no right to take up three hours of their time because it's nothing more than a rollercoaster pirate yarn, then I have to throw up my hands in sheer incomprehension. Why the hell did you go to watch it at all if you didn't want it taking up your time?