Longest miniseries ever (or just come discuss the 10 hour movie event)

Cafe Society
1

Remember the good ole days when miniseries used to be a REAL TV event? Not just a 4 hour pilot or made-for-TV movie broken into two nights (I’m looking at you TNT and Sci Fi Channel).

Of the top of my head, I thought I would just brainstorm the longest/most memorable miniseries I could think of:
Taken (2002) - 20 episodes - 1200 minutes (sweet mother of god! It’s like a 20 hour episode of X-files meets Signs! Screw that!)

Winds of War (1983) - 883 minutes (All I remembered was LONG)

Band of Brothers (2001) - 10 episodes - 600 minutes (Spielberg returns to the 10 hour war epic)

Shogun (1980) - 10 episodes - 600 minutes (Hai!)

Roots (1977) - 573 minutes (Look kids! It LeVar Burton! And I bet that OJ guy becomes a big hit on TV)

Frank Herbert’s Dune/Children of Dune - (2000,2001) 6 episodes -536 minutes (What’s Dune without Patrick Stewart, Sean Young, Alicia Witt and of course… Sting?)

V / V: The Final Battle (1983,1984) - 5 episodes - 469 minutes (Ahh… they don’t make fascist metaphores like this anymore)

The Thorn Birds (1983) - 460 minutes (Ok some of these are a little girly)

Shaka Zulu (1984) - 300 minutes (SHAKA!! ZUUUU-LUUU!!)

Shit that’s a lot of TV. Feel free to add your own and discuss

2

“Centennial” (1978 or so)-- 26 one-hour episodes. Figure 44 minutes per, and that comes out to about 1144 minutes.

3

“The Stand” Without commercials it was 366 minutes, according to IMDB.

4

Does Ken Burns “The Civil War” count or is that a TV movie?

5

Taylor Caldwell’s CAPTAINS AND THE KINGS- I have no idea how long but still Loooong!

6

The premise of this thread is dubious. There is a point at which a miniseries is no longer a miniseries", but just a plain series.

7

I, Claudius was over 600 minutes, I know for sure, though I couldn’t tell you exactly how much more.

8

I don’t know but North & South/North & South II (561/570 minutes) and The Blue and The Grey (398) minutes certainly count.
Walloon - Series are usually something like 30+ 30 to 60 minute episodes that run over the length of the broadcast season. Mini-series generally run over one or a couple of weeks and are a self contained series of 60-120 minute episodes.

A notable exception was Taken which was as long as some shows entire season. But since it ran over the course of a week or two, it is a “mini” series.

9

Well if you’re going to allow Ken Burns then you’d skip right to “Baseball” which stands at 1140 minutes. 19 hours. Now that was some fine television.

10

The 10th Kingdom, a little shorter than some of the others listed, but IMDB lists it at 417 minutes.

11

I don’t know exactly how long it runs in terms of minutes, but Brideshead Revisited runs for 12 episodes, about 50 minutes each. That’s–what?–about 600 minutes.

I do know that I can read the book in less time than it takes to watch.

12

Does Shoah count, or is this an actual movie? It’s 9.5 hours long. :slight_smile:

http://us.imdb.com/Title?0090015

13

Wagner’s Ring cycle- about 18 hours. Hey, I saw it on PBS.

14

Berlin Alexanderplatz clocks in at 930 minutes (15 1/2 hours):

http://us.imdb.com/Title?0080196

15

If you take a mini-series to mean a series that runs over a fixed amount of time, encompassing a planned story arc, I nominate Babylon 5.

16

The IMDB list it at 10 90-minute episodes.

IMDB lists it at 750 minutes.

Yeah, unfortunately, that’s not what a mini-series is. Miniseries are specifically designed to be broadcast in a limited number of episodes, typically in a concentrated piece of time. A series that lasted for several years and subject to annual renewal does not meet this definition.

Shoah is considered a theatrical film.

Actually, the IMDB lists it with a running time of 1560 minutes. Looks like our leader so far…

17

The Taken web site claims 20 hours (1200 minutes)

I guess we can just chalk it up to another case of “lost time” common to alien abductions.:wink: