Starting off slowly: movies that paid to stick with, and those that didn't

[tomcar]

@Martian Bigfoot

*Solaris *is an peculiar case, because the action actually picks up quite a lot (relatively speaking) in the second part of the movie, once the main character actually arrives at the space station. Everything from that point onwards ranks among my favorite pieces of cinema ever. Of course, to get that far, you first have to suffer through the fantastically boring opening which takes place on Earth, culminating in the notorious highway sequence, which seems to just go on forever. I really think that the first hour could have been squeezed into about five minutes, and the movie would have been none the poorer for it. Then again, Tarkovsky was a genius filmmaker, and I’m not, so what do I know.

I have heard that Tarkovsky would make the build-up in his movies so gawd-awfully slow in order to make sure that the less appreciative audience members left the theater before the real action started. Don’t know if it’s true, or why he would do that, but Solaris, at least, feels a bit like that.

The first half is so beautiful and strange though. I found the beginning so mysterious, far from boring.

[elfkin477]

@Chimera

Hot Fuzz, Shaun of the Dead. They start slow and build the environment first before stepping into the action. If you walk in and only watch the first 10 minutes and then get pissed because no one is screaming and running yet, the problem isn’t the movie…

I’ve never heard anyone else say that about Hot Fuzz. I disagree about Shaun of the Dead, and was so disappointed by the slower start to Hot Fuzz I almost stopped watching. Then it suddenly got good.

[JohnT]

@Apocalypso

Contact (with Jodie Foster). I really wanted to like it but it was just too slow of a build up and too little payoff. I read the Carl Sagan book, thinking it would be better than the movie, but other than some very minor details it was the same. It’s like Sagan got as far as “we’re definitely going to come into some type of contact with other beings” but got hopelessly stuck trying to depict them, and just gave up and gave us the shitty ending.

I’m confused. The ending of the book was completely different than the ending of the movie. Which “shitty ending” are you referring?

[Cuckoorex]

Pretty much any adaptation of Henry James’ Turn of the Screw. The Innocents is amazing (but slow) and the adaptation with Patsy Kensit (titled Turn of the Screw- imagine that!) is quite good as well, but this is a story with a slow burn. You really have to settle in for the long haul to get the payoff.

[handsomeharry]

**Hostel **was horribly, horribly boring for the first, what, 30 minutes, one hour?? Then, the excitement came. Of course, the excitement made me want to puke, but, at least, it was excitement!

[Elise]

worth the wait: Tree of Life. Slow, very slow, at times…but overall profound and well done. I thought!
never worth the wait: any paranormal activity movie. unless uneventful footage of kitchens and living rooms at night gets you all sweaty with suspense

[grude]

Skyline kind of annoyed me, it is basically the same alien invasion movie done a million times before, BUT near the very end it gets very different and interesting. In fact the most interesting and original part of the movie plays as still images between the end credits.:smack:

The movie actually is no where near as bad as reviews and IMDB claim it to me, it is just something that has been a million times is all.

[Jackmannii]

@Max_the_Immortal

Barton Fink starts out slowly and steadily getting weirder, but there’s no decent payoff.

That’s the one that confirmed for me that if a movie is deeply, fidgetingly dull beyond 20-30 minutes in, there’s no hope for redemption.