# Why don't movies have Intermissions anymore?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Tags:** movies
**Created:** [August 10, 2024, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546 "2024-08-10T18:34:21Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 4
### Author:  [@zbuzz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zbuzz)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/61 "2024-08-12T02:08:22Z")
> [@Limmin](#):
>
> Good memory! My DVD set of this movie has a side 1 / side 2 (or A/B) and I believe it is separated where the intermission was. Right at the part where John Glenn is having his flight.
Seems like placing the intermission soon after the scene where the audience’s bladders are tortured with images of flowing water hoses, spilled coffee, and gurgling water coolers while Shepard is desperately squirming to avoid turning his space suit into the whiz palace would have been the kind thing to do.
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### Author:  [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/62 "2024-08-12T03:16:29Z")
> [@ch51](#):
>
> The Right Stuff (1983) 3 hrs 13 minutes is the only “new” movie I’ve seen with an intermission. Didn’t know it had one until it came up on the screen. I was only 19 but can’t say I objected to being able to stretch. I probably wasn’t as worried about a washroom as I would be now.
Are you sure? That’s my favorite movie ever, and I saw it multiple times in the theater during its initial release. I don’t remember an intermission, but I wouldn’t swear it didn’t have one, either. There the great “hero walk” scene, with dramatic music playing, about midway through; is it possible you’re remembering that as an intermission?
Someone upthread mentioned **Grand Prix**. I don’t know about its theatrical run, but when I’ve seen it recently on TCM there is an intermission.
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### Author:  [@ch51](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ch51)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/63 "2024-08-12T03:31:11Z")
I’m sure, but it’s also possible (I suppose) that the theatre added the intermission. This would have been in Vancouver, BC, Canada - at time of release.
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### Author:  [@zbuzz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zbuzz)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/64 "2024-08-12T03:42:49Z")
I was going to post this earlier, but I didn’t want to get too far into the weeds. But since other people don’t mind…
I read 2 contemporaneous reviews of The Right Stuff. One said there was an intermission, the other said there wasn’t.
Then there is [this interview with one of the editors of The Right Stuff](https://americancinemaeditors.org/in-honor-of-the-right-stuff/) where it would seem to suggest there was no official intermission.
> **GP:** **Talking about the running time was there ever a plan to have an intermission?**
>
> **SR** : No, I don’t think so.
Also, my digital copy of The Right Stuff doesn’t have an intermission, but other films that had intermissions during their theater runs do include the intermission in the digital copy, such as Gandhi, Spartacus and Ben-Hur.
Now please excuse me while I take a moment to stretch my legs and purchase a box of Goobers.
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### Author:  [@ch51](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ch51)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/65 "2024-08-12T03:56:38Z")
Heh, so the one movie I ever saw with an intermission actually had an “unofficial intermission”. 🥴
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### Author:  [@ZonexandScout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZonexandScout)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/66 "2024-08-12T14:24:39Z")
In addition to the lists of longer films with intermissions, it may be helpful to remind everyone that a lot of movie showings effectively had intermissions because they were double-features. This was true both of kids’ matinees (e.g., _Master of the World_ and _Mysterious Island_) and adult shows (e.g., _Dr. No_ and _From Russia with Love_, which were re-released after _Goldfinger_ did so well).
In fact, in the 1960s, I would have thought it odd to NOT have any sort of intermission, either during a long movie or between two shorter movies. (And I would have felt cheated if I only got one movie for my 35 cents.)
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### Author:  [@XOldiesJock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XOldiesJock)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/67 "2024-08-12T15:47:21Z")
As I recall from my tenure as a teenage theater usher in the 1960s, we would run two shows on weeknights and continuous shows on weekends. The screen curtains would close, and the house lights would come on between shows for about 10 or 15 minutes. It gave enough time for the house to empty and for new people to visit the concession stand and then be seated. I never thought of that as an intermission, but I guess it was.
Of course, in those days there were theaters called “grind houses,” where the lights were never turned on except when the theater was closed for cleaning, but you’d only find those in larger cities.
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### Author:  [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/68 "2024-08-12T16:15:39Z")
What about movies that welcome you “to the middle of the picture”? “It was a most elusive fish.”
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### Author:  [@Limmin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Limmin)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/69 "2024-08-12T18:53:17Z")
> [@zbuzz](#):
>
> Seems like placing the intermission soon after the scene where the audience’s bladders are tortured with images of flowing water hoses, spilled coffee, and gurgling water coolers while Shepard is desperately squirming to avoid turning his space suit into the whiz palace would have been the kind thing to do.
That…would be a very logical place to put the intermission, for sure!
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### Author:  [@GailForce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GailForce)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/70 "2024-08-12T20:20:06Z")
I haven’t seen ten movies in a theater in the last ten years. I watch them all at home, or in someone else’s home, and I freely use the pause button whenever I’m hungry thirsty or need to pee. Often, I get sleepy and watch the rest of the film the next day, or even later.
So an intermission would be wasted on me. I decide where the intermissions go, and there are usually more than one in any one viewing. And I think filmmakers are aware of this practice in many viewers other than me.
Post-pandemic (is that where we are now?) I’d be surprised if I’m not describing most movie viewers. This seems perfectly normal to me now.
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### Author:  [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/71 "2024-08-12T20:42:30Z")
It was very different back in the '50s and '60s, when you sometimes wanted to get out of the house and spend a whole evening at the pictures, especially when a BIG ONE you MUST SEE happened to come to your city. It was an experience I sorely miss.
I sometimes watch old movies like _ **It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World** _ on TV with my grown daughter and am sad that she’ll probably never see them projected on the big screen.
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### Author:  [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2024, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/72 "2024-08-12T21:01:17Z")
I never cared for the theater experience. I have a large 4k OLED tv and a nice sound system (set up for music but I plug the tv into it too). It’s perfect for me. I would never claim that it has similar visuals or sound as a large theater but it suits me infinitely better. I love being in charge of when I watch and when I intermission. I am so thankful for streaming.
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### Author:  [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)
#### Post date: [August 13, 2024, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/73 "2024-08-13T02:58:21Z")
Yeah, i really prefer almost all shows at home.
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### Author:  [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)
#### Post date: [August 13, 2024, 7:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/74 "2024-08-13T07:27:34Z")
If we consider “movies” to include films outside the Hollywood subset of the global film industry, there are still a lot of movies being made with intermissions. And of course, whether theaters choose to impose an intermission break during screening, even for movies not designed for it, depends on the region.
Hindi cinema (“Bollywood”), which makes more movies annually than Hollywood although not as much total revenue, routinely includes intermissions in the films it makes, and Indian theaters typically break for intermission in Indian and foreign films alike.
Turkey, Iceland and Italy AIUI are some of the other countries where movie screening intermissions arr expected.
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### Author:  [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)
#### Post date: [August 13, 2024, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/75 "2024-08-13T16:12:25Z")
> [@Kimstu](#):
>
> Hindi cinema (“Bollywood”), which makes more movies annually than Hollywood although not as much total revenue, routinely includes intermissions in the films it makes, and Indian theaters typically break for intermission in Indian and foreign films alike.
Back in 2010 I had to travel to Bangalore for work. During my time there the manager of the team I was working with took us out to see _Avatar_ one evening. At a seemingly random point the film just stopped and the lights came up. Our host had to explain to me and the other Americans that it was intermission.
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### Author:  [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)
#### Post date: [August 13, 2024, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/76 "2024-08-13T16:52:32Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#):
>
> Yeah, i really prefer almost all shows at home.
Not me! I mean, I like watching shows at home just fine, but for a really immersive movie experience, give me my favorite seat (aisle seat up front, like about three rows away from the screen, yes I am weird) in a not-crowded theater, with some overpriced soda and popcorn, and lots of previews to hone the anticipation. Mmmmm 😍🤣
At home I am inevitably going to be knitting or sewing while watching. Just can’t feel right looking at the little screen in my own home and getting nothing done! 🤣
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### Author:  [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)
#### Post date: [August 13, 2024, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/77 "2024-08-13T17:22:02Z")
An intermission can also work quite well as a narrative break. For example, Lawrence of Arabia puts its intermission after Lawrence has returned from taking Aqaba and before the time skip to where he and his allies are doing things like attacking Turkish trains. I think such a skip feels jarring otherwise even if narratively told by something like a fade to black and a “six months later” title.
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [August 13, 2024, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/78 "2024-08-13T17:32:21Z")
I do also, but I did had the experience of seeing the big screens since I was a kid. When I watch movies on any size TV I can imagine what it would like on the big screen. Children should get a chance to see the world at several times life size while they are still small enough to experience the wonderment. They likely will see something on a big screen later in life, but I wouldn’t want to have missed those experiences myself. I haven’t ever been to an iMax, not something that existed when I was young, but I really should go once to see what it’s like. Hope they have dead afternoon and late night showings.
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### Author:  [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)
#### Post date: [August 13, 2024, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/79 "2024-08-13T17:39:28Z")
I still like to go to the movies partly for the lack of distraction. At home, the computer is right there next to the TV screen, the kitchen is nearby, etc. If a movie at all drags, it’s very easy to start to do something else. In a movie theater, though, I’ve got the phone on silent mode and in my pocket and really nothing else to distract me.
Plus, ideally, it’s a social event if there are other people in the theater.
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### Author:  [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)
#### Post date: [August 13, 2024, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-dont-movies-have-intermissions-anymore/1005546/80 "2024-08-13T18:22:43Z")
I’m taking an intermission right now from watching my 60-something inch TV with a friend. It’s social.
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