Advice on cutting down length of Feature

capitalP

capitalP

Veteran
My feature length movie is an action urban drama, when I started editing, the final run time was 2hrs and 10 minutes. I was able to cut it down to 2hrs and 2 minutes and yesterday I cut it down again to 1hr and 58minutes.

My goal is to have it at 1hr 45 minutes. I know it's tough to keep an audience attention for 2hrs so I wanna tighten the story up a bit, then after that tighten it some more. I once heard a board member say it's ok to chop down your film, but don't overdue it.

Any advice on what to look for when tighten up a finish project? I'm afraid if I cut too much, I might leave some critical parts of the film out. I'm not a professional editor but I've heard stories of editors being able to cut a decent 2hr film to a good 1hr 30 minute film.

Just looking for advice on what to avoid while trying to do this. And I know some films the length really doesn't matter, as long as the story is engaging audiences will forgive and somtimes lose track of time, but I honestly think my film would be better if shorten.
 
Well, Walter Murch cut down the origianl 5+ hour version of Cold Mountain to a reasonable 2 and a half hours. His rule is that if you go deeper than 30% you start to change key elements and might have to re-structure the story.

That being said (and never having seen your film) I would guess that you could. I have never seen a film that I said "That should have been longer", but I've seen plenty that would have benefitted from a little liposuction.

The first thing I would suggest is to read "In The Blink of an Eye"
"Read?" you ask. "But I need to edit this film!"
Yes, it's a short book and almost every library and major bookstore should have a copy. It's the best crash course on the philosophy of editing I've ever seen.

Second, have someone you respect (and who will be honest with you) view your cut. See what they think about what you can lose. If you wrote and directed it, chances are you are in love with some elements that could go, but you see them in a subjective context. An objective POV really helps.

Third, take a break if you have the time. Move on to something else for a week or so. Looking at it again with fresh eyes helps.

Fourth, watch it with a group of people, including some you don't know. You don't even have to get their feedback if you don't want it. You can see when they get restless or bored, and when they are really paying attention. Besides, just sitting in a room with a group of people watching your film puts everything under a microscope. You will definitely notice things you can lose.
 
I find it amazing sometimes when I watch Director's Cuts of movies to find entire sub-plots cut. So...

Also perhaps watch the movie and grade each scene from 0 to 5 for importance, 0 being able to be completely cut. How you grade each scene will have nothing to do with how much you like it but how much the scene furthers the story.

At this point it's probably very hard for you to see the movie from an objective point of view so maybe get a couple mates to give you some notes.
 
Last edited:
My buddy and I do the 24 hour film contests every year, and the rule is that they're supposed to be 3 minutes long, no more, no less. Normally the other contestants will turn in something whatever length, but we are very strict about it. Our shorts turn out being about 4 and a half minutes, so while it's only a minute and a half, it's something like almost 20% of the total film that we have to cut in a few hours.

I don't know if you've done this, but when we're doing our hard cutting, mostly we focus on each scene we have. With screenwriting, the whole ethos is like showing up to a party: Arrive late, leave early. So every single take, we go to the end and cut back as many frames as we can. Even 2 or 3, they add up. Then cut at the beginning of every take. Unless there's a reason to linger, I cut as deep in to every take as I can.

It's gotten us through 3 of these contests, so that might help. With a feature, you've got a lot more takes to dig in to.

Also, if this is a film you've directed, I would seriously consider bringing in a separate editor. Director's cuts always run longer than an editor's cuts, just because the director sees a lot more things as "necessary" than the editor, who's more objective about what should go. It's the same reason I hate editing any thing I've shot, because I can never objectively cut on it and try to hold each take as long as possible, but if someone else shoots then I'll cut like crazy.
 
It's a very difficult question to answer without seeing the film, but unless it is a very, very invloved plot where every scene is crucial to the audience understnding them I'm positive you could chainsaw whole parts out of it.

Have a look at the scenes that don't change the value of the story ie they don't reverse the movement of the story.

EG In one scene it starts well and ends badly (or vice versa) and the next scene carries on from the negative value and ends with the negative value. Scenes like that are usually purely expositional and (probably) are unimportant.

Get rid of any scenes that do the same thing as well eg scenes that are supposed to reinforce someones character. If the point has already been made, then you don't need to labour it.

Also look at getting each individual scene as tight as possible. Going into it frame by frame if necessary. Over the course of 2hrs, cutting a few seconds of a car drive or a guy walking across a room really starts to mount up.
 
Thanks for the feedback guys, I'm going to try and schedule a screening with some people and see what certain parts drag and so on.

And I had an editor on board to edit the film early in pre-production, but the editor got a paid gig and couldn't work on it anymore.

I will try some of the suggestions mention and see if it helps, I think I can't go wrong for cutting off a few Unnecessary scenes, you know how the whole Take I, II III thingie, I'm going to focus more on the resolution of the film, I think that starts around last hour, if there's scenes in there that doesn't move the resolution forward then it's gone.

But a second opinion should help. I'm on it. Thanks guys.
 
oops.. I thought maybe I ask this question before, wasn't sure... ok. you busted me Detective Luis.. LOL
 
Have you considered paying an editor? You said the last one left because of a paying gig, but this is something that's really worth paying for.
 
LOL! Nope, this is my first and as you can see, I'm kinda nervous about it, just trying to make it as good as I can.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top