We went to see Moneyball yesterday. Moneyball is a movie starring Brad Pitt and Johan Hill that is based on the book Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game by Michael Lewis, published in 2003, about the Oakland Athletics baseball team and its general manager Billy Beane. Its focus is the team’s modernized, analytical, sabermetric approach to assembling a competitive baseball team, despite Oakland’s disadvantaged revenue situation.
All in all it was a good movie.
Was it a great movie?
No.
And here is why…
The movie is 2 hours and 6 minutes long.
I am usually smarter about picking movies and check the running time, but somehow I forgot with this one. This seems to be a growing trend in Hollywood. They love an extended cut edit edit. Just throw everything in there. In reality, about 30 minutes could have been cut off of Moneyball and no one would have noticed or cared. It would have remained a great story and been actionpacked. Instead, I was left with a sore ass from sitting there while Hollywood tried to milk my emotions. Ugh.
Then when I go back and watch the trailer (I don’t watch trailers as a general rule and I will explain this later), I see that they have taken every best part of the movie and jammed it into 2 minutes. Why can’t the person editing trailers also edit the movie?!?
I honestly believe that every movie should be about 90-100 minutes tops. Something about that last 26 minutes kills every movie. Editors should be like product managers. KILL KILL KILL.
So is Moneyball worth it? Yes. But perhaps in the comfort of your own home when you have access to a bathroom and a pause button.
