Spectre Reviews: 11 Early Reactions You Need To Know

5. It's Too Long

In the days leading up to the first Spectre press screening, it was revealed that the film's run-time was 148 minutes, making it the longest entry into the series by a nose, running in at 4 minutes longer than the previous title-holder, 2006's Casino Royale. Depending on what your perception of Spectre is so far, this is either a good thing or a bad thing, but critics have finally chimed in, and there's a pretty vocal agreement that one of the film's big flaws is that it runs far too long. Some of the reactions to the length include phrases like "indulgent", "excessive" and in slightly more diplomatic terms, Variety called it "not entirely justified". It shouldn't be a huge surprise, though: this is the third of Craig's four Bond films to run over 140 minutes in length, so it was pretty likely that at least one of them would end up feeling a bit bloated. Though MGM are surely eager to avoid the criticisms that Quantum of Solace was too rushed, there's probably a happy medium in-between the two lengths that's more amenable. What's wrong with a snappy 120-130 minutes?