Octorox said:

Darth Venal said:

Ghost said:

Sometimes you need to break from the story a little bit to make the overall movie better to watch.

Christ, are you joking? If there is one, single cardinal rule of film-making, it is that you never, ever break from the story. Everything else is secondary. Everything, be it some fantastic scene that you really want to keep, or a great FX sequence. If they don't contribute to the plot, they have to go. If you don't get that, don't waste time trying to do anything with movies.

Do you know why people got bored with the fights and battles in the prequels? Because they wasted time showing us "pretty stuff to watch" when they should have been advancing the story. Yes, you can have duels and battles. But they should serve their function to the plot and nothing more.

Correct, one, single cardinal rule of Hollywood filmmaking. If you're talking about a 3 act narrative structure yes. If you're talking about an episodic structure, no. Ever heard of Italian neorealism? It tends to "waste time" on small everyday events that often don't have anything to do with the narrative, but allow the characters to breathe and reflect their reality, as if they were you and I. Also, when a film has a very deep message, it is usually a good idea to force some long takes to give the audience a chance to reflect on what they just saw.

You're also completely throwing experimental or non-narrative structure out of the window.

Sorry, I'll shut up now. I believe you are in the industry and I'm a lowly first year film student so I probably don't know what I'm talking about...but yeah I would say in a Star Wars film you wouldn't want long breaks from the narrative.

This isn't art-house cinema. This isn't Dinner with Andre. This is traditional narrative film making. So Venal and Bingo are correct in pointing out the importance of set-up,conflict, and resolution.