There was a time when going to the movies was an occasion, and people would jump up from their seats even at the sight of a moving image. Intervals have been an integral part of the cinema-going experience since then. During the 1910s, intervals were necessary as films came in multiple reels. The time that it took to change a reel served as the intermission. Even when the cinemas eventually got rid of the problem with multiple projectors, inter projectors, intervals stuck around.
Fast forward around a hundred years, the interval has shaped cinema in their own way. And what's more interesting is that there is still an epiphany of voices for and against its existence. In contemporary cinema, India remains the last stronghold for the interval. It is imbibed into our movie watching experience and we are usually in for a cultural shock when we watch a film without one, despite never consciously thinking about it. Indian filmmakers learn from the tradition and tradition and naturally structure their films around the break in the middle.
To crudely simplify film structure, and ignoring the ghost of Goddard hovering above the projectors, we can say that most films are made with a three-act structure. Many films have a well-defined mid-point, often what Aristotle called the point of reversal in Poetics. The first Avengers movie's mid-point brilliantly shows up at the exact middle of the film by its runtime. Most films use the first act for introduction and exposition, second act for development and raising the stakes and the third act for the climax. The classical structure would have its protagonists at their lowest at the end of Act 2 and have them build to the climax in the third act. Avengers does it, and so does Whiplash, a film with one of the strongest third act in recent memory.
Most Indian films, however, are structured around the interval. All filmmakers have a different way of dealing with it but the trend is to put up a mini climax in the middle of the film, right before the intermission, to leave the audience with a cliffhanger as they go out to buy their samosas and popcorn. When the film reopens it usually starts at a 'low'. The momentum builds again in the first few minutes and then moves towards the final climax. This method can essentially have two three-act structures and works well for longer movies. Raj Kapoor has even taken it a step further with films that had two intervals, like Mera Naam Joker, essentially having a three-act structure spanning over more than four hours. However, there are cons to this structure too.
Not everyone watches their films in the cinema, and not everyone necessarily likes to break their immersion for a break especially when watching a film at home. Building a film around the interval causes a drastic slowdown right after the middle, one that many films can't quite get over. The interval is also taxing to certain genres. Thrillers rely on immersion for a big payoff near the climax. A slow burner like Zodiac would potentially bore one to sleep if it was cut in two halves. In one go, it draws into a limit until the realization creeps in, nearly at the end. On the other side, there are films that have used the interval to perfection. Classics like Sholay and Guide come to mind. Lootera literally divides the film into two small films. The first half is bright, musical and fills the screen with yellows and reds while the second half is grim, dark and brooding; what happens in between makes the film great. Hollywood epics of the yesteryears built intervals into the screenplay too.
Gone with the Wind, Lawrence of Arabia and Ben-Hur are prime examples. There is a practical side to the debate about intervals too and it involves, among other things a natural inevitability. The great Alfred Hitchcock was adamant that 'The length of a film should be related to the endurance of the human bladder.' His own films strictly had a runtime from two to two and a half hours. Most Hollywood films do fall into that bracket and do not typically challenge the human bladder.
However, epics like The Godfather would've been taxing to sit through. Recent epics like Lord of the Rings films and Avengers Endgame have clocked well over three hours. As great an experience, those films are, sometimes the overbearing nature of the task of sitting at one place for a time so long can hamper one's enjoyment of a film. Surely that is counterintuitive to the filmmaker's vision?
In India the conversation is different. Intervals are the bread and butter of theatre earnings and no theatres would want to let go of them. Even Hollywood films are screened with a cut wherever the theatre feels like putting it. Many films are cut in the middle of a chase sequence and pi sequence and pick up from the exact time after the intermission. This too grossly hampers the enjoyment of a film. No one needs an interval for a 90-minute film but a break is hammed in nonetheless to maximise profits. When a film is released without an interval, it makes the news. 'Dhobi Ghat' released without an interval, much to the dismay of multiplexes. The interval remains the norm for mainstream Indian cinema though and there is no reason for filmmakers to let go of it. With Hollywood cashing in on big-budget studio blockbusters again, the average length of their films has also increased, leading to arguments in favour of intervals. Quentin Tarantino often releases his films with an interval.
The arguments in favour of it interestingly count the things that have downgraded cinema experience in India as refreshing and positive. Perhaps the answer is not in a proposal for a steadfast rule. Three hour-long films are better off without a break and two hour-long films greatly benefit from it. Maybe the choice to have an interval should remain with the filmmaker, and the ideal environment should be positive enough to not compromise the distribution of the film. It is an idealistic perspective, but the most sensible one. It was filmmakers themselves who got rid of the interval in the Hollywood system back in the day too, perhaps they can find a middle way in this age of extraordinary flexibility of craft. The middle way was indeed found by one of the master filmmakers of our time. Gangs of Wasseypur screened all around the globe in film festivals in its magnanimous glory of five hours and twenty minutes. For the Indian release, it was divided into two films and each film had an interval that fits right in.
Homegrown sequels had never quite worked in India, and crime dramas last turned a profit in the 90s. Despite everything, the film became a sleeper hit, and a cult classic rewatched to this day. Perhaps it is all about making it work, like everything else that goes into making a film. Somehow, making it work.