Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on March 2013

Some moviegoers complain when a film strays north of the two-hour mark. They have obviously never seen Berlin Alexanderplatz (1980; pictured), by German bad boy director Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Widely considered the longest narrative film ever made, the drama weighs in at a hefty 14 hours and 56 minutes. If you don’t think your backside can take that much sitting, thank the sensible folks at Eurospace (1-5 Maruyamacho, Shibuya-ku; www.eurospace.co.jp) who are breaking it up into 14 episodes, screening March 16-April 5.

The Danish drama The Hunt (2012) is screening at Bunkamura’s Le Cinema (2-24-1 Dogenzaka, Shibuya-ku; www.bunkamura.co.jp) from March 16. A study on group hysteria, it shows how quickly a remote village turns on a male teacher who is falsely accused of abusing a student.

Late French director Eric Rohmer made many films in his long career, including one film for each of the four seasons. The whole cycle, beginning with A Tale of Springtime (1990), will play at an all-night screening at 10:15pm on March 16 at Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro (3F, 1-43-5 Higashi-Ikebukuro Toshima-ku; www.shin-bungeiza.com).