I know that you’ve been on the edge of your seat waiting for my review of the movie “Nightmare Alley.” You might have even had trouble sleeping last night in anticipation of today’s DEEmail.

The wait is over, but you’re going to get far more than just Dr. Dee’s critical opinion of the film.

The 1947 version of “Nightmare Alley” was far superior and grittier than a remake. I encourage you to watch the Tyrone Power version over the Bradley Cooper one.

At first, I thought the movie was too long, with it clocking in at two hours and twenty minutes, but it wasn’t that the length of the film that was the problem; it was the pacing. The movie plodded along at a snail’s pace, making for a tedious viewing experience.

Note that there was nothing wrong with the “content” or even the “storytelling” aspects of the movie. Remember, those elements were relatively the same as in the previous version. Bradley Cooper and the rest of the cast did a fine acting job. The issue I had was with how long parts of the narrative were. For example, Stanton Carlisle’s (Cooper) backstory took too long to tell. Many scenes dragged on.

You see, the problem with the movie was with the editing. And that’s often the issue with one-to-many presentations. They need much more editing.

A-list copywriters will tell you that part of excellent writing is editing. Often a copywriter will discard the first one of two pages of copy from their first draft to get to the key points quicker.

Most of the editing I suggest when reviewing clients’ webinars is during the teaching section of their presentations. They deliver too much content in too much detail or have too many technical details. All of those things make for a boring and confusing presentation.

The problem isn’t the length of a presentation. Instead, it’s whether the speaker delivers engaging information in correct proportions so that their audience is sitting on the edge of their seats.

As living legend Dan Kennedy says, “The number one marketing sin is being boring.”

Could your presentation use some judicious editing? “Nightmare Alley” would have benefited from it.

Kick butt, make mucho DEEnero!

Dave “The Movie Critic” Dee