Is there a word to describe a film (or book) that features very long dialogues and most of its scenes or passages revolve around dialogues? I came up with the word "dialogue-y" but that obviously doesn't exist. Ideally, the best answer would be a single word, but a phrase or expression will do too.
Thank you very much
The adjectival form of 'dialogue' (variant spelling is 'dialog') is
dialogic also dialogical, adj.
pertaining to or characterized by dialogue.
[dialogic. (n.d.) Random House Kernerman Webster’s College Dictionary. (2010). Retrieved January 25 2016 from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/dialogic ]
Thus, aside from technical senses of 'dialogic' ('dialogical' is a variant spelling), a dialogical novel, for example, is a novel dominated by dialogue, whether by weight or by volume.
An example from the wild, with reference to a novel:
Spanish novelist Delibes (The Hedge, Five Hours with Mario--a monologue) here uses a series of psychiatric interviews to make a spare, dialogical novel.
(From a review of "THE WARS OF OUR ANCESTORS By Miguel Delibes", in Kirkus Reviews, 1992.)
Another example, with reference to film:
Today's films of counter-information are distinguished by an extensive arsenal of stylistic devices: self-criticism, bluff, irony, wit, the view of events from the periphery, the letter form, dialogical film forms.
(From "Filmic Counter-Information: A Few Highlights from Film History", 2003, at the Republic Art site. By Thomas Tode, translated by Aileen Derieg.)
For extended and technical senses of 'dialogic', and an outstanding work generally, see The Dialogic Imagination, by Mikhail Bakhtin.
Verbose/ Wordy
using or containing more words that are needed (according to Oxford dictionary)
Long-winded
continuing for too long and therefore boring
The dialogues were verbose or prolix.
Fans of French cinema might be inclined to describe exceedingly wordy films as Rohmeresque, after the great Éric Rohmer, in most of whose movies practically nothing happens outside the conversations of the characters. A Google Books search turns up two dozen unique matches for Rohmeresque, going back to this one from The New York Times Film Reviews (1975) [snippet]:
Until this point, "Femmes au Soleil" is, as the festival program describes it "Rohmeresque," at least to the extent that it recalls the mood and the wit of Eric Rohmer's "Claire's Knee," which was ...
Not all of these sources use Rohmeresque in the same sense, but this example, from Rob Stone, "Between Sunrise and Sunset: An Elliptical Dialogue Between American and European Cinema," in World Cinema's 'Dialogues' With Hollywood (2007), seems entirely on point:
In its apparently aimless nonconformism, Slacker exhibits the cool flavour of the French New Wave in its structure, characters, and themes. The debt to French cinema is especially evident in its platform for insouciant Godardian monologues delivered rhetorically but with no specific audience in mind, and intense Rohmeresque dialogues in search of meaning.
...
Before Sunrise often contextualises Jesse and Céline amongst a collage of couples and characters who resemble the protagonists of intimate Rohmeresque dramas and there are even moments of what might be affectionate parody, when, much like Belmondo and Aznavour emulating Bogart because they have seen too many films noirs in Breathless (À bout de souffle 1960) and Shoot the Pianist (Tirez sur le pianiste 1960) respectively, Jesse and Céline, who may have seen too many French films, seem to fill pauses in the conversation by thinking of what a character in a film by Rohmer might say next.
