When cinema first became a medium, movies were quite short. Back then, when nickelodeons were becoming an event or spectacle for the masses, places people could go to across all social classes, the films being screened at these kinds of theaters were shorter than what is expected today of a feature film. Recently, beginning in 2022, American cinema has been noticing a shift in what kind of movies are being consumed. While the average movie might be a little or under two hours, some of the biggest blockbusters of the year are pushing past two and a half hours, leading some to prompt this question: should we be having intermissions if a movie is going past three hours?

Other forms of national cinemas, especially in Bollywood and Chinese cinema, have been consuming these kinds of long movies for decades now. American movies were once longer, but it seems like these days the trend is skewing toward having more time to tell the story on the screen in its full glory. However, this can be a boon and a bane for the film industry. Not only is it more expensive to create these kinds of movies, locking out filmmakers without major support from studios, but it also has to be done right, or it can be a drag to get the final arcs. Let’s deep dive into why this is the case.

The Rise of 3-Hour Movies
Paramount Pictures

In 2022 and 2023, several big movies were clocking in at what seemed unfathomable before. Damien Chazelle’s Babylon, which came out at the end of December 2022, can be seen as a turning point in this recent trend. Chazelle’s Babylon, despite the mixed opinions about it, clocked in at three hours and nine minutes, and casual moviegoers and fans alike were complaining about how the plot seemed all over the place and that it couldn’t sustain the film for that long. While it may seem like Babylon was an anomaly that appears once every couple of years, it wasn’t the beginning. Movies like The Irishman also were over three hours long.

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Then came Avatar: The Way of Water, which saw similar complaints. Christopher Nolan’s hyped film Oppenheimer, which comes out July 2023, will also join this exclusive club, as its run time has been said to clock in at three hours and nine seconds. Even John Wick: Chapter 4 almost reaches three hours in its length, as it has a running time of two hours and 49 minutes. For audiences that have become acclimated to TikTok and short-form content since the pandemic years and the idea that audiences are worsening with their phone usage and managers, it becomes surprising that people theoretically are wanting to sit down and watch these kinds of films.

This isn’t a new invention though — even a beloved classic like Titanic clocks in at three hours and 15 minutes. However, a film has to be well crafted to fully get away with such a long running time, and keep the audiences at the edge of their seat. Otherwise, it fails to captivate and instead becomes like a chore, or obligation, to finally get to the end.

A Sometimes Tedious Deep Dive
Universal Pictures

Bollywood movies are particularly long, with their storylines diving into many different subplots, themes, and dance numbers throughout. If there’s something to note about the Bollywood model, it’s that these kinds of movies have been able to keep audiences cheering and booing for their favorite — and least favorite — characters as they progress through their physical and emotional journeys. There’s a certain kind of magic that comes with longer movies that allow the audience to truly become one with the characters on the screen, but that’s if the script and direction are done right.

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When it comes to longer movies like Babylon, they tend to divide audiences because of how deep the movie goes. Babylon becomes the ideal example of polarization in terms of length because it tries to do a lot in its three hours. It transitions between a historic movie, a romance, and, towards the end, a crime drama of sorts. As it never truly finds its footing in one genre and progresses through them in a way that doesn’t feel seamless at times, it ends up creating a hole that the audience can fall through quite quickly if they’re not feeling up to it or particularly astute that day.

Longer movies can be a great time to show off excellent writing and characterization. However, it can also be a medium of gatekeeping with resources, support, and distribution. When theaters across the country are stuck playing fewer movies because a three-hour movie takes up more screens consistently, it typically shuts out indie, BIPOC, and international filmmakers who may have needed that exposure more than a Marvel movie. At the same time, if more resources are being pooled into a longer, more mainstream movie, it also denies the same opportunities to those who have had less of a spotlight.