Martin Scorsese’s majestic western, Killers of the Flower Moon (The American note), showing this Friday, lasts almost three and a half hours. The duration of the most recent Palme d’Or, the excellent Anatomy of a fall by Justine Triet, in theaters next week, is more than two and a half hours long.
One of the biggest cinematic successes of the summer, Oppenheimer by Christopher Nolan, had a duration of three hours. The much awaited Napoleon by Ridley Scott is 158 minutes long and its long version, which will be broadcast on the Apple TV+ platform after its cinema release on November 22… will be more than four hours long.
Are the films longer? Yes. Are they too long? No.
Since the advent of the feature film 110 years ago, there have always been long films. Many peplums from the 1950s and 1960s were three hours long and required a break to change the reels. Ben-Hur (1959), by William Wyler, was 214 minutes long.
The three biggest popular hits in the history of Hollywood cinema, in constant dollars, are Gone with the wind (1939), 221 minutes, Avatar (2009), 162 minutes, and Titanic (1997), 195 minutes.
Lengths that allow some myths to be debunked. The one according to which the public prefers short films, which does not stand up to statistical data. And the more recent one, according to which the TikTokization of video content, increasingly brief, endangers the attention span of the public, and in particular young audiences, for cinema. Many TikTok subscribers went to see Avengers: End Game (2019), despite its 181 minutes.
The trend towards long films has been particularly strong, however, since 2018, according to a report in the most recent issue of the magazine The Economist. The English weekly analyzed some 100,000 feature films that have been released internationally since the 1930s, using data from the Internet Movie Database (IMDb).
PHOTO MELINDA SUE GORDON, ASSOCIATED PRESS
Cillian Murphy in Oppenheimerthree-hour drama by Christopher Nolan released in 2023
He concluded that the average length of films had increased by about 24%, from 1 hour 21 minutes in the 1930s to 1 hour 47 minutes in 2022. The average length of the 10 most popular films of the year, still according to IMDb, has progressed by almost 50% since the 1930s, to around 2 hours 30 minutes in 2022.
Blockbusters, particularly the avalanche of superhero films in recent years, are of course at the heart of the phenomenon. The most recent James Bond, No Time to Die (2021), is the longest film in the series, at 163 minutes. The continuation ofAvatar, The Way of the Water (2022), dragged on at 192 minutes. Obviously, it’s not just blockbusters that are long. Recent Babylon by Damien Chazelle and Beau Is Afraid by Ari Aster lasted 189 and 179 minutes respectively.
Why are movies longer? Many observers believe that in order to attract spectators to theaters, far from the comfort of their living rooms, cinema must distinguish itself from TV series, with more spectacular scenes.
The irony is that the longer the cinema goes on and attempts to “expand the narratives”, fleshing out the characters and subplots, the closer it gets to the TV series.
The price of a cinema ticket is roughly equivalent to that of a monthly subscription to a digital platform. Market logic dictates that film producers give the customer more bang for their buck. However, another paradox is that the cost of a 3-hour film ticket is generally the same as that of a 90-minute film. While theater owners can show fewer films in a day.
There is of course a real pleasure in watching a 90-minute film without the slightest length. Humanist vampire seeking consenting suicideby Quebecois Ariane Louis-Seize, wraps up in 91 delightful minutes. Towards a bright future, Nanni Moretti’s most recent film, lasts only 1 hour 35 minutes. There are many films, it is true, which do not deserve to last longer. Too many filmmakers indulge in unnecessary scenes that they should have cut during editing. Conciseness is also what makes cinema so charming.
The fact remains that if we can endure a mediocre series like Tapie on Netflix stretches the sauce of the life journey of a peddler over seven one-hour episodes, we can “make the effort” to discover a work such Killers of the Flower Moonof 206 minutes, certainly, but which reveals a fascinating part of the history of the First Nations in the United States.
There is a certain form of hypocrisy in declaring that a film lasting more than two hours is “too long”, when we televore quantities of series episodes every weekend. Of course, at home, you can take a break at any time to go to the bathroom or make some herbal tea. It’s not like being part of the “captive audience” in a movie theater. The fact remains that there is no more beautiful place than the cinema, no better place, to see the new Martin Scorsese film.
The beauty of it is that we can see again The mom and the whore by Jean Eustache, 3 hours 40 minutes, then discover the Netflix series on David Beckham, 285 minutes, a few weeks apart, binge three episodes of The candidate (129 minutes) and watch a Palme d’Or, 152 minutes, two days later. All with great pleasure. It’s possible, while enjoying the good weather. I confirm it to you.