The title of the "shortest movie ever" depends on the category, but prominent contenders include "A Boy and His Atom" (world's smallest animation by IBM) and "Soldier Boy", a 7-second film recognized by Guinness World Records. For Oscar-nominated works, "Fresh Guacamole" (2012) by PES is famously short at 1 minute, 41 seconds, a title it held for brevity in that category.
Logistics, or Logistics Art Project, is a 2012 Swedish experimental film conceived and created by Erika Magnusson and Daniel Andersson. At 51,420 minutes (857 hours or 35 days and 17 hours), it is the longest film ever made.
In 2013, IBM scientists created the Guinness World Record-holding "world's smallest movie," titled: A Boy and His Atom.
18+ movies to watch
A short film is a film with a low running time. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of not more than 40 minutes including all credits".
A practical cut-off guide
If you're making a short, anything over 20 minutes is going to shrink your festival options dramatically - and probably your audience too. If you're calling it a feature, make sure it crosses 45 minutes at the very least, though ideally you'll aim for 80+ to make it saleable.
Martin Scorsese's epic Western, Killers of the Flower Moon, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Lily Gladstone, and Robert De Niro, clocks in at 3 hours and 26 minutes, making it one of the top 50 longest films in box office history.
Yours, Mine & Ours is a 2005 American family comedy film directed by Raja Gosnell and starring Dennis Quaid, Rene Russo, Rip Torn, and Linda Hunt. It is a remake of the 1968 film of the same name. The film follows a blended family with 18 children, who try to stop the marriage between the two parents.
Deadpool & Wolverine and X-Men Universe are the highest-grossing R-rated film and its live-action franchise, respectively.
Highest Grossing Chinese Films
While several films have long productions, the movie famously associated with a multi-year shoot, including a period of about 7 years for filming, is Richard Linklater's Boyhood (2014), shot intermittently from 2002 to 2013, following a boy from age six to eighteen, though the entire project spanned 12 years from start to finish. Other films like The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (8 years) and Dhruva Natchathiram (8 years) also had long productions, but Boyhood is the iconic example of a narrative feature filmed over such an extended, real-time period.
A group of IBM researchers have created the world's smallest movie - starring 130 atoms (well, the oxygen atoms of carbon monoxide molecules).
The Blair Witch Project (1999)
Writers, directors and editors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez spent between $35,000 and $60,000 shooting “The Blair Witch Project,” making it arguably the cheapest movie ever made.
The animated film that famously took 29 years to make is The Thief and the Cobbler, which began production in 1964 and was finally released (in a modified form) in 1993, though it was an unfinished project riddled with production hell and director changes. Another contender is Mad God, a stop-motion film that was in development for 30 years before its release in 2021.
A 1080p HD 30 fps 2-hour movie averages 3 GB in file size. A 720p HD 2-hour movie averages 2 GB in file size. A Standard Definition (SD) 2-hour movie averages 1 GB in file size.
The movie that took 48 years to make is The Other Side of the Wind, Orson Welles' final, unfinished film that began shooting in the 1970s and was finally completed and released by Netflix in 2018, long after Welles' death. The project was famously trapped in legal issues and distribution nightmares, with production spanning years and the editing process continuing posthumously until its eventual release, making it one of the longest-produced films ever.
A Z-grade movie is an extremely low-budget film, even worse than a B-movie, characterized by terrible production quality, bad acting, poor scripts, and obvious mistakes (like crew members in shot). These films often lack professionalism, sometimes making unintentional comedy that gives them cult status, appealing to audiences who enjoy "so bad it's good" cinema.
It is against theater policy to admit unaccompanied minors to R-rated films. Those under 17 must be accompanied by a parent or guardian (at least 21 years old). It may include strong brutal and graphic violence (including blood), excessive strong language, sexually-oriented nudity, drug use, and/or other elements.
There's no single "number one movie" as it depends on the criteria, but James Cameron's Avatar (2009) is the highest-grossing film worldwide unadjusted for inflation. When adjusting for inflation, Gone with the Wind (1939) is often cited as number one, while The Shawshank Redemption (1994) is consistently rated the top movie by users on IMDb based on critical acclaim and audience votes.
Delivery Man. In this heartwarming comedy, underachiever David Wozniak (Vince Vaughn) learns he's actually an overachiever—he's fathered 533 children via donations made twenty years earlier! David soon discovers that the shock of his life might just be the best thing that's ever happened to him.
Overall comments and recommendations
Parents are reminded that children under the age of five can sometimes be disturbed by comic or slapstick violence. Children over the age of eight should be ok to see this movie with or without parental guidance.
The "saddest" movie based on a true story is subjective, but top contenders often include Schindler's List, due to its harrowing Holocaust depiction; 12 Years a Slave, for its brutal portrayal of American slavery; Grave of the Fireflies (animated, deeply tragic WWII story); and The Pianist, showing survival in the Warsaw Ghetto, with Worth, focusing on the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund, also cited for emotional impact.
Is 'Titanic' the longest movie? Though the iconic movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet boasts a runtime of three hours and 14 minutes, according to IMDb, it is nowhere near the longest film.
Gettysburg is a 4-hour Civil War epic that ditches cli... War between the states. One of my favorite movies! The authenticity that the re-enactors brought to this movie was amazing!
28 Years Later (2025) "28 Years Later" is an upcoming post-apocalyptic horror film set to release on June 20, 2025. Directed by Danny Boyle and written by Alex Garland, the film serves as the first installment in a new trilogy, continuing the narrative established by "28 Days Later" (2002) and "28 Weeks Later" (2007).