No, ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ is Not “Nearly 4 Hours”

A Variety report from last week had hinted that Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon” runs “nearly 4 hours” which led a few people to email me about its accuracy.

I reached out to ‘Killers’ screenwriter Eric Roth about the runtime, and he plainly stated:

People like to throw out numbers. I find it rather meaningless. Mr. Scorsese's work speaks for itself. I'm just proud to be associated with this remarkable movie.

There is no Indication that it’s close to four hours, but that didn’t stop the news from travelling all over the internet, to the point where it’s now the #1 trending topic on Reddit Movies.

Then you had a slew of notable media outlets reporting on the 4-hour length: here, here, here, here, here ..

It’s not necessarily Variety’s fault either. 3 and a half hours could mean “nearly 4.” Last we heard, Scorsese had a cut of ‘Killers’ that ran for 3 hours and 20 minutes.

I’m not bothered. Length is second fiddle to quality. As Roger Ebert once said “No good movie is too long, and no bad movie is short enough.” If you’re an avid movie lover, length won’t matter all that much to you, especially if you’re used to, much like myself, watching double or even triple features at Saturday matinees.

However, Scorsese has been really pushing it with runtimes these last few years. His last three films were all epic in length: “Silence” (161 minutes), “The Wolf of Wall Street” (180 minutes) and “The Irishman” (210 minutes) had monstrous post-production processes.

Initial production on the $200 million budgeted ‘Killers’ wrapped in October of 2021. All of its actors will probably look slightly older when they walk the red steps at cannes next month.