'Infinity War' Runtime: It's Marvel's Longest Movie, Until 'Avengers 4'

To say that Avengers: Infinity War is a big movie is the understatement of the year. In fact, the film’s runtime, 2 hours and 30 minutes according to AMC, makes it one of the longest movies ever in the Marvel franchise. And directors Joe and Anthony Russo tease that next year’s Avengers 4 will be even longer.

On Sunday, during the press tour for Avengers: Infinity War, the Russos told Collider that Avengers 4 will be longer than Infinity War, though they could not confirm an exact run time because work is still underway. When asked by journalist Steve Weintraub, “Do you think Part 2 will be longer?,” Joe Russo answered, “I do.”

“It’s pretty long,” co-director and brother Anthony Russo said. Joe Russo added, “It’s our longest rough cut than any of [our] four movies.” (Anthony Russo interjected, saying they actually have an assembly cut, which in film terms is a cut with all shot footage arranged in sequence before editing.)

That Avengers 4 will be longer than Infinity War is a revealing statement. Though the confirmed run time is in dispute by Fandango and AMC, the ballpark figure is a long one. With pre-movie trailers and post-credits scenes factored in, you’re looking at at least 2 hours and 40 minutes for the whole theatrical experience.

But this is also kind of obvious, and necessary, given a film with this large of a scale. With something like two dozen principal actors, there’s no way Infinity War could be told at a more common span of two hours.

The brothers added that Disney has never given them a mandated run time, but that the directors aim to keep it under three hours. “It could easily be a three hour film but I think we’re very hard on the material,” Joe Russo said. “We like it to play on a certain pace. I’m sure we’ll squeeze it.” Based on the Russos’ last two Marvel films, 2014’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier and 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, they’ve shown expertise at making big, unwieldy concepts into extremely breezy movies. These three hours will go by fast.

Avengers: Infinity War will be released on April 27. Avengers 4 will be released on May 5, 2019.