10 Highest-Grossing Movies Over Three Hours, Ranked by Worldwide Box Office

There's nothing quite like a good long movie. When a film is compelling and entertaining enough that it's able to hold the audience's attention for a whopping three hours or longer, it's an admirable feat like no other in the realm of filmmaking. Some of the greatest films ever made are over three hours long, from ambitious historical epics to profound dramas, and plenty of these nailed outstanding numbers at the box office.

Old Hollywood classics like Gone With the Wind and modern blockbusters like Avatar: The Way of Water are a handful of the highest-grossing movies of all time to have a runtime that's way over the industry average, to say the least. Audiences don't often flock to theaters to watch a significantly long movie, so the fact that these films did so well is a testament to their quality. Conquering audiences around the world. These exceptionally long movies are the highest-grossing at the worldwide box office.

10 'Schindler's List' (1993)

Worldwide Box Office: $322,161,245

One of the most harrowing anti-war movies ever made, Steven Spielberg's magnum opus, Schindler's List, is a WWII drama set in a German-occupied Poland. The plot follows industrialist Oskar Schindler as he gradually becomes more concerned about his Jewish workforce after witnessing their persecution by the Nazis.

Larger-than-life in all the most devastating ways, Schindler's List may be a tough watch, but it's worth every bit of effort. Audiences clearly thought so, too, since the movie made nearly 13 times its budget through ticket sales. Even without considering box office success, however, Schindler's List is a '90s classic like no other, capable of depicting the horrors and atrocities of the Holocaust with the kind of sensitivity that only a director like Spielberg would have been able to harness.

Schindler's List (1995)

*Availability in US

• stream
• rent
• buy

Not available

9 'The Wolf of Wall Street' (2013)

Worldwide Box Office: $392,000,694

Starring Oscar-winner Leonardo DiCaprio in what might just be his best acting performance of the 2010s, The Wolf of Wall Street is an unconventional biopic and yet another triumph from Martin Scorsese. The plot centers on former American stockbroker and financial criminal Jordan Belfort, chronicling his rise to wealth and his downfall laced with corruption, depravity, and the intervention of the federal government.

One of only three narrative feature films over three hours long that legendary filmmaker Scorsese has made, The Wolf of Wall Street was a cultural phenomenon back in 2013. Scenes and lines from the film became an instant sensation on the internet, and DiCaprio's corrupt role has lived in infamy since. The Wolf of Wall Street made a shocking amount of money for a film so time-demanding and unashamed of its depiction of its characters' moral perversion.

The Wolf of Wall Street

*Availability in US

• stream
• rent
• buy

8 'Gone With the Wind' (1939)

Worldwide Box Office: $402,382,193

In this seminal period epic, a manipulative Southern belle and a roguish profiteer dive into a turbulent romance as the society around them crumbles and gets rebuilt during the American Civil War and Reconstruction periods. There will never be another film like Gone With the Wind, a sprawling romantic drama on a jaw-dropping scale with a staggering runtime of only a little under four hours.

The thing about Gone With the Wind is that it came out nearly a century ago, so after adjusting for inflation, it's far and away the highest-grossing movie of all time. Even such a long time after its release, Gone with the Wind is still able to be counted among the highest-grossing 3+-hour-long movies even without adjusting its profit. This impressive fact alone should be enough of a clue to just how astonishing its financial success was back in the late '30s.

Gone With the Wind

*Availability in US

• stream
• rent
• buy

Not available

7 'Dances With Wolves' (1990)

Worldwide Box Office: $424,208,848

Kevin Costner is best known for his work as an actor, but he has proved on multiple occasions to be just as worthy of admiration when working behind the camera. His Western epic Dances With Wolves proved itself worthy of seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and understandably so. It's the rousing, stirring story of Lt. John Dunbar, who's been assigned to a remote Civil War outpost and finds himself engaging with a neighboring Sioux settlement that causes him to question his true purpose.

Though it was and continues to be criticized for its limited understanding of Sioux culture, Dances With Wolves was a huge box office hit. This game-changing picture was no less than the 3rd highest-grossing of 1990, a high achievement at a time when movies over three hours long had for long been out of vogue. Even today, Dances with Wolves has been able to surpass its flaws and age as a beautiful, deeply moving epic.

Dances with Wolves

*Availability in US

• stream
• rent
• buy

6 'Pearl Harbor' (2001)

Worldwide Box Office: $449,220,945

Based on the event that propelled the U.S. into joining World War II, Pearl Harbor mixes war, romance, and history—whether it does so in a way that works is a different story. Its story follows two lifelong friends and a beautiful nurse who are caught up in the horrific events of this infamous 1941 Sunday morning.

Director Michael Bay has always had a huge box office draw. Even if critics don't love Bay's movies, audiences do, and his films usually perform outstandingly in terms of ticket sales. Pearl Harbor was no exception, bringing in nearly half a million dollars in revenue despite the fact that it clocks in at a little over three hours, making it Bay's longest film by a considerable margin. Scathing reviews have done little to improve its standing, but the numbers don't lie!

Pearl Harbor (2001)

*Availability in US

• stream
• rent
• buy

Not available

5 'Oppenheimer' (2023)

Worldwide Box Office: $968,213,540

Oppenheimer was one of the biggest cultural phenomenons that cinema had to offer in 2023, and it isn't hard to see why. Biopics about controversial people can often be hard to nail, but Christopher Nolan did what some would call the best work of his career in this epic character study about J. Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atomic bomb, chronicling his journey to achieve this goal and how its creation impacted his life.

Winner of seven well-deserved Oscars, Oppenheimer is unafraid of taking an experimental approach to examining the psyche of its complex protagonist. Cillian Murphy is more than up to the challenge, playing the titular character with incredible pathos and nuance. Audiences were unafraid of such an ambitious project, with the name of Nolan and his flashy cast being appelaing enough. Oppie and his friends attracted nearly a billion dollars in revenue. Not too shabby for a talky film about physics.

Oppenheimer

*Availability in US

• stream
• rent
• buy

4 'The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King' (2003)

Worldwide Box Office: $1,156,598,523

With stunning production qualities, a perfectly cast ensemble, plenty of iconic quotes, and a script that flawlessly captures the essence and magic of J.R.R. Tolkien's Legendarium, Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy is without a doubt one of the best film series of all time. Return of the King was the epic conclusion of the trilogy, showing Gandalf and Aragorn leading the World of Men against Sauron's forces to distract the enemy's gaze from Frodo and Sam's journey into Mount Doom to destroy the One Ring.

The first two movies in the franchise were surprise box office hits as well, but Return of the King defied every expectation when it made well over $1.1 billion worldwide at a time when such a number was unheard of. That's a surprising number for more than 200 minutes of pure high fantasy epicness, showing the universal appeal of Tolkien's work and the masterful way in which Jackson and his team captured it. Return of the King is a direct precursor to the countless blockbusters that would follow throughout the next decade, but none have been able to match its sheer scope.

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

*Availability in US

• stream
• rent
• buy

3 'Titanic' (1997)

Worldwide Box Office: $2,264,750,694

For many years, trailblazer filmmaker James Cameron's groundbreaking period drama, Titanic, was the highest-grossing film of all time. Even now, nearly thirty years later, it's surprising that such a serious romantic drama about a 17-year-old aristocrat and a poor artist falling in love aboard the luxurious R.M.S. Titanic managed to make over $2 billion in revenue at the box office.

If anything, the film's financial success speaks to Cameron's quality as a filmmaker. Titanic is a cinematic achievement that must be seen to be believed, an instant phenomenon that broke new ground. It uses every minute of its over 3-hour-long runtime to impress audiences with beautiful and elegant visuals, a gripping story about love and class differences, and a striking third act bolstered by some of the most impressive visual effects of the '90s. Few films have ever been as explosive or generation-defining as this romantic epic, whose legacy only increases with each passing year.

Titanic

*Availability in US

• stream
• rent
• buy

2 'Avatar: The Way of Water' (2022)

Worldwide Box Office: $2,320,250,281

Cameron's 2009 sci-fi epic Avatar is no less than the highest-grossing film of all time, so a lot was resting on its sequel's shoulders when it came out a whopping thirteen years later. Fortunately, The Way of Water lived up to expectations, telling a riveting story of Jake and his family running away from a familiar threat.

Avatar: The Way of Water managed to make almost as much money as its predecessor. There has been much talk about Avatar's glaring lack of a real impact on modern pop culture, but audiences were evidently more than interested enough to make the franchise's first sequel gross well over $2 billion worldwide. Though it's one of the longest movies of the past ten years, The Way of Water proved that the resurgence of 3+-hour-long films of the last few years is a real thing. Indeed, audiences will go to the theaters for specific, once-in-a-generation cinematic events, even if they demand a little bit more patience.

Avatar: The Way of Water

Watch on Disney+

1 'Avengers: Endgame' (2019)

Worldwide Box Office: $2,799,439,100

There had never been a pop culture phenomenon quite like Avengers: Endgame, the culmination of over 10 years and over 20 movies' worth of exciting MCU films. There probably never will be anything like it again. It's by far the second highest-grossing movie of all time, following the titular team assembling after Thanos's devastation to undo the villain's actions and restore balance to the universe.

Endgame made almost $3 billion at the box office internationally, an achievement that can't be taken lightly. It singlehandedly made 2019's summer one of the best for movies and united millions of people under one common passion. Despite its many flaws, Avengers: Endgame is a thrilling superhero epic that takes full advantage of its runtime to give viewers a bit of everything, from fan service to long-awaited pay-offs and exciting action sequences. The film is basically a massive victory lap for a studio that dominated the entertainment conversation throughout the decade.

Avengers: Endgame

*Availability in US

• stream
• rent
• buy

NEXT:The Highest-Grossing Movie of Each Decade

ncG1vNJzZmibn6G5qrDEq2Wcp51ktaqzx56qrWWXp7y0v8innmaln6u2pr%2BMqK2eql2ptbOxxGafqK2iqHq4u9Glm7ChlJp6o7vXZqafnpmYsm6%2BwKeinpxf