When Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair returns to movie theaters this weekend, it does so with a stunning new transfer as well as a new “lost chapter” created in Fortnite. The most novel part of the experience, though, isn’t the opportunity to once again watch The Bride (Uma Thurman) lay waste to those who wronged her. It’s the 15-minute intermission.
It’s admittedly a little disconcerting to be sitting in a regular-ass AMC theater when the lights come up mid-movie — traditionally, a sign that something has just gone wrong. At the recent Kill Bill press screening I attended, there was no flourish to the reveal, just the white “Intermission” text popping up against a black screen. Yet it was still a welcome opportunity to stand up, stretch my legs, and order some mozzarella sticks before the movie began again.
Yes, I also used the bathroom during that time. Presenting The Whole Bloody Affair with an intermission is pretty much a biological necessity, as the full running time of Tarantino’s action epic (combining the original releases of Kill Bill: Volume 1 and Kill Bill: Volume 2) is 275 minutes (including the intermission). Yes, that’s over four and a half hours. Long haul truckers might be able to forgo bathroom breaks for that length of time, but most of us do not have that kind of training, despite modern filmmakers like James Cameron and Martin Scorsese pushing their recent runtimes beyond the three-hour mark.
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The phenomenon of bladder-challenging epics isn’t one that began in the 21st century, as the golden age of cinema is rich with examples of movies of a considerable length: Gone With the Wind, Lawrence of Arabia, Ben-Hur — all acclaimed blockbusters of their eras. The key difference between now and then: Those movies had intermissions, built-in periods of time to pause and reflect on what had already happened, before proceeding forward.
Outside of the mainstream, much longer films have been produced over the years, such as 1968’s The Longest Most Meaningless Movie in the World, a 48-hour-long compilation of found footage that, at the time of its release, was technically the longest movie ever made. That record’s been beaten many times since then: Just this fall, two West Virginia students created The Freedom of Uselessness, which clocks in at 100 days of footage.
Those are experimental films, meaning that if you decide to take a few hundred bathroom breaks while watching, you won’t miss too much of the plot. You definitely can’t say the same about Kill Bill, packed as it is with so much movie. By the halfway point, you’ve watched a dizzying amount of action as The Bride takes down two of the Deadly Vipers — the opportunity to reset is valuable.
Key to any intermission is its placement: Kill Bill’s does not come at the exact halfway point of the movie, but it does happen in between Chapters 5 and 6 (out of 10), a good stopping point. It’s also worth noting the importance of Tarantino splitting the movie into parts: As a work gets longer, breaks become increasingly essential, allowing the mind to rest for a moment — it’s why almost all novels have chapters and why TV episodes are structured as a series of acts. Constructing the movie as a series of segments, many featuring their own unique style and tone, make Kill Bill an easier viewing experience than, say, the 206 minutes of Killers of the Flower Moon.
Easier, not better, necessarily. Flower Moon is an incredible ride into the depths of moral despair, and part of its impact is the fact that Scorsese doesn’t give us a break. Yet would it be easier to make it through that final half hour with a fresh soda and an empty bladder? Very likely.
The era of multiplexes can create a logistical challenge when it comes to intermissions — those golden age movies were often shown in single-screen movie palaces, meaning that the theater staff wasn’t trying to keep track of multiple audiences entering theaters multiple times. Given how the majority of movies made these days clock in at under two and a half hours, though, it feels like a minor inconvenience.
Also, remember what I said about ordering mozzarella sticks? Hey movie theaters, this means twice the opportunity to sell concessions!
Intermissions aren’t totally absent from modern movies: 2024’s The Brutalist (with its brutal runtime of 215 minutes) not only included an intermission, but that intermission remains intact even now that the movie is available on HBO Max. The key difference is that for the theatrical release, the intermission was 15 minutes long — for streaming, it’s trimmed to just one minute, with an on-screen countdown. The presumption being that the viewer at home can pause for themselves, and take however long a break they like.
Invariably, it doesn’t matter what’s happening in a film, or even how good your attention span is. The longer the movie, the more of a mental marathon it is, and every runner eventually hits a wall. Intermissions are the rest stop we sometimes need and definitely deserve. Of all the nostalgic touches Tarantino packs into Kill Bill, it’s undoubtedly the best.
Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair is in theaters beginning December 5th, 2025.