Sure – plot, character development, and beautiful cinematography are important factors for movies, but what about sheer on-screen body count? In fact, I think the real question we should be asking ourselves is: what is the highest body count movie marathon possible?
Of course there are tools available on the internet to assist us with answering this question (you doubted it for a second?). I was first alerted to this fact by Randal Olson’s blog, which has a handy infographic of the deadliest films of all time – as measured by on-screen deaths.
After some investigative work (i.e. I read the article), I discovered Randal’s source was moviebodycounts.com. This site does all the exhaustive work of cataloging on-screen deaths in popular movies – so you don’t have to! Their counting methodology is described in the FAQ. Since they have a website, clearly they are the most scientific source on the subject of on-screen movie deaths.
They have the 101 highest body count movies in a convenient list (they also have a deadliest character list). If you simply took the top entries, and jammed them into a 24-hour period, you would come up with a movie marathon schedule like the following.
Top Body Count Movie Marathon
| Start Time | Title | Year | Runtime | Body Count |
| 12:00 PM | LoTR: Return of the King | 2003 | 201 min. | 836 |
| 03:21 PM | Kingdom of Heaven | 2005 | 144 min. | 610 |
| 05:45 PM | 300 | 2007 | 117 min. | 600 |
| 07:42 PM | Troy | 2004 | 163 min. | 572 |
| 10:25 PM | The Last Samurai | 2003 | 154 min. | 558 |
| 12:59 AM | LoTR: The Two Towers | 2002 | 179 min. | 468 |
| 03:58 AM | Grindhouse | 2007 | 191 min. | 310 |
| 07:09 AM | Hard Boiled | 1992 | 128 min. | 307 |
| 09:17 AM | Titanic | 1997 | 194 min. | 307 |
| 12:31 PM | Finish |
That’s 4,568 on-screen deaths spread across nine movies over 24.5 hours. That’s not bad, but the schedule is a little over the 24-hour time limit and, well, the schedule includes Titanic. Is that really the best that you can do?
Since time in any movie marathon is limited (to, you know, 24 hours), I thought that a better way at looking at the problem is the efficiency of the movies – as measured in average bodies per minute. When you look at things that way, you get a schedule like this.
Top Bodies Per Minute Movie Marathon
| Start Time | Title | Year | Runtime | Body Count | Bodies / Minute |
| 12:00 PM | 300 | 2007 | 117 minutes | 600 | 5.1 |
| 01:57 PM | Kingdom of Heaven | 2005 | 144 min. | 610 | 4.2 |
| 04:21 PM | LoTR: The Two Towers | 2002 | 179 min. | 468 | 2.6 |
| 07:20 PM | LoTR: Return of the King | 2003 | 201 min. | 836 | 4.2 |
| 10:41 PM | The Last Samurai | 2003 | 154 min. | 558 | 3.6 |
| 01:15 AM | Troy | 2004 | 163 min. | 572 | 3.5 |
| 03:58 AM | Rambo | 2008 | 92 min. | 247 | 2.7 |
| 05:30 AM | Hard Boiled | 1992 | 128 min. | 307 | 2.4 |
| 07:38 AM | We Were Soldiers | 2002 | 138 min. | 305 | 2.2 |
| 09:56 AM | Equilibrium | 2002 | 107 min. | 236 | 2.2 |
| 11:43 AM | Finish |
This schedule has 4,739 on-screen deaths spread across ten movies over 23.5 hours. That’s 171 more kills, one extra movie, accomplished in one less hour, with exactly one less Titanic movie! Now we’re talking! Also, this schedule delivers an impressive average of 2.5 bodies per minute. This will dull your sense of empathy for your fellow man in no time!
What do you think? Can you improve on this schedule? Or is it truly the pinnacle of cinematic carnage?
