This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (October 2009) In the film industry, a feature film is a film made for initial distribution in theaters and being the main attraction of the screening, rather than a short film screened before it; a full length movie. The term is also used for feature length, direct-to-video and television movie productions. Contents 1 Description 2 History 3 See also 4 References // Description The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences,1 the American Film Institute,2 and the British Film Institute3 all define a feature as a film with a running time of 40 minutes or longer. The Centre National de la Cinématographie in France defines it as a 35 mm film longer than 1,600 metres, which is exactly 58 minutes and 29 seconds for sound films, and the Screen Actors Guild gives a minimum running time of at least 80 minutes.4 Today, a feature film is usually between 80 and 210 minutescitation needed; a children's film is usually between 60 and 120 minutescitation needed. An anthology film is a fixed sequence of short subjects with a common theme, combined into a feature film. History This article may be better presented in list format to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please help improve this article by converting it into a stand-alone or embedded list. (November 2010)

The term evolved from when there was a series of short subjects before the main film. The shorts would typically include newsreels, serials, animated cartoons and live-action comedies and documentaries. These types of short films would precede the featured presentation - the film given the most prominent billing and running multiple reels. There was no sudden jump in the running times of films to the present-day definitions of feature-length; the "featured" film on a film program in the early 1910s gradually expanded from two to three to four reels. Early proto-features had been produced in America and France, but were released in individual scenes, leaving the exhibitor the option of running them together. The American company S. Lubin released a Passion Play in January 1903 in 31 parts, totaling about 60 minutes.5 The French company Pathé Frères released a different Passion Play, La Vie et la passion de Jésus Christ, in May 1903 in 32 parts running about 44 minutes. There were also full-length records of boxing matches, such as The Corbett-Fitzsimmons Fight (1897).6

Defined by length, the first dramatic feature film was the Australian 70-minute film The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906).7 Similarly, the first European feature was the 90-minute film L'Enfant prodigue (France, 1907), although that was an unmodified record of a stage play; Europe's first feature adapted directly for the screen, Les Misérables, came from France in 1909.8 The first Russian feature was Defence of Sevastopol in 1911.9 The first UK features were the documentary With Our King and Queen Through India (1912), filmed in Kinemacolor,10 and Oliver Twist (1912).11 The first American features were a different production of Oliver Twist (1912), From the Manger to the Cross (1912), and Richard III (1912), the latter starring actor Frederick Warde.12 The first Asian feature was Japan's The Life Story of Tasuke Shiobara (1912),13 the first Indian feature was Raja Harishchandra (1913),14 the first South American feature was Brazil's O Crime dos Banhados (1913),15 and the first African feature was South Africa's Die Voortrekkers (1916).16 1913 also saw China's first feature film, Zhang Shichuan's Nan Fu Nan Qi,

By 1915 over 600 features were produced annually in the United States.17 The most prolific year of U.S. feature production was 1921, with 682 releases; the lowest number of releases was in 1963, with 213.18 Between 1922 and 1970, the U.S. and Japan alternated as leaders in the quantity of feature film production. Since 1971, the country with the highest feature output has been India,19 which produces a thousand films in more than twelve Indian languages each year.20 See also Films considered the greatest ever List of films considered the worst Feature length References ^ 79th Academy Awards Rules, Rule 2: Eligibility. ^ The American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures. ^ Denis Giford, The British Film Catalogue. ^ Screen Actors Guild Letter Agreement for Low-Budget Theatrical Features. ^ Passion Play" (1903), in: The American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures [online database]. ^ Charles Musser, The Emergence of Cinema: The American Screen to 1907, p. 197–200. ^ Patrick Robertson, Film Facts, New York: Billboard Books, 2001, p. 9. ISBN 0-8230-7943-0. ^ Patrick Robertson, Film Facts, New York: Billboard Books, 2001, p. 9. ISBN 0-8230-7943-0. ^ Patrick Robertson, Film Facts, New York: Billboard Books, 2001, p. 13. ISBN 0-8230-7943-0. ^ Charles Urban, A Yank in Britain: The Lost Memoirs of Charles Urban, Film Pioneer, The Projection Box, 1999, p. 79. ISBN 978-0-9523941-2-9. ^ Patrick Robertson, Film Facts, New York: Billboard Books, 2001, p. 9. ISBN 0-8230-7943-0. ^ Patrick Robertson, Film Facts, New York: Billboard Books, 2001, p. 10. ISBN 0-8230-7943-0. ^ Patrick Robertson, Film Facts, New York: Billboard Books, 2001, p. 10–14. ISBN 0-8230-7943-0. ^ Patrick Robertson, Film Facts, New York: Billboard Books, 2001, p. 12. ISBN 0-8230-7943-0. ^ Patrick Robertson, Film Facts, New York: Billboard Books, 2001, p. 10–14. ISBN 0-8230-7943-0. ^ Patrick Robertson, Film Facts, New York: Billboard Books, 2001, p. 10–14. ISBN 0-8230-7943-0. ^ American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures [online database]. ^ American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures [online database]. ^ Patrick Robertson, Film Facts, New York: Billboard Books, 2001, p. 15. ^ Nelmes, Jill (2003), "10", An introduction to film studies (3 ed.), Routledge, p. 360, ISBN 0415262682