The 15 highest grossing movies of the Box Office of all time (2024)
Amongst the most controversial lists, the one that deals with the biggest box office hits in the history of movies is one of the most discussed, but if you factor in inflation throughout the years and some variables about cost and earnings, the truth starts to seep in a little about the numbers compared to what they would be in contemporary times. Let’s take a look at the final list and see how its latest members are doing.
Three James Cameron movies and four Avengers amongst the biggest 15 titles
Of course audiences love Disney. The wide majority of the 15 highest grossing releases of all time come from their studios. Superheroes still reign, and every other release besides Avatar comes from the first decade of the 21st century. The oldest one in the list is Titanic, from 1997, in number 3.
Speaking of Cameron, the impressive run Avatar: The Way of Water is having after its release on December 16 is staggering. Not even a month in theaters and already in the 15th position of the list with over 1.4 billion dollars worldwide. In fact, it is the sixth movie in history to break a billion during its first two weeks.
Another title that’s soaring through the numbers is Top Gun: Maverixk, Tom Cruise’s return to planes, the air force, and shirtless beach sports. Both movies have been duking it out, and now only Frozen 2 is standing in between them. But Top Gun has already been out for a long while, which means that Cameron’s film is probably going to surpass it sooner rather than later. We leave you with the full list, which includes their total earnings up to this date in dollars:
Avatar (2009): 2,922,917,914
Vengadores: Endgame (2019): 2,797,501,328
Titanic (1997): 2,201,647,264
Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (2015): 2,069,521,700
Vengadores: Infinity War (2018): 2,048,359,754
Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021): 1,916,306,995
Jurassic World (2015): 1,671,537,444
El Rey León (2019): 1,663,075,401
Los Vengadores (2012): 1,518,815,515
Furious 7 (2015): 1,515,341,399
Top Gun: Maverick (2022): 1,486,657,763
Frozen II (2019): 1,450,026,933
Avatar: El Sentido del Agua (2022): 1,407,417,914
Los Vengadores: La Era de Ulrón (2015): 1,402,809,540
Moviegoers couldn't get enough of the film and the ticket sales rushed in from the start and didn't stop until it nearly reached $3 billion off a roughly $237 billion budget. Even after almost 14 years, Avatar's reign atop the highest-grossing films of all time list has rarely been contested. Read our review of Avatar.
Currently: The movie with the highest worldwide, unadjusted gross is Avatar (2009), with a total of $2.92 billion as of February 10, 2024. Historically: Considering inflation and population changes, other movies might have been more "successful" in their time.
While John Carter is far from a poorly made movie and, in fact, does quite a few things well, it will forever remain one of the biggest box office bombs in history. At over $250 million in loss of revenue, John Carter rules both the red planet and the leaderboard of feature picture commercial catastrophes.
Adam Sandler's four film projects of 2023 propelled him to an annual salary of $73m (£57m), making him the highest-paid performer in Hollywood, according to Forbes magazine.
Writers, directors and editors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez spent between $35,000 and $60,000 shooting “The Blair Witch Project,” making it arguably the cheapest movie ever made. It later received between $200,000 and $750,000 from Artisan Entertainment for post-production.
While they never intended to release the film domestically, they had an obligation to the Screen Actors Guild, which required a U.S. theatrical release for films with a budget under $2.5 million that were not in the direct-to-video market.
Mithun Chakraborty has the dubious distinction of starring in the highest number of flop films in his career in Hindi cinema. The popular actor has 180 flop films in his career as a lead actor.
One of the most successful low-budget films was 1999's The Blair Witch Project. It had a budget of around $60,000 but grossed almost $249 million worldwide. It spawned books, a trilogy of video games, and a less-popular sequel.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix joins the ranks as the most recent addition to cross the $1 billion mark at the box office. Here's a look at the 54 films that have achieved this remarkable box office milestone.
The first movie to ever obtain this achievement was Titanic, whose billion-dollar box office gross was the first of its kind. Since Titanic, though, many movies have crossed the 1 billion mark,...
Introduction: My name is Chrissy Homenick, I am a tender, funny, determined, tender, glorious, fancy, enthusiastic person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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