Sometimes a movie's budget is a good indicator of how well a movie will do at the box office. Most of the time, the movies with a higher budget will tend to be more successful while the ones with a lower budget might not be. However, there have been plenty of times where that's the exact opposite. More expensive movies tank while the cheaper ones rake in the millions.
Looking at the budget of some of the movies, it's insane to see how expensive some of them are, and it's even cooler to look at what was made at the box office and how much it compares to the budget. Every year the most expensive movie ever made is broken, and it's exciting to see which one.
10 'Transformers: The Last Knight'
Transformers: The Last Knight is one of the last movies in the Transformers franchise. The movie cost over $217 million to make, which is an insane amount of money for any movie. Five days after its big debut, it only made a total of $69.1 million, which is not a lot compared to its budget and to a previous movie release. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen made a whopping $200.1 million, which is a significant difference. Numbers-wise, comparing the budget and the income, it was definitely a flop.
9 'John Carter'
John Carter is one of the worst budgets versus box office losses. Disney took a huge loss with this movie as the director took what he had already filmed and completely scrapped it to start from scratch. Because of this, the budget for the film went to over $300 million. After a tax rebate, the final budget for the film came to be $263.7 million.
The film wound up bombing the box office, making a total of $284.1 million at the worldwide box office. It doesn't take a lot of math to realize that they barely made a profit from the movie, making it not only one of the most expensive movies of all time, but also one of the biggest box office bombs.
8 'The Lion King' (2019)
The 2019 live-action version of The Lion King was also one of the most expensive movies to ever be made. The budget for the movie was about $260 million. Compared to other live-action remakes like The Jungle Book which cost $175 million, Dumbo which cost $170 million, and Aladdin that cost $183 million clearly didn't cost as much compared to The Lion King. When it comes to the box office, the movie took in a gross amount of $543.6 million in the United States.
7 'Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides'
Over the years the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise has made millions upon millions of dollars from all of the movies made. in 2011, it was reported that the movie had an insanely high budget at $410.6 million, making it one of the most expensive films in history. Thankfully, despite the insane budget, they were able to make their money back and more as the worldwide gross amount was $1 billion. When you have a movie star in your film like Johnny Depp, you shouldn't be afraid to drop some big money.
6 'Beauty And The Beast' (2017)
It's pretty clear by now that Disney isn't afraid to put out the big bucks when it comes to making their movies. Recently, they've been making a lot of remakes of their old animated films into live-action ones. In 2017, they made a live-action version of an old favorite, Beauty and the Beast. Disney released the numbers, and for this version, it took them about $300 million to make the movie and market it. In the first week, the movie earned $490.6 million domestically alone.
5 'Titanic'
Titanic is a classic movie that will be talked about for years and years to come. It's one of those movies that makes a lasting impact on everyone and one that you will watch over and over again. Despite being filmed in the late '90s, the budget for the movie was over $200 million.
At the time, it was the most expensive movie ever made, but we know now that that's no longer the case. The movie broke all kinds of records at the box office, and thanks to re-releases the gross earnings is way over $2 billion.
4 'The Dark Knight Rises'
With a budget of $185 million, The Dark Knight Rises did really well at the box office. The budget for this movie was a lot more compared to Batman Begins and it definitely showed at the box office. Domestically, the movie made over $535 million and over $469 million internationally which is over $1 billion total. These numbers are almost three times more than Batman Begins. In this case, a bigger budget really did pay off.
3 'Avengers: Age Of Ultron'
Avengers: Age of Ultron took $250 million to produce. Thankfully, it seems like anything that features the Avengers is instantly successful. People love their superheroes and they will always be willing to see another movie. At the box office, this Avengers installation managed to make a total gross of $459 million domestically. With that income, there's no reason why any Avengers film would do poorly. If there's one thing we know, people love action and adventure movies, and that's everything the Avengers are about. We expect them to keep making millions.
2 'Avatar'
We will always remember the movie Avatar for being the highest-grossing movie worldwide. The movie cost just $237 million to make, but would go on to make literal billions. Originally, Titanic was the highest-grossing movie worldwide, but this movie broke that record by far. It became the highest-grossing movie worldwide with $2.29 billion. However, another movie eventually came along and beat Avatar, which was Avengers: Endgame back in 2019.
1 'Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker'
The last movie of the Star Wars franchise was none other than Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. The film's budget was over $275 million which is a huge budget for a Star Wars film. Unfortunately in the case of this movie, a big budget didn't pay off as much. Domestically the movie made $515.2 million. Compared to the other movies, though, it was significantly less. The Last Jedi made $620.1 million while The Forxe Awakens made $936.6 million, beating both movies.