# "10 Movies That Made A Dime Into Millions" - Yes it's a slideshow, but actually quite interesting **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 18, 2015, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134 "2015-01-18T04:16:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134/1 "2015-01-18T04:16:49Z")
Yes it’s a shameless clickbait slideshow list, but actually it’s a very interesting group of movies with mini-descriptions and some details of how they got made and the cost vs box office. [10 Movies That Made A Dime Into Millions](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/) ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134/2 "2015-01-18T05:28:05Z")
Weird for a list like that not to include **Primer** which was famously made on film for $7000. ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134/3 "2015-01-18T06:55:31Z")
[“Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels”](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/1/) Budget: $1.35 million Revenue: $28.3 million [“Sex, Lies, and Videotape”](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/2/) Budget: $1.2 million Revenue: $24.7 million [“Saw”](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/3/) Budget: $1.2 million Revenue: $103 million [“Rocky”](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/4/) Budget: $1 million Revenue: $225 million [“Napoleon Dynamite”](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/5/) Budget: $400,000 Revenue: $46.1 million [“Mad Max”](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/6/) Budget: $400,000 Revenue: $100 million [“Halloween”](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/7/) Budget: $325,000 Revenue: $70 million [“Clerks”](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/8/) Budget: $27,575 ($230,000 post) Revenue: $3.1 million [“The Blair Witch Project”](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/9/) Budget: $750,000 (depending on the source) Revenue: $248.6 million [“Paranormal Activity”](http://www.likesharetweet.com/inspiring/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions/10/) Budget: $15,000 Revenue: $193.3 million **Primer** didn’t even make a half million so it hasn’t turned “a dime into millions.” “Vote for me and all your wildest dreams will come true.” ---
**Author:** ![Jim\_s\_Son](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19adc/32.png) [@Jim\_s\_Son](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_s_Son)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 11:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134/4 "2015-01-18T11:19:24Z")
“Deep Throat” was made for less than $50,000 and probably grossed about $100 million, much of that going to the Columbo family. Would have made more if it wasn’t banned in New York City, which was not as suave and sophisticated as Binghamton. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134/5 "2015-01-18T15:20:12Z")
> [@ZipperJJ](#): > > **Primer** didn’t even make a half million so it hasn’t turned “a dime into millions.” > > “Vote for me and all your wildest dreams will come true.” Primer didn’t have a huge theatrical release but it was huge on DVD/streaming as people discovered it. Still, even at half a million, that’s a 7000% return on investment. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134/6 "2015-01-18T15:49:52Z")
They said Paranormal Activity was the most profitable movie ever…but then the next movie showed more profit than PA. On top of that, surely other movies have made considerably more than those two. Let’s quick look at Titanic. 200mil budget, 2bil at the box office. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134/7 "2015-01-18T15:56:23Z")
Here’s another such list with an overlapping set of movies compared to the one linked to in the OP: > **[Percentage-Wise, The 20 Most Profitable Movies of All Time](https://www.pajiba.com/seriously_random_lists/percentagewise-the-20-most-profitable-movies-of-all-time.php)** > > In furtherance of my lifelong obsession with box-office numbers, I had every intention this morning of spending a couple of hours pouring over box-office grosses and comparing them to budgets to arrive at the ten most profitably movies of all... And neither list includes _Hardware Wars_, which made about $1,000,000 on a budget of about $8,000. Note that “most profitable” here means the largest number from this calculation: (Gross of the film)/(Cost of the film) ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134/8 "2015-01-18T16:00:12Z")
Yeah, and there’s a lot more to it than that. Clerks, for example, may have made $3.1MM box office - I have no idea - but it’s made a lot more money in downstream revenue than anyone could have every expected. Toys, comics, the entire ViewAskew universe and so forth. ---
**Author:** ![armedmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@armedmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/armedmonkey)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134/9 "2015-01-18T16:15:55Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > They said Paranormal Activity was the most profitable movie ever…but then the next movie showed more profit than PA. On top of that, surely other movies have made considerably more than those two. Let’s quick look at Titanic. 200mil budget, 2bil at the box office. They’re looking at percentages rather than total dollars. _Titanic_ had a 900% return on its investment. Good, but _Paranormal Activity_ had a 1,288,500 % return! That’s insane. It’s mostly due to it having a budget lower than the cost of a used Honda Civic, of course, but it’s still impressive. calculation method : (total revenue - production budget) / production budget ---
**Author:** ![armedmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@armedmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/armedmonkey)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/10-movies-that-made-a-dime-into-millions-yes-its-a-slideshow-but-actually-quite-interesting/710134/10 "2015-01-18T16:39:00Z")
To put it another way, for _Titanic_ to get the same return relative to it’s production budget as _Paranormal Activity_, it would have to make 2.5 trillion dollars. Trillion!