# Why was Tangled so expensive to make? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 11, 2011, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270 "2011-03-11T04:23:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/1 "2011-03-11T04:23:35Z")
I just read _Tangled_ was the second most expensive movie ever made in history. (The most expensive was _Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End_.) And my question is how? Okay, it was CGI animated. But dozens of movies have been made that way- it’s not a new technology. And the animation on _Tangled_ didn’t seem significantly different than what I’ve seen before. And other than that, what? There was no rights to purchase and no major stars in the cast. Disney’s obviously not new to the business - they know how how to organize a animated feature production. So where did $260,000,000 go? On an unrelated question, the end credits had scenes from the story as background. But there was one scene of Flynn and Rapunzel meeting a monkey dressed up like a fortune teller who was reading a crystal ball. There was nothing like that in the movie. Was it from some deleted scene? ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/2 "2011-03-11T04:48:10Z")
It took about ten years of multiple aborted attempts, each of which got quite far into it before they scrapped everything and started again. Imagine half a regular animated film budget, but spent three or four separate times. ---
**Author:** ![Red\_Barchetta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/da6949/32.png) [@Red\_Barchetta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Red_Barchetta)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 8:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/3 "2011-03-11T08:44:13Z")
Also, animating the hair was a bitch. There was a really good article I read about it, but I forget where… ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 10:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/4 "2011-03-11T10:21:09Z")
I thought Avatar was the most expensive? ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 10:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/5 "2011-03-11T10:30:36Z")
Perhaps “expensive movie” has become an selling point and execs do some creatieve budgeting to plump up the numbers? ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 11:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/6 "2011-03-11T11:26:52Z")
Wig budget. ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2011, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/7 "2011-03-11T12:43:56Z")
Red Bull for Mandy Moore. The girl just runs on it! ---
**Author:** ![typoink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@typoink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/typoink)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2011, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/8 "2011-03-12T14:19:32Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > It took about ten years of multiple aborted attempts, each of which got quite far into it before they scrapped everything and started again. Imagine half a regular animated film budget, but spent three or four separate times. Yeah, back when it was called “Rapunzel,” starred Kristen Chenoweth, and was being rendered with non-photorealistic-rendering patterned after Pre-Raphaelite art, I was excited for it. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2011, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/9 "2011-03-12T15:06:36Z")
I thought it was pretty good. Not up at the level of _The Lion King_ or _Lilo and Stitch_ but better than _The Princess and the Frog_ or _Home on the Range_. I did feel the musical numbers were weak. ---
**Author:** ![Lasciel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e79b87/32.png) [@Lasciel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lasciel)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2011, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/10 "2011-03-12T15:23:22Z")
> [@typoink](#): > > Yeah, back when it was called “Rapunzel,” starred Kristen Chenoweth, and was being rendered with non-photorealistic-rendering patterned after Pre-Raphaelite art, I was excited for it. I so would have loved that movie. I am sad that it will never exist. I \*liked \*Tangled, but I think I would have liked the earlier version better. ---
**Author:** ![Eats\_Crayons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/278dde/32.png) [@Eats\_Crayons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eats_Crayons)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2011, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/11 "2011-03-12T16:43:55Z")
> [@Lasciel](#): > > I so would have loved that movie. I am sad that it will never exist. > > I \*liked \*Tangled, but I think I would have liked the earlier version better. Me too! ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2011, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/12 "2011-03-12T20:49:31Z")
Also inflation. It’s rather fascinating to see how adjusted dollars affects movie numbers. For example, Gone with the Wind is actually the highest grossing movie of all time. Iirc, it had 120 million ticket sales, which would be well over 1 billion dollars today in the US alone. Also in adjusted dollars, I believe the Russian production of War and Peace was $700 million in adjusted dollars. Adjusted gross: [Home - Box Office Mojo](http://boxofficemojo.com/alltime/adjusted.htm) Adjusted cost: [http://achieverwiki.standardbank.co.za/content/top-ten-most-expensive-movies-ever-made-adjusted-inflation](http://achieverwiki.standardbank.co.za/content/top-ten-most-expensive-movies-ever-made-adjusted-inflation) It’s actually quite sickening how movie studios will pull any trick out of their ass just to increase sales, like fake critics, false advertising, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Capitaine\_Zombie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e95f7d/32.png) [@Capitaine\_Zombie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capitaine_Zombie)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2011, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/13 "2011-03-12T20:52:22Z")
> [@Superhal](#): > > It’s actually quite sickening how movie studios will pull any trick out of their ass just to increase sales, like fake critics, false advertising, etc. Ben Lyons would do that for free and a little pat on the head. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2011, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-tangled-so-expensive-to-make/574270/14 "2011-03-12T21:48:56Z")
> [@typoink](#): > > Yeah, back when it was called “Rapunzel,” starred Kristen Chenoweth, and was being rendered with non-photorealistic-rendering patterned after Pre-Raphaelite art, I was excited for it. _“Rapunzel Unbraided”_ no less, which I think is a fantastic title. Still, I think they did the right thing to boost the funny. As pretty as it may have been stylistically, the humour really makes it what it became.