Directors Budgets and Rate of Return Header

So, you want to make a large budget theatrical film. Which modern director will give you the most bang for your buck?

We've put together career overviews of six of the biggest, comparing the production budgets of their movies with the gross revenues they garnered in theaters around the world. From this we can see the rate of return on the initial budget and ultimately how much value for money each director offers.

Numbers

  1. Budget – Production budget. Excludes promotion and advertising.
  2. Revenue – Worldwide box office gross. Excludes home movie and merchandising sales.
  3. R.O.R. – Rate of Return. Calculated by: (Revenue - Budget)/Budget * 100.
 

Key

  1. Yellow – Early movies.
  2. Green Figures – The three highest rates of return (excluding early movies).
  3. Red Figures – The three lowest rates of return (excluding early movies).

Methodology

  1. Only titles in which the director has been accredited as such are included.

  2. Feature length films only - no documentaries, music videos or shorts.

  3. Movies considered 'early' (i.e. non-mainstream work) have been listed but not included in the final value - for - money figure.
Rate of Return for James Cameron and Michael Bay Rate of return for George Lucas and M. Night Shyamalan Rate of Return for Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese Pie Chart that Shows Directors' Rate of Return
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Sources:

Many thanks to imdb.com, forbes.com, celebritynetworth.com and boxofficemojo.com. All images in the public domain and licensed under Creative Commons.

 

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