Below is my Most expensive movie sets list in no particular order.
Waterworld (1995)
This movie was a total nightmare to make. The most expensive movie sets was a giant 1,000 ton atoll that was built off the coast of Hawaii. It apparently used up all the steel in Hawaii, costing 75 million extra the initial over budget. Budget is thought to be over 100 million. The set was over ¼ of a mile in circumference which is evident during one of the overhead shots. It was accomplished by towing the set into open ocean.
Two co stars almost drowned during one of the sequences. An underwater stunt coordinator (Norman Howell) experienced a near fatal case of “the bends”. During one of the movie scenes, Kevin Costner was tied to a mast and dragged to sea, needing rescue.
Cleopatra (1963)
The entire movie cost about 44 million dollars but adjusted to inflation and that runs around $344 million. This almost ruined 20th Century Fox movie studios. There were 79 sets created for the movie as well as 26,000 costumes. It was initially planned for the movie to be released in two parts. “Caesar and Cleopatra” and “Antony and Cleopatra”, with each movie running over 3 hours. However, 20th Century Fox decided against this and released the movie as is with a running time of just over 4 hours.
This is regarded inaccurately by many as a flop but the movie did eventually turn a profit. After it broke even in 1973, the studio “closed the books” so any revenue earned going forward will go to them instead of the cast as residuals. Elizabeth Taylor’s (played Cleopatra) wardrobe cost over $194,000 to make. She had over 65 costumes with some dresses made from 24-carat gold cloth. In terms of sets, the Roman forum built at Cinecittà (largest film studio in Rome, Italy) for the movie was three times the size of the real forum.
Cleopatra’s barge cost over $2 million in today’s money. Other things like weather, Taylor’s affair with Richard Burton, moving production from one country to another, rebuilding sets multiple times, Taylor’s outrageous demands, and overall delays in the movie made it so hard to film. In fact, director Joseph L. Mankiewicz tried to remove his name from the movie, but stayed due to being friends with Elizabeth Taylor.
It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)
While it is considered to be a quintessential feel good Christmas movie, It’s a Wonderful Life had its share of hiccups during it’s production. While it was not a big hit once it premiered, it eventually turned a profit. However, the giant set built for the movie was nothing short of an incredible feat.
Bedford Falls location in the movie was a giant set that stretched 4 acres. It had 75 stores and buildings, 20 fully grown oak trees, residential areas, and 300 yard long Main Street (3 city blocks). Shot in the summer of 1946 when a big heat wave was going on, the movie producers wanted to build a giant town so they could control the snow fall. In the movie, it is evident in many scenes that star James Stewart was sweating. The heat reached over 90 degrees. Another thing that was changed was the snow composition in the movie. Up to that point the snow was usually made from crushed up corn flakes that were painted white. However this requires actors to be dubbed due to it being “loud”. For this movie they made a “chemical snow” which consisted of foamite (a fire fighting chemical), water, and soap.
Titanic (1997)
The total cost of making Titanic is somewhere around $200 million. For comparison, the original Titanic cost in 1912-1913 was $7.5 million or $120-150 million in 1997 dollars. With over 100 speaking roles and over 1000 extras, it is evident to see why the movie was so time consuming. Reportedly the movie cost 150 million but due set cost and time constraints, Paramount pictures step in to provide an additional 65 million to cover the cost in exchange for US distribution rights.
Speaking of set cost, a giant 17 million gallon Baja, Mexico water tank was constructed to house the 90% scale replica of Titanic. It cost about 40 million dollars to be constructed. The inside of the ship was carpeted and period appropriate furniture, dishes, and rooms were all recreated down to a tiny detail. Every week the studios were getting more and more nervous of increasing cost and the eventual release of the movie. There were a lot of budget disagreements as well as verbal fights. A lot of extras disagreed with James Cameron (director) and called him a tyrant.
The General (1926)
The General was one of those movies that was not only expensive to make, but was plagued by problems. According to some sources, the movie had over 3,000 people on its payroll and it cost about $400 an hour to make. Buster Keaton who starred and co-directed the movie was impossible to work with. He would build real bridges for train scenes and build dams to control water depths. There were also on-set accidents such as train wheel running over brakeman’s foot (2,900 lawsuit) as well as train’s wood burning engine catching fire multiple times which spread to local forests and farmers haystacks which cost the production $25 per burnt haystack.
Of course the most famous scenes that required a train to be dropped into water over a bridge. It cost $42,000 to make and is considered to be the most expensive single shot scene in silent movie history. This was done with a real train, which later became a tourist attraction until 1944 when it was scrapped for metal for WWII.
Another scene cost the production about $50,000 when a fire broke out on the set, forcing the crew to go back to L.A while heavy smoke cleared, costing money and delaying production. The movie is considered to be one of the great failures of Keaton’s career and it marked the end of the silent movie era.
Many people consider the Matrix trilogy to be a visual spectacle. Utilizing many revolutionary VFX shots and techniques, the movie became a sight to behold.
While many scenes were CGI, the most expensive practical set that was featured in the movie was a giant freeway car chase that was accomplished on a real road….that was built by the production team. The road was a mile and a half long with 19 foot walls and an off ramp built for this chase sequence. The scene was part of an extensive shoot that could not be filmed on a real freeway. Instead the production team built a new road that cost $2.5 million. The freeway was six lanes wide and featured many cars that were later destroyed. In total, the reported car destruction cost over 2 million dollars.
Thanks for reading my Most expensive movie sets list
