Online Encyclopedia
List of highest-grossing films
A top-grossing movie is a motion picture that has received the most total revenue compared to all other movies ever made. Sources of these revenues include; ticket sales, merchandise and video rentals.
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Top 25 highest-grossing films not adjusted for inflation
Here are the top 25 grossing movies of all time, based only on total worldwide box office receipts to August 16, 2004.
Note that the majority of these movies are in the genres of science fiction or fantasy.
- Amounts are in United States dollars, include ticket sales only, and are not adjusted for inflation. Movies such as Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope may well have earned more than more recent films such as Independence Day when adjusted for inflation. Given population growth as well as inflation, these numbers are not a very good indicator of the popularity of movies over time.
Highest-grossing adjusted for inflation
This is a list of the highest-grossing movies of all time, where "gross" is defined as
- worldwide box-office revenues in U.S. dollars
- adjusted for the effects of inflation using the U.S. consumer price index for January of the year of release (except for long runners, see below)
This list was compiled in June 2002.
The adjustment for inflation better reflects the importance of older films, as lists compiled without adjustment for inflation will consist almost entirely of films released in the last 20 years.
Note that this may tend to overstate the ranking of films that have long runs or repeated re-releases -- however, any film that can sustain such a long run is important in itself. Therefore, for "long runners" (defined as: the classic Disney children's films, Gone with the Wind and The Rocky Horror Picture Show) the gross has been smoothed over the entire time from release to date to try to correct for this bias, and corrected for inflation for each year in which revenue is booked.
This has the effect of moving these films down the list. For example, Gone with the Wind moves down the list to #3 from #1 before, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show drops out of the top 100 entirely.
Film List
- Gone with the Wind (1939)
- Star Wars (1977)
- Titanic (1997)
- Jaws (1975)
- E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
- The Exorcist (1973)
- Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
- Bambi (1942)
- Jurassic Park (1993)
- Grease (1978)
- Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi (1983)
- Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999)
- Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's/Philosopher's Stone (2001)
- Independence Day (1996)
- The Sound of Music (1965)
- Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
- Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
- Saturday Night Fever (1977)
- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
- Superman (1978)
- The Lion King (1994)
- Forrest Gump (1994)
- Thunderball (1965)
- Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
- Home Alone (1990)
- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)
- Ghost (1990)
- Goldfinger (1964)
- The Sixth Sense (1999)
- The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)
- Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
- The Sting (1973)
- Men in Black (1997)
- Pretty Woman (1990)
- Doctor Zhivago (1965)
- Rain Man (1988)
- One Hundred and One Dalmatians (1961)
- Armageddon (1998)
- Batman (1989)
- You Only Live Twice (1967)
- Jaws 2 (1978)
- Dances with Wolves (1990)
- Back to the Future (1985)
- The Godfather (1972)
- Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984)
- Mission: Impossible II (2000)
- Twister (1996)
- Aladdin (1992)
- The Graduate (1967)
- The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)
- Top Gun (1986)
- Beverly Hills Cop (1984)
- Mission: Impossible (1996)
- Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)
- Crocodile Dundee (1986)
- The Ten Commandments (1956)
- Monsters, Inc. (2001)
- The Bodyguard (1992)
- Moonraker (1979)
- Mrs. Doubtfire (1993)
- Live and Let Die (1973)
- Saving Private Ryan (1998)
- Toy Story 2 (1999)
- Diamonds Are Forever (1971)
- Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991)
- Fatal Attraction (1987)
- Ghostbusters (1984)
- Rocky IV (1985)
- (1985)
- Love Story (1970)
- The Matrix (1999)
- Back to the Future Part II (1989)
- The Jungle Book (1967)
- Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
- Gladiator (2000)
- American Graffiti (1973)
- Beverly Hills Cop II (1987)
- Shrek (2001)
- Alien (1979)
- Airport (1970)
- Tarzan (1999)
- From Russia with Love (1963)
- The Fugitive (1993)
- Pearl Harbor (2001)
- Blazing Saddles (1974)
- Basic Instinct (1992)
- Ocean's Eleven (2001)
- Ben-Hur (1959)
- The Mummy (1999)
- Cast Away (2000)
- True Lies (1994)
- Coming to America (1988)
- The Towering Inferno (1974)
- Billy Jack (1971)
- Look Who's Talking (1989)
- The Mummy Returns (2001)
- The Flintstones (1994)
- Die Hard: With a Vengeance (1995)
- Toy Story (1995)
- GoldenEye (1995)
See Also: List of top-grossing movies in the United States for lists not adjusted for inflation.
External Links
- http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/international/records.php
- http://www.worldwideboxoffice.com/
- ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/special.requests/cpi/cpiai.txt
- http://boxofficemojo.com
- http://www.imdb.com/Charts/worldtopmovies