The movies that have cleared the $1 billion mark at the box office belong to a pretty exclusive club. To date, there are only 53 members.
The newest initiate is 2023’s Barbie, the Greta Gerwig–directed juggernaut that star Margot Robbie pitched to Warner Bros. as a film that would net $1 billion. “Which maybe I was overselling, but we had a movie to make, OK?!” Robbie told Collider last month. Not only did Barbie hit $1 billion, it managed to do so in less than three weeks. (For the record, the movie to gross $1 billion the fastest is Avengers: Endgame, which managed the feat in just five days.)
Barbie isn’t the only 2023 film to make the list. The Super Mario Bros. Movie, released in early April, is in 15th place with a worldwide gross of a little over $1.35 billion. As of August 7, Barbie is in 45th place, but it’s pretty much a foregone conclusion that it won’t stay there. It only needs to rake in about $3 million more to overtake Despicable Me 3 (2017).
Though both 2023 entries are based on existing intellectual properties, they can still be considered original films, in a way—a marked departure from last year’s trend. All three 2022 films to make $1 billion at the box office were sequels: Avatar: The Way of Water, Top Gun: Maverick, and Jurassic World Dominion.
Unsurprisingly, most billion-dollar blockbusters draw from existing IP. There are more straight sequels (2019’s Frozen II and 2015’s Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens); live-action remakes (2019’s The Lion King and 2017’s Beauty and the Beast); adaptations of beloved novels (2001’s Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, 2012’s The Hobbit); and, of course, plenty of superhero movies.
The notable exceptions to that rule mainly come from James Cameron, including the original Avatar and 1997’s unsinkable Titanic, which grossed a hardy $2.26 billion. Oh, and Disney’s Zootopia is also on the list. (It’s hard to beat a talking fox voiced by Jason Bateman.)
We’ll have to wait and see whether the other half of the ‘Barbenheimer’ phenomenon makes it into the billion-dollar club. Right now, Oppenheimer’s worldwide gross is just shy of $553 million.
Find out if your favorite spectacle on the silver screen made the list below, and see which flicks just missed it via Box Office Mojo.
- Avatar (2009) // $2,923,706,026
- Avengers: Endgame (2019) // $2,799,439,100
- Avatar: The Way of Water (2022) // $2,320,250,281
- Titanic (1997) // $2,264,743,305
- Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (2015) // $2,071,310,218
- Avengers: Infinity War (2018) // $2,052,415,039
- Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) // $1,921,847,111
- Jurassic World (2015) // $1,671,537,444
- The Lion King (2019) // $1,663,075,401
- The Avengers (2012) // $1,520,538,536
- Furious 7 (2015) // $1,515,341,399
- Top Gun: Maverick (2022) // $1,495,696,292
- Frozen II (2019) // $1,453,683,476
- Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) // $1,405,018,048
- The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023) // $1,352,756,895
- Black Panther (2018) // $1,349,926,083
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (2011) // $1,342,359,942
- Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi (2017) // $1,334,407,706
- Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018) // $1,310,466,296
- Frozen (2013) // $1,284,540,518
- Beauty and the Beast (2017) // $1,266,115,964
- Incredibles 2 (2018) // $1,243,225,667
- The Fate of the Furious (2017) // $1,236,005,118
- Iron Man 3 (2013) // $1,215,577,205
- Minions (2015) // $1,159,444,662
- Captain America: Civil War (2016) // $1,155,046,416
- Aquaman (2018) // $1,148,528,393
- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) // $1,147,633,833
- Skyfall (2012) // $1,142,471,295
- Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019) // $1,131,927,996
- Captain Marvel (2019) // $1,131,416,446
- Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011) // $1,123,794,079
- Jurassic Park (1993) // $1,109,802,321
- Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014) // $1,104,054,072
- The Dark Knight Rises (2012) // $1,081,169,825
- Star Wars: Episode IX - The Rise of Skywalker (2019) // $1,077,022,372
- Joker (2019) // $1,074,458,282
- Toy Story 4 (2019) // $1,073,841,394
- Toy Story 3 (2010) // $1,067,316,101
- Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006) // $1,066,179,747
- Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016) // $1,058,682,142
- Aladdin (2019) // $1,054,304,000
- Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011) // $1,046,721,266
- Despicable Me 3 (2017) // $1,034,800,131
- Barbie (2023) // $1,031,481,000
- Finding Dory (2016) // $1,029,266,989
- Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999) // $1,027,082,707
- Zootopia (2016) // $1,025,521,689
- Alice in Wonderland (2010) // $1,025,468,216
- Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001) // $1,023,842,938
- The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012) // $1,017,030,651
- The Dark Knight (2008) // $1,006,234,167
- Jurassic World Dominion (2022) // $1,001,978,080
This article was published earlier in 2023 and has been updated.
This article was originally published on www.mentalfloss.com as All 53 Movies That Have Made More Than $1 Billion at the Box Office.