“Gladiator II” (Paramount) is expected to gross over $60 million when it open this week in the U.S./Canada. (It’s already playing in most of the world, where it’s taken in $87 million in 63 territories.) If so, that will be a strong start for Ridley Scott‘s 29th feature in his 45-year career.
With a budget reported to be somewhere around $250 million-$300 million, it will need all of that and more. While this may be his fourth film to cost over over $200 million (adjusting to current dollar value), “Gladiator II” appears to be the highest spend of Scott’s career.
It’s also the record expense for a director over 80. Paramount’s decision to entrust Scott clearly speaks to his past performances, particularly internationally.
We surveyed all 28 previous Scott features, calculating their grosses and budgets at 2024 values. And while a $60 million “Gladiator II” opening would be a record on paper, that only works if you don’t adjust his track record to current dollars and ticket prices. In reality, it would need to be over $75 million to be among his five best in the U.S./Canada. (For the record, unadjusted his best opening was the 2001 “Hannibal,” $58 million, adjusted about $120 million; at $228 million, the 2015 “The Martian” is his best domestic total.)
Here is how his films rank in worldwide adjusted results, grouped by approximate gross ranges. Exact numbers, particularly for pre-2000 foreign results, are more difficult to pin down with precision.
Over $1 billion
“Gladiator” (2000)
$750 million-$1 billion
“The Martian” (2015), “Hannibal” (2001)
$500 million-$750 million
“Alien” (1979), “Prometheus” (2012)
$400 million-$500 million
“American Gangster” (2007), “Robin Hood” (2010), “Black Rain” (1989)
$300 million-$400 million
“Kingdom of Heaven” (2005), “Blackhawk Down” (2001), “Exodus: Gods and Kings” (2015), “Alien Covenant” (2017)
$200 million-$300 million
“Napoleon” (2023)
$150 million-$200 million
“Body of Lies” (2008), “1492: Conquest of Paradise” (1992), “House of Gucci” (2021), “Blade Runner” (1982), “G.I. Jane” (1997), “Thelma & Louise” (1991)
$100 million-$150 million
“Matchstick Men” (2003), “The Counselor” (2013)
$50 million-$100 million
“Legend” (1985), “A Good Year” (2006), “All the Money in the World” (2017)
Under $50 million
“Someone to Watch Over Me” (1987), “White Squall” (1996), “The Last Duel” (2021), “The Duellists (1977)
The breakdown explains the investment in “Gladiator II”: All told, at today’s rates the original grossed around $1.15 billion worldwide. “The Martian,” his second best, did about $875 million. Even expensive films that seemed weak in U.S./Canada like “Exodus,” “Robin Hood,” and “Kingdom of Heaven” appear to have done well enough abroad to eventually break even. (“Napoleon” and its uncertain value to Apple similarly was disproportionately foreign).
We could only find three Scott films that made the domestic top 10 among their year’s releases: “Alien” (#5), “Gladiator” (#4), and “The Martian” (#8). That’s not an insignificant showing, but pales against other high-budget/high-concept directors like Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, James Cameron, and Robert Zemeckis.
The cost of his films versus their results is strong: With both figures adjusted, his worldwide gross total is about $7.8 billion against budgets of $4.1 billion — a 90 percent return, marketing budgets notwithstanding. By comparison, a recent study of Clint Eastwood’s films at Warner Bros. grossed around $9 billion against budgets of $2.7 billion, or a 233 percent return.
Scott’s top grosses have mainly been in this century, when budgets soared beyond the cost of inflation and foreign markets demanded the kind of epic (and expensive) films for which he’s known.
He’s sustained a film career over 45 years that came after an already-remarkable stint in advertising. The success of “Alien” in 1979 sustained him for nearly 20 years over uneven results. “Black Rain” (with a huge response in Japan) was a timely hit a decade later. In 1991, “Thelma & Louise” was one of his least expensive films; it became a modest box-office hit and major critical success. A year later, he released “1492,” which was a flop and grossed an adjusted $20 million domestic. However, this film set the template for the period male-oriented epic that has been his favored genre ever since.
While it’s highly unlikely that “Gladiator II” will be his last film — IMDb lists a staggering 72 possible projects as producer and/or director — it could be the last on this scale. Now in preproduction is “You Should Be Dancing,” a Bee Gees biopic slated for early 2025 shooting that he will direct and produce for Paramount and Amblin Prods.
