![the highest grossing movies of all time the highest grossing movies of all time](http://s3.amazonaws.com/oz-wp-media/2019/05/boxoffice.png)
The '90 and '00s had a lot of movie posters that were literally just the actor's disembodied heads taking up 50% of the poster. There are half bodies in there, not to mention lightsabers and lasers and spaceships and all that. Hell, the public was talking about the film for years before its release (ever since the book was released, really.) You could make the argument that Birth of a Nation in 1915 was the only film of its kind in America to see, but Gone with the Wind was a BFD. Every big enough city had more than one theater because the studios owned the theaters. Gone with the Wind dominated in an era when there was tons of great films out there.
#THE HIGHEST GROSSING MOVIES OF ALL TIME SERIES#
This isn't even counting the countless serials, westerns, poverty row cheapo films, series films like Andy Hardy and the Thin Man and tons and tons of B-pictures. Oh and some other film you may have heard of called The Wizard of Oz, which was also directed by the director of GwtW: Victor Flemming. The Little Princess (Shirley Temple was box office gold in the late 30s).Gulliver's Travels (only the second major animated feature, after Snow White.).Stagecoach (John Ford and John Wayne's first pairing).Ninotchka (Garbo laughing was a BFD in 1939).In 1939 alone the following films were released to high acclaim and big box office. If the movie going market in 1939 was the size of Avatar's available market in 2009 Gone with the Wind would have likely crushed it by an additional 200-300%.ġ939, the year of GwtW's release is often called the greatest year of American films. population saw it.Īvatar's total domestic ticket sales? 79 million tickets sold in a market with 300 million people meaning only 26% of the U.S. That means on it's initial release the equivalent of 46% of the U.S. population of only 130 million.and went on to sell 220 million tickets (again only domestically). In its initial release it sold 60 million tickets domestically with a U.S. If you look at ticket sales (not in dollar value, but physical tickets sold) per percentage of the market population it blows away everything. Relatively speaking Gone with the Wind is an even bigger box office success than its inflation adjusted numbers show. Gone with the Wind didn't open nationwide and play steadily for 4 years in every theater across the country for that entire period of time.
![the highest grossing movies of all time the highest grossing movies of all time](https://sm.ign.com/ign_in/gallery/t/the-top-25/the-top-25-highest-grossing-movies-of-all-time-domestic_essn.jpg)
You have to understand that movies sort of went on "tours" around the nation. If Avatar and Titanic could have had 4 year runs believe me they definitely would have but even with several BILLION more movie goers to potentially watch those films they still couldn't top Gone with the Wind. Do you people understand how insane that is? Do you realize how massive the international market is for modern movies?īecause it was making money for 4 years even with literally a tiny fraction of the modern movie market available to it. IT HAD NO INTERNATIONAL BOX OFFICE TO SPEAK OF. population in 1939 was only 130 million people as opposed to 300 million today. How is it unfair? If anything it makes the movie even more dominant.