The latest full accounts for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, trading as Carbonado Industries (UK) Limited, were filed on October 13th, revealing the film’s cost rose to $593.7 million (£450.2 million) making it the third most expensive movie in history.
The cost increased by $10.1 million (£8 million) in 2024, putting it just behind The Force Awakens with a cost of £452 million, and trailing Jurassic World: Dominion which is the most expensive at £453.6 million, as revealed in The Guardian earlier this year. It will be interesting to see if the 2019 sequel film attracts any additional costs in 2025, as it could yet pass The Force Awakens.
This from Forbes.com that broke this story…
The budgets of movies made in the United States are usually a closely-guarded secret as studios combine the cost of them in their overall expenses and don’t itemize how much was spent on each one. It’s a different story in the U.K.
Studios filming in the U.K. get a reimbursement of up to 25.5% of the money they spend in the country provided that at least 10% of the movie’s core costs are incurred there. In order to demonstrate this to the authorities, studios set up separate companies to produce each film in the U.K. and they are obliged to file legally-binding financial statements.
As with all U.K. companies, these filings are released in stages long after the period they relate to. The process starts during pre-production and continues long after the premiere. There is good reason for this.
It is revealed in the 2018 financial statements for the production company behind Star Wars spinoff Rogue One which state that “the company was involved in paying the ongoing production costs in relation to the film” even though it was released two years earlier. In short, the financial statements are compiled in stages over a long period of time in order to give the production team time to ensure that all the bills are paid.
The filings are a goldmine of financial information as they reveal everything from the production’s overall cost and level of reimbursement right down to the headcount, salaries and even the social security payments to staff. They also reveal whether the movie cost more or less than the studio originally budgeted for it.
The filings for the production company behind The Rise of Skywalker state that by March 2019, one month after filming wrapped, the movie was “in line with the budget”. However, post-production cost less than expected and by the end of the year, less than two weeks after the movie debuted, it was “below the production budget”.
Read more analysis here.
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