The Most Expensive Movie Scenes Ever Filmed

"Open your eyes ..." "Vanilla Sky" sets the tone of surreal, reality-questioning confusion from the opening scene. Perfectly groomed, grey-hair-plucking playboy millionaire David Aames (Tom Cruise) wakes as Radiohead's "Everything In Its Right Place" aptly lyricizes David's life — immaculate, flawless, perfected. Yet, as David drives his vintage Ferrari through the streets of New York, the first cracks in this illusion appear.

He drives to Times Square, "The Crossroads of the World" with approximately 330,000 daily visitors. It's completely empty, not even the faintest hint of the usual hustle and bustle. David wakes, abruptly. It was all a dream, a false awakening, interpreted by his therapist as a metaphor for loneliness. At only 30 seconds of screentime, the scene provides a fundamental function in the narrative, questioning the nature of reality, and humankind's relationship to dreams.

Surprisingly, no CGI was used. Instead, director Cameron Crowe struck a deal with the NYPD to close off the area between 5AM and 8AM on a Sunday in November of 2000. The result was a spectacular sequence with a spectacular price tag: over $1 million for 30 seconds of footage. Was it worth it? Absolutely. Combining Cruise's enigmatic star power with the desolate backdrop helps to create a poignancy lacking in the 1997 Spanish-language original, "Open Your Eyes"; it would, without a doubt, become the best-remembered visual from the Crowe remake.

Think of Bond, and what's the first thing that comes to mind? Aside from a cat-stroking evil genius, cool gadgets, and Bond girls, the answer is more than likely luxurious cars. After all, what would 007 be without an Aston Martin DB5 for company, a car featuring in seven different installments? Snazzy automobiles are largely part of the agent's mythology, and the most recent addition, "Spectre," continued that tradition by placing Daniel Craig in the front seat of the stylish Aston Martin DB10, a car which was never put into production and only exists in that one film (or does it?).

Illustrative of the multi-millions Hollywood has to play with (the budget was rumored to be between $300 and $350 million), production of the 24th Bond set a new record — £24 million ($32 million) of the budget was spent destroying cars. The biggest expenditure came from totaling seven of the ten aforementioned DB10s, a fact that will no doubt cause car enthusiasts to shed a tear. "In Rome, we wrecked millions of pounds' worth," chief stunt coordinator Gary Powell told The Daily Mail.

The DB10 sped through the narrow streets of the Vatican "at top speeds of 110mph" in a cat-and-mouse chase with a henchman in a Jaguar C-X75. A set amount for this singular scene hasn't been confirmed, but the number of destroyed DB10s were "shot one entire night for four seconds of film," making its cost-per-footage ratio astronomically high.

Four years after Neo (Keanu Reeves) swallowed the red pill and unveiled the true nature of reality in "The Matrix," the philosophical cyberpunk sensation returned in 2003 with the second installment in the trilogy. This time, the Wachowskis had over double the budget; safe to say they spent it wisely. Ignoring the adage "don't play with traffic," they rejected digital effects and instead constructed a fake freeway at a disused naval base in Alameda, California.

Stretching a-mile-and-a-half, the set was the backdrop for a white-knuckle chase between Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne), Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), The Twins (Neil and Adrian Rayment), and a host of agents. Surprisingly, the Wachowskis also opted for real-life stunts. "They needed to have the best stunt people in the world," Carrie-Anne Moss, who overcame a "major fear" of motorcycles shooting the scene, told IGN. "It was dangerous. You could really feel that everyday that you went out there."

The final result is 20 minutes of mind-blowing, physics-defying carnage — and one of the most memorable car chases in cinematic history. As for the total cost? That had the blue pill treatment, never to be revealed publicly. However, the freeway alone cost $2.5 million. Throw in over one hundred destroyed cars, practical effects and CGI, and a significant percentage of the $150 million budget will have been spent on this single sequence.

Michael Bay is renowned for larger-than-life spectacles brimming with huge explosions and bombastic set pieces, epitomized by his live-action "Transformers" franchise. Clearly, there's a thirst for big robots that turn into things, with the series earning a total worldwide box office of $4.48 billion.

"The Last Knight" was the most poorly reviewed in the series, receiving a measly 15 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, but that wasn't due to a lack of investment. Its budget was a whopping $217 million, with a large chunk of that spent on location for one particular scene. As previous "Transformers" installment "Age of Extinction" concluded in a junkyard, producers were keen to maintain continuity. "The (movie's) art director was probably just doing a Google image search for a junkyard," Phoenix film Commissioner Phil Bradstock wryly remarked to Phoenix Business Journal. "And they came across this junkyard just north of the Deer Valley Airport."

Arizona's authorities won't be complaining about the fortuitous Google image search, though — it led to a hefty investment in the area. In rare, detailed insight, Bradstock revealed that over the 10-day shoot, producers hired 40 locals to work behind the scenes, as well as 50 local vendors, and 3,000 cumulative hotel nights. Two months on location equated to an investment of $15 million ... before factoring in CGI and other cost-increasing factors.

It's almost impossible to imagine the magnitude of the production behind "Ben-Hur." The 1959 adaptation of Lew Wallace's novel, and remake of the 1925 silent film of the same name, is memorable for its extravagance. A stunning nine-minute chariot race is the crux of Wallace's story and William Wyler's feature aptly gravitates around the same centerpiece, underpinning the thrill of the theatrical experience, and highlighting the ability of motion picture to provide audiences with a gateway to another world.

Enduring acclaim is a deserving accomplishment. Following five years of preparation, the production was tireless and demanding, including 300 sets covering 148 acres, nine sound stages, and thousands of extras. Set at Cinceitta Studios in Italy, it was the largest film set of its era. The arena alone — set in the ancient city Antioch — was built by a construction team of 750 workers, created to capture the race between Judah Ben-Hur (Charlton Heston) and Messala (Stephen Boyd).

Shot over 10 weeks, the singular scene cost $4 million. In today's money that's over $34 million, around $3.7 million for each minute of footage. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer wanted the experience to lure audiences into theatres, though, and it worked. To this day, Ben-Hur is one of the highest-grossing films ever (adjusting for inflation), proving sometimes hefty investment pays off.

Marlon Brando was widely regarded as one of the finest actors of his generation — if not any generation — when he won his second Academy Award for his captivating portrayal of Don Corleone in 1972's "The Godfather." That film was also a blockbuster, and if the producers of the first big-budget "Superman" movie wanted to secure the great Brando to play Superman's father, Jor-El, they were certainly going to have to dig deep and pay up.

Brando ultimately appears in the 1978 "Superman: The Movie" for about 10 minutes out of the film's 143-minute running time. And yet he received top billing, over both Academy Award winner Gene Hackman (as Lex Luthor) and relative newcomer Christopher Reeve (actually portraying the character after whom the film is named). In addition to an appearance fee of $3.7 million, Brando was also contractually obligated to take home 12 percent of the film's profits. The former Godfather's take: $19 million. (In 2020 dollars, that's about $75 million.) And this doesn't even count the expensive-looking Krypton sets that filmmakers had to build for Brando's brief scenes.

Director Ridley Scott was preparing to release his drama "All the Money in the World" in late 2017 when he was faced with a dilemma: Multiple allegations of sexual misconduct had been levied against actor Kevin Spacey, who played wealthy industrialist J. Paul Getty in the film, which, as Variety noted, had the potential to sink its prospects at the box office and for awards season. With a slated release date of December 22, 2017, Scott made the decision to fire Spacey and not only replace him with Oscar-winning actor Christopher Plummer, but reshoot all of Spacey's scenes with Plummer in the role.

Scott did not enter into the decision lightly; the reshoots carried the potential for exorbitant costs, including fees for not only Plummer but co-stars Michelle Williams and Mark Wahlberg, who would be required to appear in the reshoots. According to Variety, costs for new promotional and advertising material would also require additional fees to rush them to print and screen.

The estimated total for the reshoots, according to Variety, was $10 million, a substantial chunk of the film's $50 million productions costs. "All the Money in the World" ultimately recouped its costs but barely turned a profit; the international box office take was approximately $57 million.

If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).

Prior to its release in 1986, director Frank Oz's update of the 1960 Roger Corman classic-turned-musical went the route of so many studio movies, with a test screening for an advance audience. According to Oz, the preview audience in San Jose was enthusiastic — up to a point. "For every musical number there was applause, they loved it, it was just fantastic," he told Entertainment Weekly in 2012. "Until we killed our two leads."

The original ending of "Little Shop" echoed the finales of its source material — Corman's 1960 feature — and the Broadway musical, which featured music by Alan Menken and lyrics and book by Howard Ashman (who later collaborated on Disney's "Little Mermaid" and "Beauty and the Beast"). In both versions, the monster plant, Audrey II, devours romantic leads Seymour and Audrey, while the musical infers through a song that Audrey II has the rest of the world slated for its next meal. The Oz movie version takes that scenario to a "Godzilla"-level extreme, with multiple monster plants smashing bridges, devouring trains, and standing triumphant on the Statue of Liberty, impervious to an assault by soldiers milling below it.

Despite stellar puppet and miniature work by Richard Conway, audiences were horrified by the death of Seymour and Audrey, played by Rick Moranis and Ellen Greene. Oz and Ashmun created a new finale where Seymour and Audrey not only defeat Audrey II, but also live happily ever after. The cost of this new end note? Sources vary, with some citing a $1 million price tag, while others note a tally of up to $5 million — either way, a substantial portion of the film's $25 million budget for a single scene.

The 2016 "Ghostbusters" (dubbed by the studio "Ghostbusters: Answer the Call" to differentiate from the 1984 classic) had more than its share of problems before, during, and after production, including reshoots that executive producer Dan Aykroyd claimed were upwards of $30 to $40 million (Sony countered the claim in a statement which insisted they were in the neighborhood of $3 to $4 million). But a scene deleted from the original running time generated an inordinate amount of coverage in the press, as well as a reportedly sizable sticker price.

The scene involves Kevin, the Ghostbusters' hapless receptionist, played by Marvel fave Chris Hemsworth. Possessed by the film's main antagonist — Neil Casey's occult Rowan North — Kevin uses his newfound supernatural powers to command an assembled team of NYPD detectives, officers, soldiers, and federal agents to perform in a dance number set to the tune of the Bee Gees' hit "You Should Be Dancing." Though it's an amusing moment and impressively performed by Hemsworth and the actors, Feig told Vulture that the dance number simply didn't work with the rest of the picture. "It was making the rhythm a little too goofy, in a weird way, and it was hurting our story a little bit."

Citing an unnamed source, the Hollywood Reporter reported that it was also an expensive scene, with costs in the low seven figures (Sony again refuted the claim in a comment issued to the Reporter), so its removal would have to have been a major consideration for Feig, the producers, and the studio. Feig said as much in the Vulture interview: "This was the biggest decision of my life," he explained. The solution: Move the scene to the end credits, and add the complete scene to the extended cut of the film on home video.