A24 has certainly dabbled in costly productions before. Reviewing the 11 most expensive films in its history reveals a trend of increasing investment over time. These budgets span various genres and directors, culminating in their latest big-budget project, “The Smashing Machine,” a drama starring Dwayne Johnson about the real-life martial artist Mark Kerr. These high-priced films not only demonstrate A24’s confidence in its visionary filmmakers but also highlight the studio’s evolution from its humble beginnings with “Moonlight.”

There was a time when Adam Sandler’s comedies were synonymous with hefty price tags, with “Grown Ups 2” costing an eye-watering $80 million and “You Don’t Mess with the Zohan” reaching an even loftier $90 million. In contrast, Sandler’s first foray with directors Josh and Benny Safdie, “Uncut Gems,” was comparatively modest at $19 million. Still, this marked A24’s most expensive in-house production at the time.

The budget for “Uncut Gems” was justified by the film’s New York City setting and its star-studded cast, including LaKeith Stanfield and Idina Menzel. The production also featured helicopter scenes and basketball icon Kevin Garnett, adding to the costs. To offset these expenses, A24 sold the international distribution rights to Netflix in September 2018. This strategic move, common in the late 2010s, allowed studios to recover a portion of their investment by selling streaming rights for potentially risky projects.

For a while there, Adam Sandler’s comedies were costly enterprises, with “Grown Ups 2” requiring an absurd $80 million budget. 2008’s “You Don’t Mess with the Zohan” reached an even wilder $90 million. For Sandler’s first collaboration with Josh and Benny Safdie, though, the budget was kept in check. 2019’s “Uncut Gems” cost $19 million to make, only a little more than 20% of that “Grown Ups 2” cost. Still, at the time, this was A24’s costliest in-house venture.

It’s no surprise “Uncut Gems” would need that kind of budget, though, considering that it was shot in New York City and brought in a slew of professional actors to work alongside Sandler, like LaKeith Stanfield and Idina Menzel. With those glitzy locations NYC locations also came a helicopter and basketball legend Kevin Garnett. None of that comes cheap. It’s no surprise, then, that in September 2018, A24 sold international distribution rights to “Uncut Gems” to Netflix to help cover the film’s budget. In the late 2010s, selling off the streaming rights to risky projects was a fairly common practice, and ensured that at least some of a film’s budget could recouped.

A24 had no reason to worry. “Uncut Gems” grossed just over $50 million domestically. Temporarily the studio’s biggest domestic film, “Uncut Gems” was how A24 (and Sandler) won the money game.

Sofia Coppola, with an already great collection of memorable movies, reunited with A24 for a third time to deliver the story of “Priscilla.” Though A24 didn’t provide initial financing for the project, the studio is retroactively credited as a key instrument in “Priscilla” getting made, thanks to the studio investing in its domestic release. When foreign distributors like Sony Pictures International walked away from the production, A24 clutched at the North American distribution rights, eventually launching it as a big player for the fall 2023 award season.

How did “Priscilla” rack up a $20 million budget? Getting the “Euphoria” sensation Jacob Elordi into the feature couldn’t have cost pennies, even if Cailee Spaeny was a relative newcomer to film as Priscilla herself. More importantly, getting the ’60s-specific costumes and sets to reflect Elvis Presley’s (Elordi) lavish lifestyle would also be costly. In comparison, the 2022 Austin Butler vehicle “Elvis” cost $85 million to make. Even the ramshackle faith-based Elvis-adjacent movie “The Identical” cost $16 million, and it didn’t have anyone as big as Elordi in that cast. Making cinema about The King is never a microbudget odyssey.

The budget for “Priscilla” was well-utilized, since  its striking visual elements are one of the film’s greatest strengths. It faced plenty of challenges getting the necessary financing, but every nickel and dime ended up on screen for Presley fans to admire.

Back when major studios actually made erotic thrillers, these weren’t super expensive projects to launch. “Fatal Attraction” in 1987, for instance, cost $14 million to produce while 1980’s “Dressed to Kill” cost $6.5 million. Halina Reijn’s 2024 contribution to this genre, “Babygirl,” continued this trend with a $20 million pricetag. “Babygirl” was never going to cost less for several reasons, partially due to the presence of Nicole Kidman in the lead. Further major names in the cast like Antonio Banderas and Sophia Wilde can’t come cheap either. Then there was the fact that the feature shot on location in New York City.

Though there’s been a dearth of steamy titles in modern times, “Babygirl” proved a tidy moneymaker for A24, thanks to a leggy box office run that eventually reached $28.1 million in the U.S. Exempting the “Fifty Shades of Grey” movies, “Babygirl” was the biggest erotic thriller in a decade, since January 2015’s “The Boy Next Door.” Worldwide, it scored $63.7 million, meaning it more than tripled its budget in its global theatrical run. That impressive feat meant “Babygirl” was in line with the biggest worldwide hauls of pre-2010 erotic thrillers, a welcome sign for the genre’s durability in the modern pop culture landscape.

“Babygirl” was a departure from A24’s famous horror movies and prestige dramas. However, taking that risk paid off with steamy, lucrative results, giving theatrical erotic thrillers a new lease on life. 

Writer and director Celine Song’s second feature film (following 2023’s acclaimed “Past Lives”) was “Materialists,” a romantic drama released in the heart of summer 2025. Starring Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans, and Pedro Pascal, “Materialists” didn’t lack star power, which helps explain how it stacked up a $20 million budget. Its opulent surroundings (the title is “Materialists,” after all) and costume design also hit the production in the credit cards. To help cover the costs, A24 sold the foreign distribution rights to “Materialists” to Sony Pictures Releasing International for an unclear sum that’s definitely north of $10 million. 

At the very least, that meant half the budget was taken care of before the film’s first public screening. Even better, A24 found major domestic success for “Materialists” when the title secured $36.5 million at the box office. Currently, that makes “Materialists” the seventh-biggest A24 movie ever domestically and only the eighth title ever from the studio to surpass $35 million in North America. Internationally, though, is where this feature really procured some eye-popping figures. 

Worldwide, “Materialists” grossed $103.5 million, making it one of the rare titles connected to the A24 brand to surpass the nine digit mark. This romantic drama and its contemplative tone struck a chord with audiences worldwide. It didn’t hurt that summer 2025 was largely devoid of romantic titles aimed at women. “Materialists” filled an empty void and reaped the benefits. With only her second motion picture, Celine Song became a box office powerhouse. 

The grim drama “Warfare” recounts Ray Mendoza’s experience in the Iraq War in November 2006. The feature lacks much in the way of sensationalism that would distract from the raw depiction of men (including a version of Mendoza played by D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai) enduring enemy fire and fighting to stay alive. As the end credits reveal, this film’s principal location (a two-story civilian home) was constructed on a stage. A full build like that is a costly exercise. To boot, the feature had a sprawling cast of popular new male actors that included Cosmo Jarvis, Joseph Quinn, Charles Melton, and Noah Centineo.

Unsurprisingly, assembling all of these pieces (including the tools and craftspeople needed to realize the various explosions and shootouts) meant that “Warfare” (co-helmed and written by Alex Garland with Mendoza) ended up costing $20 million. In its theatrical run, “Warfare” grossed a fine but not spectacular $26 million domestically and only $6.9 million overseas. That meager international total isn’t surprising, since this is a film targeted almost solely towards American audiences. 

As for why it didn’t reach higher in its home demographic, “Warfare’s” bleak tone might have turned off some potential viewers. Mendoza’s push for blisteringly accurate depictions of combat lacked the palatable-if-not-particularly-accurate qualities informing other modern war movie hits like “Lone Survivor” and “American Sniper.” Still, A24’s losses for the title were minimal, and the project had no trouble wringing maximum value out of every dollar in its budget.

After director Ari Aster’s first two movies for A24, “Hereditary” and “Midsommar,” became stone-solid hits, the studio has been willing to give the auteur whatever he needs to deliver his pessimistic visions. First came 2023’s “Beau is Afraid,” starring Joaquin Phoenix, which is elsewhere on this list. Aster and Phoenix then reunited two years later with “Eddington,” a COVID Western that cost $25 million to make. While cheaper than “Beau is Afraid,” this was still a hefty bundle for something so uncommercial. All that money largely went to the actors set to work with Phoenix, which included Pedro Pascal, Emma Stone, and Austin Butler. Extensive action and several major New Mexico shooting locations also couldn’t have come cheap.

Any hopes that “Eddington” could turn around Aster’s box office trajectory after the way “Beau is Afraid” flopped never materialized. This production only grossed $10.1 million in its entire domestic run, less than “Hereditary’s” North American debut. This was in spite of a prime mid-July release date, and A24 giving the title a major promotional push. Because Westerns don’t have much appeal outside of America, overseas audiences couldn’t come to the rescue, leaving “Eddington” with a dismal $12.42 million worldwide haul. 

A24 also didn’t (at least to the public’s knowledge) make a splashy deal with other studios for international rights. That would have alleviated some of the budget for “Eddington,” as we’ve noted for other films. That just exacerbated this film’s problems and made it one of the studio’s costliest boondoggles to date. That’s a far cry from Aster’s big breaks.

One of the earliest big-budget moon shots for A24 was the dark comedy “Beau is Afraid.” A 179-minute descent into anxiety and internal chaos, Beau Wassermann’s (Joaquin Phoenix) ceaseless nightmare required a $35 million budget to come to life. Every penny was spent on the varied visual aesthetics (including glimpses of stop-motion animation) used to visualize his tormented interior world. Extensive sets were also required to realize environments like Beau’s dilapidated apartment complex, or the seemingly friendly suburban house he visits.

All of this effort accentuated the punchline of “Beau is Afraid:” excessive expansiveness servicing a very intimate, internal turmoil. A24 had good reason to invest in such an offbeat concept, though, given that Aster was responsible for major hits like “Hereditary.” However, this challenging motion picture never took off with general audiences. Its worldwide gross amassed $12.3 million, an anemic haul for something this costly. That included $8.17 million domestically, a clear sign that neither of Aster’s two hits, nor “Beau’s” visual razzle-dazzle, were enough to get droves of moviegoers out to see this one. 

By the end of 2023, word broke that A24 had lost $35 million on this enterprise, a significant setback. In hindsight, that was a fittingly nightmarish end for a film about a man plagued exclusively by worst-case scenarios.

For A24, the $40 million budget of the (in our opinion) less than smashing film, “The Smashing Machine,” a Benny Safdie-directed biopic of UFC legend Mark Kerr, was one of the studio’s biggest features to date. For star Dwayne Johnson, haunted by enough bad films to earn a worst-of ranking, it was a detour into a more modest budget territory. Since “Fast Five” in 2011, Johnson’ has steadily headlined a slew of movies with muscly $160+ million budgets, like the DC superhero clunker “Black Adam.” Projects like “Jungle Cruise” and “Red One” even exceeded the $200 million threshold for their budgets. After years of exclusively dabbling in movies with blockbuster costs and unreliable returns, Johnson came down to earth with “The Smashing Machine.”

Getting both Johnson and Emily Blunt to do the film ensured that “Machine” was going to cost more than the last Safdie film for A24, “Uncut Gems.” All those sequences recreating major UFC fights were going to cost precious effects money, too. Given that this motion picture is a biopic about a famous fighter fueled by Johnson’s star power, A24 executives likely saw that $40 million budget as a reasonable expense for something so potentially mainstream. “Machine” also fit right in with other recent A24 films, like the 2023 wrestler biopic “The Iron Claw,” or the bare-knuckled brawling of “Love Lies Bleeding.”

Time will tell if A24 wins back its investment in “The Smashing Machine.” Ponying up the cash to get a blockbuster staple like Dwayne Johnson to headline one of its films, though, is another sharp indicator of how big A24’s output has become.

On one level, Alex Garland’s “Civil War,” which followed war journalists navigating a dystopian vision of America torn apart by conflict, is a grim examination of this country during what’s still a frightening and uncertain time. On another level, it was also A24 making a big swing into mid-budget cinema with its $50 million cost. Despite the harrowing nature of the final film, A24 executives were hoping that the allure of explosions and gunfire (not to mention a provocative premise) could lure hordes of moviegoers. That plump budget was handed over to writer and director Alex Garland, a veteran of A24 cinema. 

Garland, whose “Ex Machina” brought A24 some necessary early success, is also responsible for writing mainstream faves like “28 Days Later” and “Dredd.” With him, A24 knew they had the potential and the reputation to create a box office hit, making “Civil War” a fairly safe investment for a budget this big. The film grossed a respectable $68.7 million in its domestic run, while its worldwide haul stood at $127.3 million. That means it safely secured 2.5 times its budget. 

While not quite a blockbuster, the global take still made “Civil War” a blow up hit. Domestically, it was the second-biggest A24 movie to date, sitting behind “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” That isn’t too shabby for something this grueling, paving the road for A24 to embrace more big budget movies.

“Queer” is an interesting entry in the canon of costly A24-distributed movies. The feature, shot and produced in Italy, was made for a reported $50 million budget that A24 originally had nothing to do with. While most movies costing more than $20 million that A24 theatrically releases are titles the studio produced in-house, “Queer” was acquired by the studio just days before its 2024 Venice International Film Festival premiere. Entities like Fremantle North America and The Apartment Pictures covered the costs of initial production. Part of the budget was also offset by selling the feature to major distributors, such as A24 in America, and Mubi in a slew of international territories. 

Why did this William S. Burroughs novella adaptation of a drifter (Daniel Craig) obsessing over a younger dude (Drew Starkey) cost so much to make? Creating visuals and sets that homage the pair’s colorful sensibilities had to be a costly endeavor. Ditto for all the locations in Italy that have to stand in for various backdrops in Ecuador and Mexico City. After his “James Bond” box office track record, Craig rarely needs to work for pennies. That said, his paycheck for “Queer” is unknown, and he was an eager participant in promoting the final film. 

While Guadagnino’s “Challengers” and “Call Me by Your Name” found some financial success in theaters, “Queer” puttered out with a take of just $7 million worldwide. Needless to say, it didn’t come close to recouping its budget. For A24, at least, the fallout is minimal.

Back in 2008, director Josh Safdie debuted his first feature-length directorial effort, “The Pleasure of Being Robbed.” This microbudget indie was the very definition of ramshackle DIY filmmaking, an aesthetic that would carry over to subsequent artistic endeavors like “Daddy Longlegs.” Josh Safdie (along with his brother, Benny Safdie) was soon associated with grimy films that used their financial restrictions to zero in on real New Yorkers. 17 years after “The Pleasure of Being Robbed,” Safdie is helming “Marty Supreme,” a Timothée Chalamet star vehicle in which the “Dune” leading man plays the fictional ping-pong champion Marty Mauser. On paper, it sure sounds like a great potential addition to Chalamet’s collection of underrated films.

Little is known about “Marty Supreme” right now, but one fairly concrete detail is its reported $70 million budget, by far the largest pricetag ever attached to an A24 motion picture. While something like “Queer” might inspire curiosity over why it cost so much, the moneybags “Marty Supreme” is lugging are far less mysterious. For one thing, Chalamet’s box office power means he can now command a several million dollar paycheck per role. For another, this production has a sprawling cast encompassing popular picks like Gwyneth Paltrow, Tyler the Creator, and Fran Drescher. 

Then there’s the filming locations, which stretch far beyond Safdie’s classic New York digs. The first reports of the film’s budget described the project as a “globetrotting” exercise. Extensive shooting in Japan alone would bolster the budget significantly. Safdie surely couldn’t have imagined all these lavish costs in his hands back when he was shooting “Daddy Longlegs” on nickels and dimes. Here’s hoping that “Uncut Gems” magic touches this film, too, preventing A24 from ever tightening its artistically tasteful belt.