10 Most Profitable Film Studios in Hollywood
Did you know that these are the 10 Most Profitable Film Studios in Hollywood?
We know how much you like to watch films and TV series. We thought we should save you some trouble and have listed the 10 most profitable film studios in Hollywood.
It is known that Hollywood is the place where the most popular, famous and successful films are produced. This is why Hollywood studios are extremely wealthy.
Let’s find out which studio has the greatest films!
10) The Weinstein Company (TWC) – $181,726,400
Number 10 in our list is The Weinstein Company aka TWC. It belongs to two brothers and independent producers, Bob and Harvey Weinstein.
They started the studio in 2005 when they left the Miramax Films,and so far they had a blast releasing some of the most famous films out there.
You might find the company familiar from movies like the Spy Kids, Scary Movie, Scream franchise and The King’s Speech and the hit from 2012- Django Unchained.
At 2012 Academy Awards the studio earn eight Oscars, setting a new record for the studio. Five Oscars were only for The Artist.
TWC’s film division brought in nearly $182 million in 2014.
9) Lionsgate – $420,419,393
The Canadian-American entertainment company was founded in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1997.
As of November 2013, Lionsgate is the most commercially successful mini major film and television distribution company in North America.
Lionsgate is also the ninth most profitable film studio in Hollywood. Their success came in 2000 when they released “American Psycho” and it got bigger with “Girl with a Pearl Earring”, Fahrenheit 9/11, “Hotel Rwanda”, 3:10 to Yuma”, “Kick-Ass”.
But let’s not forget the global hits: Saw, Transporter, The Expendables, Twilight Saga and Hunger Games franchises, which gave Lionsgate over $400 million this year.
8) Paramount – $882,022,462
The film studio, television production company and motion picture distributor is one of the most profitable film studios in Hollywood.
It is a subsidiary of U.S. media conglomerate Viacom and a member of the Motion Picture Association of America.
Several successful films were distributed by Paramount.
Successful films like Transformers, Mission: Impossible, The Marvel Cinematic Universe series (2008-2011), Indiana Jones (1981-2008), The Godfather, Star Trek, Jack Ryan, Jackass.
Other box-office hits were: Friday the 13th and G.I. Joe.
It is the world’s fourth oldest continuously-operating major film studio and in 2014,and the studio was the first major Hollywood studio to distribute all its films in digital-form only.
7) Universal – $956,267,478
Universal is an American film studio owned by Comcast and one of Hollywood’s “Big Six” film studios.
Its production studios are at 100 Universal City Plaza Drive in Universal City, California. The studio is also a member of the Motion Picture Association of America.
It was founded in 1912 by the German Carl Laemmle which make it the third oldest major film studio.
Their most famous films were directed by Steven Spielberg and are: Jaws (1975), E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982), and Jurassic Park (1993) all achieved box office records and became the highest-grossing films ever at the time of their initial release.
6) Sony/Columbia Pictures – $1,181,819,246
Founded in 1918 as Cohn-Brandt-Cohn (CBC) Film Sales by brothers Jack and Harry Cohn and Joe Brandt, the studio is one of the leading film studios in the world.
The studio which released its first feature film in 1922 is the world fifth largest major film studio.
Columbia Pictures’ most famous productions are Lost Horizon, His Girl Friday, The Lady from Shanghai, Gilda, All the King’s Men and “You Can’t Take It With You”.
Jack and Harry died in 1956 and 1958, but the studio continued to produce major box-office hits like: The Last Picture Show, Taxi Driver, Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Saturday Night Fever.
Coca-Cola Company bought the film studio in 1982 and after that the studio sold Columbia Pictures Entertainment to Sony Corporation in 1989.
Their recent blockbusters are: Men in Black/ Spider-Man/Da Vinci Code franchises, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Zero Dark Thirty and The Social Network.
5) Warner Bros. – $1,311,488,764
The American producer of film, TV and music entertainment is one of the major film studios and one of the most profitable film studios in Hollywood.
Warner Bros. has several subsidiary companies, including Warner Bros. Pictures, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, Warner Bros. Television, Warner Bros. Animation, Warner Home Video, New Line Cinema, Castle Rock Entertainment, DC Entertainment, and the former The WB Television Network. Warner Bros. owns half of The CW Television Network.
It was created by brothers Harry, Albert, Samuel, and Jack Warner. They began buying film theaters in the early 1903.
Ten years had to pass for them to produce and distribute their own films and to move their operations to Hollywood in 1917, and then to create Warner Brothers Pictures Inc. in 1923.
This studio was the one that produced the famous Casablanca film.
Others famous films produced by the studio are Batman, Harry Potter and Hangover franchises, 300, The Bucket List, The Blind Side, The Lego Movie and Interstellar.
4) Buena Vista – $1,395,509,401
Buena Vista is a brand name which was often used for divisions and subsidiaries of The Walt Disney Company.
The logos for the various Buena Vista brands feature the “Buena Vista” word mark superimposed over the Disney Castle image to signal the affiliation between Buena Vista and Disney.
The brand was originally used for the Buena Vista Distribution company by Walt Disney.
It was designed by Walt Disney after the release of Peter Pan as a film distribution wing of this empire.
But in 1999 they sold the brand and Disney Television productions to ABC.
Films like The Lion King, the Toy Story, Pirates of the Caribbean and Iron Man franchises, The Avengers and Frozen are among their successes.
3) MGM – $1.53 billion (approx.)
MGM also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. is an American media company which produce and distribute films and television programs.
Founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer Pictures.
MGM is one of the oldest mini-major film studios and a former major film studio.
Among their most famous productions are Tarzan the Ape Man, Grand Hotel, The Thin Man, A Night at the Opera, The Wizard of Oz, Gone With The Wind, Sunset Boulevard, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, In the Heat of the Night.
Plus, Midnight Cowboy, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Network, Rocky, Annie Hall, Rain Man and Dances With Wolves.
2) 20th Century Fox – $1,560,253,473
On number two we got 20th Century Fox, one of the six major American film studios.
Fox studio used to be a subsidiary of News Corporation, but now it is a subsidiary of 21st Century Fox and today is the second largest major film studio.
The brand we know today was founded in 1935, as the result of the merger between Fox Films Corporation and Twentieth Century Pictures.
20th Century Fox was the “father” of some successful film series, such as Avatar, the first two Star Wars trilogies, Ice Age, X-Men, Die Hard, Planet of the Apes, Night at the Museum, Fantastic Four, Alien, Predator, and the live action Alvin and the Chipmunks.
Television series produced by Fox include The Simpsons, M*A*S*H, The X-Files, Bones, House, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Futurama, How I Met Your Mother, Glee, Modern Family, New Girl, and 24.
1) Disney – $1.78 billion (approx)
I think you saw this coming. Disney is the most profitable film studio in Hollywood. It was founded in 1923 by Roy and Walt Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studios.
The Walt Disney Company is famous for the products of its film studio, which is one of the largest and best-known studios in American cinema.
Disney also owns and operates the ABC broadcast television network, cable television networks such as Disney Channel, ESPN, A+E Networks, and ABC Family and publishing, merchandising, music, and theater divisions.
But let’s not forget about Touchstone, Pixar, Marvel and The Walt Disney Motion Pictures and Animation Studios.
They are best known for their animation films such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, Bambi, Treasure Island, Cinderella, Lady and the Tramp, Sleeping Beauty and so on.
But Disney also makes great films like Pirates of Caribbean and Guardians of the Galaxy.
Which studio is your favorite?
