How badly did this film bomb?

Where did you see it broke even?

Years later in just rentals alone it did a little over 5 million according to IMDb and Box Office Mojo , and it cost 5 million to make in 1957 again according to IMDB and Box Office Mojo, but the TCM site doesn't list what it cost to make the film. I don't know about the 5 million dollar budget, "Bridge on the River Kwai" was made for about 3 million and was made and released in 1957, and made a little over 30 million at the box office. The third war picture made that year was "Paths of Glory" and it's estimated budget was about 9300,000.00.

It's my understanding that the film did well, Mr. Clift himself had commented that it would do well because people would go out of curiosity to see the difference in his appearance before and after the accident.

It's interesting that in 1957 they actually made three war pictures with major film stars that covered the Civil War, WW I and WW II.

Movies will make you famous; Television will make you rich; But theatre will make you good.

I could make a long list of films that were box office failures but got major Oscar nominations.

I'll Teach You To Laugh At Something's That's Funny
Homer Simpson

Referring to a cable documentary that I once saw. In the days of the 'studio' films, like any other business, ancillary costs were accredited/billed to the films in production at the time. ie: if you had five films in production, costs of studio electricity, accounting, security, etc. would be divided up and charged to said films. The example given was Cleopatra at 20th Century Fox. For a period of time, it was the only Fox film in production, therefore, ALL studio expenses were charged to it. Did it actually cost $40,000,000.00 to make ? Of course not, but, on the studio books, it did. This has entered current society as the concept that, NO film ever makes money.