MovieChat Forums > Bottle Rocket (1996) Discussion > A budget of 7 million dollars?

A budget of 7 million dollars?


This is one of my favourite films but for some reason I always thought it was made on a shoestring budget.

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In Hollywood, that is shoestring.

Let's be bad guys.

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Not 20 years ago, 7 mil could actually pay for a decent amount. This film looks like it was filmed for a couple mil at most. El mariachi was filmed for like 7 grand and looked similar.

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Even 20 years ago, it was a bit of a shoestring budget. Kevin Smith talks about how he only got $6 million for Mallrats, which to him was huge, but not Hollywood.

El Mariachi was filmed for 7 grand, yes, but it was not a studio production.

Seize the moment, 'cause tomorrow you might be dead.

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7 mil back then equals 11 mil today, yea thats still a relatively small budget but this film had no name actors for the time. John wick cost only 20 mil and had some real big actors and looks a hell of a lot better than this!

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this film had no name actors for the time.


James Caan. Not a huge name, but still a name.

And of course it looks better. More advanced cameras. More advanced editing software.

Seize the moment, 'cause tomorrow you might be dead.

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That figure likely includes all the money spent during the years of development (Owen and Wes were paid per diem for something like 2 years doing script rewrites) and also reshoots after poor test screenings. You also have to keep in mind that it was their first feature. I'm sure with their experience today they could do this even cheaper than they did 20 some years ago.

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