MFF Special: Movies That Feature Characters Being Swallowed Whole Are Really Expensive to Make

There is a moment in Waterworld that has stuck with me for years. It involves Kevin Costner killing a massive sea beast with ease and then feeding it to people for dinner. I’ve never understood how a person can be swallowed whole by a many teethed beast and survive. The odds are basically insurmountable but it just keeps happening to cinematic characters.

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The following posts breaks down the numbers of the live-action films that feature characters being swallowed whole whilst engaging in battle and surviving with nary a scratch. Take a look at the Waterworld clip and you will see what I am talking about.

Sidenote: There are some films that features characters surviving a terrible ordeal. However, movies like Pinocchio, Where the Wild Things Are, Anaconda or The Empire Strikes Back don’t fit entirely into the criteria that I have set up. For instance, poor Jon Voight in Anaconda comes out on the bad side of things after being swallowed whole.

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1.The Average Budget is $194,457,667

Movies that feature people being eaten whole and getting out of it with nary a scratch are really expensive. Five of the movies (Waterworld, Pacific Rim, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest) cost over $200 million and the lowest budget was Land of the Lost’s $116 million. I’m guessing when you are featuring massive beasts you need a massive CGI budget and all of these films (sans Waterworld) have loads of CGI. Take a look at this scene from Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest and you will see what I mean.

I know Captain Jack technically dies but he still comes back with nary a scratch in the third film….

2. The Average Inflated Domestic Box Office is $257,000,000 

People love movies that feature people being swallowed whole by creatures. Compared to all my other data involving movies featuring Foghat, jet ski action scenes, Corona and pencils used as weapons the total is massive. I understand the majority of these films are summer blockbusters but I’m still really impressed with the haul. I’d forgotten how HUGE the Pirates of the Caribbean and Transformers franchises are. They both made over $450 million domestically which would be top five in any year. Too bad Land of the Lost and its $57 million haul kept the total from $300 million. I do love the T-Rex vaulting scene though.

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3. Rotten Tomatoes Critics Almost Consider Them Fresh and Audiences Sorta Love Them

The 58% RT average is actually pretty good considering this list features Transformers, Kevin Costner’s ego and broad jokes. I was pleasantly surprised to see the high ratings for Men in Black (92%), Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (81%), Hellboy (81%) and Pacific Rim (71%). I love these three films and appreciate that some of my favorite characters survived being swallowed whole.

I wasn’t surprised audience scores were above average. The 6.7 score is legit and proves audiences love a lot of these films despite deserved bad ratings from critics. Only three of the movies (Men in Black, Pacific Rim, Hellboy) had higher RT scores than IMDb scores and that is natural considering IMDb scores never reach Men in Black’s 92% RT score and critics more often than not appreciate Guillermo del Toro (7.1 > 70%) more than the mainstream audiences.

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There you have it! Movies that feature people surviving being swallowed are very expensive to make and are often profitable!

If you liked this post make sure to check out my series featuring random data and useless numbers. Start with my groundbreaking posts about Leatherface sprinting,  Deep Blue Sea and Stellan Skarsgard and Halloween H20 then work your way down the list!

1. Jet Ski Action Scenes Are the Worst
2. A Closer Look at Movies That Feature the Words Great, Good, Best, Perfect and Fantastic
3. An In-Depth Look At Movies That Feature Pencils Used as Weapons
4. Cinematic Foghat Data
5. Explosions and Movie Posters
6. The Fast & Furious & Corona
7. Nicolas Sparks Movie Posters Are Weird
8. Predicting the RT score of Baywatch
9. The Cinematic Dumb Data Podcast
10. What is the best horror movie franchise?
11. How fast can a fisherman clean a trunk?