What is the most successful movie ever?

Answer 1

As of December 2010, Avatar (2009)holds the record for both domestic ($760,507,625) and worldwide ($2,779,551,867) box office receipts. However, when adjusted for inflation, Gone with the Wind (1939) holds the record for domestic box office receipts at $1,606,254,777, followed by Star Wars (1977) at $1,416,050,800, and The Sound of Music (1965) at $1,132,202,200. Avatar (2009) is ranked fourteenth in this category.

Judging a movie's success is problematic. Like comparing sports statistics over different eras, it is difficult to judge the success of a movie released in, say, 1939 with one released in the last couple of years. The population has increased dramatically in the last 70 years. Some movies released many years ago have been re-released several times over the years, while others have not. If you judge a movie's success by the number of tickets sold, you should consider the country's and the world's population. Fifty million people buying tickets for given movie today is not as impressive as fifty million people doing so 70 years ago. In terms of ticket sales, the best statistic would be what percentage of the population went to see the movie.

In terms of the most Oscar wins and the most Oscar nominations, Titanic (1997) holds those records.

This is one of those questions that really don't have a "fair" answer. What I mean is, in say, 1939, when Gone with the Wind (one of the most successful film of all time) was released, tickets I'm sure didn't cost much more than lets say 25 cents for arguments sake. In 2009 when Avatar was released they cost oh, $9-$12 on average? So really, Avatar would only have to sell about 1 ticket to every 36 - 48 for Gone with the wind in order to make the same amount. Now, I was only using those movies as models for my argument about most "successful" movie of all time. Also, what makes it unfair if the fact that there were far less theaters back then, there were no CD's, Cassettes, 8 tracks or even vinyl albums back then so there was 0 earnings outside of the theaters which numbered about 8,000 - 10000, today there are roughly 18,000-20,000 and that number does not indicate how many screen there are as most have multiple and some have as many as 16-20 at one site. So, in my estimation taking all that into account I'd have to say that either Gone with the Wind or Star Wars.