Will X-Men: Days Of Future Past Be The Second Most Expensive Film Of All Time?

Considering that the film combines two distinct branches of a franchise and has an absolutely massive, all-star cast, it's no surprise that Bryan Singer's X-Men: Days of Future Past is expected to be one of the biggest budgeted projects of 2014, but what may surprise you is where it will rank on the all-time charts. According to The Calgary Herald (via The Hollywood Reporter), the price tag on the superhero blockbuster is so high that when it is released next year it will become the second most expensive movie ever made.

The superlative comes from an article that the Canadian newspaper ran earlier this week when it was revealed that Singer and the production of the new X-Men movie would be heading back to Montreal to do some reshoots (though the director himself ,later corrected the report on his personal Twitter page, saying that they are doing pick-ups, not reshoots). Unfortunately a key detail that is left out of the Calgary Herald story is exactly how much Days of Future Past is going to cost. The film currently holding the top spot on the big budget list, as you probably predicted, James Cameron's Avatar, which estimates have said cost 20th Century Fox about $500 million. For comparison purposes, Matthew Vaughn's X-Men: First Class cost about $160 million.

The price tag for Avatar was so high because Cameron and his crew were pushing the limits of CGI and 3D technology in making the film, so it begs the question what X-Men: Days of Future Past is doing to cost so much. The new comic book adaptation is guaranteed to have plenty of visual effects, but we can't really expect anything on the level of Cameron's movie, right?

We're sure to hear more about the movie's actual budget when the film comes out next May and we start hearing comparisons between its cost and box office totals. Until then, however, expect specific details to be kept hidden by the studio for a little while.

Based on a script by Simon Kinberg and Matthew Vaughn, X-Men: Days of Future Past follows the crew of the original X-Men trilogy as they try to survive an apocalyptic future and work to send Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) back in time to 1972 to stop an event that changes the course of history. James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult, Sir Patrick Stewart, Sir Ian McKellen, Halle Berry, Anna Paquin, Shawn Ashmore, Ellen Page, Daniel Cudmore, Adam Canto, Peter Dinklage, Omar Sy, Booboo Stewart, Evan Peters, Josh Helman, and Fan Bing Bing all star in the film, which will be in theaters on May 23, 2014.

Eric Eisenberg
Assistant Managing Editor

Eric Eisenberg is the Assistant Managing Editor at CinemaBlend. After graduating Boston University and earning a bachelor’s degree in journalism, he took a part-time job as a staff writer for CinemaBlend, and after six months was offered the opportunity to move to Los Angeles and take on a newly created West Coast Editor position. Over a decade later, he's continuing to advance his interests and expertise. In addition to conducting filmmaker interviews and contributing to the news and feature content of the site, Eric also oversees the Movie Reviews section, writes the the weekend box office report (published Sundays), and is the site's resident Stephen King expert. He has two King-related columns.