Why Cleopatra, Lawrence of Arabia, Ben-Hur & Other Hollywood Classics Still Look So Good

Why Cleopatra, Lawrence of Arabia, Ben-Hur & Other Hollywood Classics Still Look So Good Cleopatra cost Twentieth Century Fox $44 million, by the studio’s own estimate. That may sound like the budget of one of those genre pictures that winds up going straight to streaming, but if we convert those 1963 dollars into current ones, it comes out to $480 million. The most expensive film ever made up to that point, it remained an industry symbol of near-parodically troubled production and grotesque cost inflation for decades. Like The Wizard of Oz, it failed to recoup its investment during its initial theatrical run, eventually turning a profit thanks only to re-releases and television rights sales. And yet, these six decades later, the investment seems to have proven sound, at least according to the video above from YouTube channel Wolfcrow, “Why Cleopatra Still Looks Like a Trillion Bucks.” Unlike some infamously expensive movies, Cleopatra doesn’t leave you wond

Added 14 Oct 2026