From ‘Jaws’ To ‘Batman’ To ‘Jurassic’: June’s Biggest Box Office Blockbusters

In order of inflation-adjusted domestic earnings, here are the biggest summer blockbusters to open (in North America) in the month of June.

Had things gone as planned, I’d be frantically doing the math concerning the domestic opening weekend of Wonder Woman 1984, as well as deducing whether the overseas debut meant that it would get a bump overseas in line with its expected domestic debut boost. Barring a fluke, we wouldn’t be looking at a new June opening weekend record (Jurassic World and its $208 million debut in 2015) or a new milestone for unadjusted domestic earnings for a June release (same, with $652 million).

So, with no new releases of that nature to discuss, I wanted to take a moment to dive into the record books for this sixth month of the year, a month where some of the biggest movies of all time, summer release or otherwise, made their stand. Without further ado, in order of adjusted domestic earnings specifically during their initial theatrical release, here are the 12 biggest blockbusters to play in the month of June. No surprise, but there’s quite a bit of Steven Spielberg representation right at the top.

Jaws (1975)

Unadjusted box office: $260 million

Inflation-adjusted box office: $1.2 billion

It makes sense that the first modern summer movie blockbuster would also be the very biggest domestic grosser, in terms of tickets sold, in the month of June. Steven Spielberg’s world-changing adaptation of Peter Benchley’s pulp novel was the first movie to earn $200 million in raw domestic earnings, inspiring four sequels (none of which Spielberg directed) and almost single-handedly turning the glorified B movie into an A movie in the eyes of an industry looking at unthinkably huge earnings. Two years later, film school pal George Lucas would seal the deal with Star Wars in May of 1977, as that sci-fi swashbuckler would earn $307 million in its initial theatrical release ($1.291 billion adjusted) and change the course of Hollywood forever.

E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial (1982)

Unadjusted box office: $359 million

Inflation-adjusted box office: $1.144 billion

Steven Spielberg’s coming-of-age drama about a young boy befriending a benevolent alien was, for 15 years, the biggest-grossing domestic earner of all time, legging out to $359 million domestic from a $11 million launch in June of 1982. The film sits alongside Jaws as prototypical Spielberg, even if the unapologetic cruelty of Jaws or War of the Worlds is arguably more representative of his filmography than the comparative gee-whiz adventure of E.T. or Hook. Moreso than Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind or even Raiders of the Lost Ark, this “boy and his unusual friend” flick essentially defined Spielberg as the definitive creator of fantastical entertainments safe for adults but smart enough and dangerous for smart kids. The sense of awe, the child’s-eye view, the John Williams themes, and the small-town authenticity still makes this modern classic crackle despite its specific pleasures being ripped off so often to almost qualify E.T. as its own sub-genre.

Jurassic Park (1993)

Unadjusted box office: $357 million

Inflation-adjusted box office: $742 million

Jurassic Park combines both the “oooh, ahhh” and the “running and screaming” that defines Spielberg as our definitive summer movie auteur. We get our fair share of slack-jawed wonder and soaring discovery before those pesky cloned dinosaurs get loose and start eating people. The PG-13 adaptation of the explicitly R-rated Michael Crichton novel (Crichton admitted that you can’t do “offscreen violence” in a book) was a leggy sensation, becoming perhaps the last blockbuster to play long enough to get an actual boost from second-run theaters. It was the first $900 million-plus global grosser of all time and put Spielberg back on top after a comparative post-E.T. slump. As a film, it’s top-flight popcorn entertainment, bridging the gap between superb practical effects and groundbreaking CGI (used in moderation). Moreover, like Independence Day three years later, it was a $65 million fantasy that still required memorable characters and engaging dialogue to account for the inability to afford non-stop action.

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Unadjusted box office: $212 million

Inflation-adjusted box office: $715 million

Coming off the overbudgeted likes of Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind and 1941 (a poorly-reviewed Pearl Harbor comedy that didn’t so much flop as it did come in well below expectations), Steven Spielberg needed to prove that he could actually make a movie on time and on budget. And since he wasn’t able to snag a gig directing a 007 movie, he and his buddy George Lucas decided to make their “American James Bond” instead. Billed as the “next great adventure” from the Jaws guy and the Star Wars guy, Raiders of the Lost Ark starred Harrison Ford (after NBC wouldn’t let Tom Sellick out of his Magnum P.I. contract) as a professor of archeology who moonlights as a globe-trotting tomb raider. The $22 million action flick brought the American action movie out of a 50-year slump and still remains, alongside Lucas’ Star Wars, a defining example of “rip-off, don’t remake.”

Jurassic World (2015)

Unadjusted box office: $652 million

Adjusted box office: $704 million

Well, here’s the first non-Spielberg entry on the list, although Spielberg was a producer, and the film’s initial success is at least partially attributed to the popularity of the initial Jurassic Park trilogy. Arriving 14 years after Joe Johnston’s Jurassic Park III, this Colin Trevorrow-directed flick was a “legacy-sequel” done right. It had the raw appeal of “dinosaurs causing chaos and carnage” a cool hook (“The park is open but consumers are getting bored with the dinos.”), a kid-friendly co-lead (Chris Pratt fresh off LEGO Movie and Guardians of the Galaxy) alongside a game Bryce Dallas-Howard. That it was, screenplay nitpicks aside, a ripping and IMAX-scaled popcorn entertainment that appealed to folks without any interest in the Jurassic IP is why it legged out beyond its record-setting $208 million opening. The Internet now pretends that it was terrible and everyone hated it, but the colorful dino romp was leggier than The Avengers and grossed $1.651 billion worldwide.

The Lion King (1994)

Unadjusted box office: $312 million

Inflation-adjusted box office: $702 million

The crowning achievement of the Waking Sleeping Beauty era of Jeffrey Katzenberg’s animated renaissance period, this “Bambi in Africa” or “Hamlet with lions” melodrama looked, felt and played like an epic despite a 88-minute running time. The soaring “Circle of Life” sequence, which was debuted by itself as the film’s jaw-dropping teaser trailer in November of 1993, set the stage for the gravitas to come. It opened with $41 million in June of 1994, the fourth-biggest opening weekend ever at the time, and played all summer long partially thanks to an all-star (Matthew Broderick, James Earl Jones, Jeremy Irons, etc.) vocal cast. The movie now plays like parable for the real-world conflicts at Disney
DIS
(after the death of Frank Marshall left Katzenberg and Michael Eisner vying for the top spot). It sold more VHS tapes (32 million) than any title in history, and a 3-D theatrical reissue earned $94 million domestic in 2011. Oh, and a “live-action” remake earned $541 million domestic and $1.643 billion worldwide last summer.

Grease (1978)

Unadjusted box office: $159 million

Inflation-adjusted box office: $640 million

Thanks to both the popularity of John Travolta’s Saturday Night Fever from the previous year and the popularity of the Broadway show, this was a genuine event musical during a time when musicals were in a generational slump. Nonetheless, the film was the year’s highest-grossing offering, ahead of zeitgeist-y titles like Animal House ($141 million) and Superman: The Movie ($134 million) and cemented Travolta as a pop culture icon even if none of his 1980’s movies (save for Look Who’s Talking 11 years later) came close to this film’s relative success. Credit the primal Romeo and Juliet hook, with winning songs offered up with a dose of 1950’s nostalgia in a thirst-filled but kid-friendly package, and, yeah, I still maintain that when Hollywood puts big money into big (and kid-friendly) musicals that audiences show up. A 1998 reissue almost knocked Titanic off the top of the weekend box office, and now even Grease 2 has undergone a critical reevaluation.   

Ghostbusters (1984)

Unadjusted box office: $229 million

Inflation-adjusted box office: $638 million

One of three massively successful movies released in 1984 and 1985, alongside Beverly Hills Cop six months later and Back to the Future in 1985, that showed Hollywood that the potential for mega-bucks wasn’t just confined to Steven Spielberg and George Lucas movies. The sci-fi fantasy, which worked as both a kid-sized horror movie and an adult-friendly comedy, was the first non-Spielberg/Lucas flick to top $200 million domestic. It actually opened on the same day as the Spielberg-produced Gremlins ($148 million from a $12.5 million debut/$401 million adjusted) and both films legged out all summer. In retrospect, the distinctly blue collar “slobs vs. snobs” comedy shows the danger of presuming that a (genuinely good) character-driven high concept blockbuster can yield a franchise unto itself. Ghostbusters II earned a record-breaking $29 million in June of 1989 only to crash and finish with just $109 million. Sometimes a hit movie is just a hit movie.

Cleopatra (1963)

Unadjusted box office: $57.7 million

Inflation-adjusted box office $636 million

The most expensive film of all time in its day, this $44 million 20th Century Fox release is an odd duck in that it was quite successful in terms of actual grosses, earning what today would be around $636 million in North America alone. But the film was so expensive that it almost bankrupted Fox and caused a number of major projects to be put in turnaround. The film’s eventual $40.3 million in earnings sent back to Fox wasn’t enough to justify the then-obscene expense. It eventually broke even after Fox sold the TV rights for a then-record $5 million. The Elizabeth Taylor/Richard Burton epic is a definitive example of a film so expensive that even best-case-scenario box office wasn’t enough. By all variables save for its massive budget, Cleopatra was a big success. The financial hit Fox would take wouldn’t really be undone, even with The Sound of Music in 1965, until Star Wars in 1977.

Incredibles 2 (2018)

Unadjusted box office: $608 million

Inflation-adjusted box office: $608 million

Yes, there are two films in the top ten in terms of “tickets sold” for June releases, so, yes, audiences are still willing to show up with bells on for the theatrical experience in certain circumstances. The long-awaited Pixar sequel to Brad Bird’s “superhero family” blockbuster ($261 million in 2004/$383 million adjusted) was the very definition of a sequel that audiences actually wanted to see. The well-reviewed follow-up nabbed a record-crushing (for a toon) $183 million opening and then legged out pretty well for the rest of the summer despite some intense competition and the mere fact that superhero movies and PG-rated action toons were far more common than they were in 2004. In terms of raw “part 1 to part 2” boosts, Incredibles 2’s 133% boost sits among the biggest for any straight-up sequel to a first-time blockbuster (as opposed to a breakout sequel) in modern history. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Incredibles 3 in theaters over the next several years.

Psycho (1960)

Unadjusted box office: $32 million

Inflation-adjusted box office: $588 million

Alfred Hitchcock’s adaption, penned by Joseph Stefano, of Robert Bloch’s lurid novel, is often considered the first modern slasher movie (give or take the underappreciated-in-its-time Peeping Tom). It was one of the first big movies where the main baddie wasn’t a professional criminal but rather someone undone by mental illness. The film is famous for the end-of-first-act murder of its presumed protagonist (Janet Leigh’s Marion Crane), a plot twist which had Hitchcock insisting that audiences not enter the theater in the middle of the movie and resulted in a marketing campaign that mostly kept Leigh and co-star Anthony Perkins (as a gee-whiz-gosh charming/movie star handsome Norman Bates) off the publicity tour. He also insisted that critics not see the film before its release, which may have aided in an initial round of mixed-negative reviews. Filmed with a TV crew for just $807,000, the flick was something of a comeback vehicle after Vertigo and became his biggest domestic grosser.

Batman (1989)

Unadjusted box office: $251 million

Inflation-adjusted box office: $573 million

Depending on your age, Tim Burton’s towering, gothic and macabre adaptation of the Bob Kane/Bill Finger comic book may be the definitive summer movie blockbuster. It was preceded by a six-month wave of “Bat Mania,” whereby merchandise flooded the marketplace and unprecedented hype for a non-sequel (since maybe Gone with the Wind) flooded the media outlets. It shattered the opening weekend record with a $43 million (including previews) Fri-Sun debut and became the biggest-grossing “not a Spielberg/Lucas movie” of all time in raw domestic earnings, at least until Home Alone in late 1990. Ironically, it would place second worldwide to Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade that summer. The Michael Keaton/Jack Nicholson action fantasy changed Hollywood forever, showing the potential for hype-driven blockbusters that A) weren’t sequels and B) were driven by the preestablished popularity of a specific piece of IP. The allure of big movie stars playing iconic pop culture characters would define Hollywood as we know it for the next 30 years.

The rest of the $400 million-plus earners…

Finding Dory – $486 million in 2016/$512 million adjusted

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen – $402 million in 2009/$488 million adjusted

Toy Story 3 – $415 million in 2010/$479 million adjusted

The Caine Mutiny – $21.75 million in 1954/$453 million adjusted

Toy Story 4 – $434 million in 2019

Wonder Woman – $413 million in 2017/$419 million adjusted

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom – $417 million in 2018

Transformers: Dark of the Moon – $353 million in 2011/$416 million adjusted

Gremlins – $148 million in 1984/$401 million adjusted