The Death of the Mid-Budget Movie

Hollywood is only banking on movies based on renowned franchises with utterly colossal budgets. But as I was informed by my professors when I got my film producer certificate in 2021, there’s more opportunities than ever for indie and low-budget filmmakers to find audiences and funding thanks to streaming platforms and simplified distribution. But what about the middle? What happened to the mid-budget production?Mid-budget movies are loosely defined as having a production budget between $5–50 million. Some producers even define that upper end more liberally, up to $75–100 million, although $5 million would easily be an indie film with decent production values (think of 2000s indie juggernauts The Room and Shaun of the Dead, both of which were produced for about $6 million each). Millennials in particular feel nostalgic for mid-budget movies because they hit their peak when we were growing up and coming of age from the 1980s to the mid 2000s, right around the advent of Netflix but before streaming became the norm.

Mid-budget movies weren’t always memorable hits that got nominated for awards. They could become cult classics like Pineapple Express or redeemed by time like Freddy Got Fingered, but they also encompass all these movies you can watch for free on YouTube Movies that came out in this same era. 80s and 90s mid-budget flicks have this certain charm to them, even the movies that wound up being flops: sometimes they were blatant cash grabs and the actors were just phoning it in as a result, or they were fairly forgettable roles with paper-thin writing that preceded an actor’s big break. Hell, not just actors — the film world was SCREAMING upon finding out that noted DP…

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