10 Movies That Spent Stupid Money On Pointless Things

4. Swordfish Flew A Bus Over Los Angeles For Real ($15 Million)

In the entertainingly dumb 2001 thriller Swordfish, the third act sees the hacker villains take their bus full of hostages, hoist it into the sky with the help of a helicopter, swing it through the Los Angeles sky and then dump it on top of a skyscraper for safe keeping.

Warner Bros. incredibly agreed to pay $15 million for the three-and-a-half-minute sequence, a significant chunk of which was achieved practically.

Director Dominic Sena had an actual bus physically hoisted through the L.A. streets, while interior shots of the bus and hostages, as well as the marquee shot of the bus being dumped on the roof, were shot with green screen and set extensions respectively.

And while that commitment to practicality is impressive, it's not really reflected in the final scene itself, because the scene is so full of ugly digital effects in-between the practical shots that most of the audience will likely assuming it was all achieved with CGI.

The film's jaundiced aesthetic makes everything look artificial, so spending almost 15% of the $102 million budget on a scene few audiences would truly appreciate was clearly a huge mistake.

It's a rare case where doing most of the heavy lifting in post would've been the smarter decision, especially as the film was ultimately a box office bust.