11 Incredibly Successful Movies (That Shockingly Made No Profit)

Forrest Gump earned well over $675 million at the box office, on a budget of $55 million, and yet somehow not only didn't make a profit, but actually lost $62 million.

How did this happen? Well, there were the costs of production, distribution, and marketing, but the biggest culprits were the salaries of star Tom Hanks and director Robert Zemeckis.

Hanks and Zemeckis were each paid $31 million for the film. Once all these expenses added up, and good ol' Hollywood accounting joined the fray, the movie failed to net a profit.

Winston Groom, the author of the novel on which the movie's based, was paid $350,000 for the rights to the book, and as part of the agreement, he would receive 3% of the film's profits. Unfortunately for him, there were never any profits to get 3% of.

Groom did get another $250,000 from the studio as an "advance against profits", though, so that's something.