This movie could have bombed at the box office and it still would have been profitable because of all the merchandising and product endorsements. Star Wars makes more money from merchandising and product endorsements and tie ins than any other movie franchise. But if we are talking about a single movie without any sequels the most profitable just from merchandising and product endorsements and tie ins was E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. Just Atari spend between $20 and $25 million dollars to get the license for its video game which is more then the movies production budget which was $10.5 million dollars. The movie had tons of other merchandise and product endorsements and tie in plus the movie itself had a fair amount of product placement in it.
