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Poster for Back to School
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Released
1986 · FILM

Back to School

Self‑made millionaire Thornton Melon crashes his son’s college campus to prove he can succeed where his kid feels defeated, only to discover that money can’t cheat the rigors of exams, rivalries and a campus culture determined to keep him out.

“He enrolled in college for the pursuit of finer things...like co-eds, shapely professors, fun and rock and roll.”

Directed by
Alan Metter
Written by
Steven Kampmann, William Porter
Rated
MPA · PG-13
Runtime
96 min
ComedyRomanceSport

Synopsis

Self-made millionaire Thornton Melon decides to get a better education and enrolls at his son Jason's college.

Credits

Actors
Editor
Production Designer
Director of Photography
Writers
Director

Related titles

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How many hands made this film

The scale of the collaboration

A crew of 73+ credited

Why a floor?

This is a minimum, not a total. We only count the credits we’ve captured so far, and coverage is uneven — a blockbuster might show a few hundred names while another of the same size shows a couple dozen. The real crews all ran into the thousands. The number here only grows as full credits are enriched — so we frame it as a floor, never a headcount.

Craft leads on file

Edited by David RawlinsShot by Thomas E AckermanScored by Danny ElfmanDesigned by David L Snyder

Box Office

1986 · Box office

💰 Box-office hit — grossed 8.3× its budget

Why 2.5×?

Cinemas keep roughly half of every ticket sold, and a wide release’s marketing often costs about as much again as the film — so a movie needs to gross around 2.5× its production budget just to break even theatrically. It’s a rule of thumb, not the studio’s ledger (home video and streaming come later).

Worldwide gross

$91.3M

Budget$11.0M
Worldwide gross$91.3M
break-even (2.5×)

Opening weekend: $8.9M — 10% of its US run. It had legs — it kept earning long after opening weekend.

Opening week (7-day): $14.8M — 16% of its US & Canada run.

Peak 1,605 theaters

Also known as

  • Mach’s noch mal, Dadde
  • Mach's nochmal, Dadde
  • À fond la facfr
  • A scuola con papàit

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