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Poster for City of Ember
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Released
2008 · FILM

City of Ember

Two daring teenagers race against a failing generator to uncover Ember’s hidden exit before darkness consumes their underground world forever.

“Escape is the only option”

Directed by
Gil Kenan, Jeffrey Kember
Written by
Caroline Thompson, Jeanne Duprau
Rated
MPA · PG
Runtime
95 min
AdventureDramaFamily
Streaming on
  • Paramount+

Synopsis

For generations, the people of the City of Ember have lived in a world of glowing lights. However, the city's once-powerful generator is failing, causing the great lamps that illuminate Ember to begin flickering. Now, two teenagers must race against time to search the city for clues that will reveal the ancient mystery of Ember's existence before the lights go out forever.

Credits

Actors
Editor
Production Designer
Director of Photography
Writers
Directors

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How many hands made this film

The scale of the collaboration

A crew of 593+ 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 Zach StaenbergShot by Xavier GrobetScored by Andrew LockingtonDesigned by Martin LaingSound by Will FilesCostumes by Ruth Myers Nm0616848Stunts by Phil AdamsVFX by Olivier Cauwet

Box Office

2008 · Box office

📉 Underperformed — grossed 0.3× 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

$17.9M

Budget$55.0M
Worldwide gross$17.9M
break-even (2.5×)

Opening week (7-day): $4.2M

Peak 2,022 theaters

Also known as

  • City of Emberde
  • City of Ember - Flucht aus der Dunkelheitde
  • La Cité de l'ombrefr
  • Ember - Il mistero della città di luceit

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