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Poster for The Pallbearer
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Released
1996 · FILM

The Pallbearer

Something magical is about to unfold in the most unexpected place.

Directed by
Runtime
97 min
ComedyRomance

Synopsis

Aspiring architect Tom Thompson is informed by the enigmatic Ruth Abernathy that his best friend, "Bill," has committed suicide. However, Tom has never met Bill, nor have his skeptical friends. When Tom impulsively agrees to deliver the eulogy at Bill's funeral, it propels him into a tense confrontation with Ruth—revealed to be Bill's sexually forward mother—and Julie DeMarco, a longtime crush from Tom's teenage years whom he hasn't seen in years.

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How many hands made this film

The scale of the collaboration

Principal cast & crew: 22

These are the principals we have on file — the full crew ran to the hundreds. Every film this size was made by far more hands than any credits list ever names.

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 Stan SalfasShot by Robert ElswitScored by Stewart CopelandDesigned by Robin Standefer

Box Office

1996 · Box office

📉 Underperformed — grossed 0.7× 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

$5.7M

Budget$8.0M
Worldwide gross$5.7M
break-even (2.5×)

Opening weekend: $2.3M 41% of its US run. Front-loaded — most of its money arrived opening weekend.

Opening week (7-day): $2.9M51% of its US & Canada run.

Peak 829 theaters

Also known as

  • Der Zufallsloverde
  • Le Porteur de cercueilfr
  • Tre amici, un matrimonio e un funeraleit

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