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Released
1984 · FILM

The Philadelphia Experiment

A Navy sailor thrust from 1943 into 1984 must stop a rogue time‑travel experiment before its deadly ripple destroys the present.

“The experiment that should never have happened 41 years ago...is still going on.”

Directed by
Stewart Raffill
Written by
Michael Janover, William Gray
Runtime
102 min
AdventureDramaRomance
Streaming on
  • Prime Video

Synopsis

Based on an "actual event" that took place in 1943, the story centers on a U.S. Navy destroyer escort that vanished from the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard. The incident reportedly caused two men aboard the ship to be transported 40 years into the future, arriving in 1984.

Credits

Actors
Editor
Director of Photography
Writers
Director

Related titles

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How many hands made this film

The scale of the collaboration

Principal cast & crew: 23

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 Neil TravisShot by Dick BushScored by Kenneth Wannberg

Box Office

1984 · Box office

📉 Underperformed — grossed 0.9× 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

$8.1M

Budget$9.0M
Worldwide gross$8.1M
break-even (2.5×)

Opening weekend: $1.9M — 23% of its US run.

Opening week (7-day): $2.7M — 33% of its US & Canada run.

Peak 490 theaters

Also known as

  • Das Philadelphia Experimentde
  • Das Philadelphia-Experimentde

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