The year 1993 in film involved many significant films, including the blockbuster hits Jurassic Park, The Fugitive, and The Firm. (For more about films in foreign languages, check sources in those languages.)
January 1 –
China Film Import & Export Corporation ends its 40-year monopoly distributing all films in China, with 16 other Chinese film studios now responsible for distributing their own films.[3]
January 29 – Bram Stoker's Dracula opens in the United Kingdom setting an opening weekend record of £2,633,635 million.[4][5]
March 31 – actor
Brandon Lee is accidentally killed during the filming of The Crow.
May 27 – actress
Kim Basinger files for bankruptcy after a
California judge initially orders her to pay $8.9 million for refusing to honor a verbal contract to star in the film Boxing Helena. As a result, Basinger loses the town that she purchased in
1989,
Braselton, Georgia, to her partner in the deal, the pension fund of
Chicago-based
Ameritech.
May 28 – Produced by Hollywood Pictures, Super Mario Bros. opens, marking the first video game film released, starring
Bob Hoskins as Mario and
John Leguizamo as Luigi. The film would unfortunately end up grossing only $20.9 million domestically and receive negative reviews from critics.
June 11 – The filmed version of
Michael Crichton's novel Jurassic Park, a
dinosaur epic with groundbreaking
special effects directed by
Steven Spielberg, breaks box-office records with a record $50 million opening weekend and goes on to become the highest-grossing film ever made with a worldwide gross of over $900 million.[6]
June 18 –
Arnold Schwarzenegger's film career falters with the commercial disappointment of Last Action Hero, despite Columbia Pictures new logo making its debut in that film.
July 16 – Jurassic Park opens in Mexico and the United Kingdom and on July 17 in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, setting opening records in each market.[7]
October 31 – actor
River Phoenix accidentally dies of an overdose during the filming of Dark Blood. The film was later completed and released in
2012.