First off, let me just say this: as much as I love me some good kickass Spider-Man action, the amount that is circulated in the media as the overall budget for the making of '3' is waaaaay out there! Sure, I know that it's probably the best of the three installments (at least, that's what the entire world is hoping) and that Sony is crossing its fingers as we speak to be even more successful than the previous two, but this is half a billion dollars we're talking about here! For two hours or less of film!

'Spider-Man 3' is now being premiered over the world in select cities but the hype is so huge that no one is actually focusing on the movie anymore. Why, you ask? Simply because everyone is stunned about the potential costs of such a mind-blowing project! Taking into account the prolonged production (which was supposed to end last summer but dragged on well into 2007), the superb special effects and the stellar cast, we can all understand why specialists claim that the whole budget was somewhere in the range of $500 million, of which more than $350 million went into post-production.

When contacted about this, Sony representatives strongly denied it. Neither were they that keen to reveal the real costs. However, from the many statements and especially from the way each one is different from the previous ones, we could conclude that maybe this rumor is not so far-fetched. A studio spokesperson dismissed the rumor as a 'complete fabrication', insisting that the production costs did not exceed $270 million. Laura Ziskin, one of the producers, also refused to say what was the actual budget, limiting herself to only this: 'I refuse to say the [real] number because it makes me choke. "Spider-Man 3" was a super expensive movie - the most expensive film we've ever made. But there's no way you can get to $300 million'.

You can imagine no Sony representative or spokesperson is going to be truly honest about the kind of money they invested in the latest adventure of Spidey because, well, that's what movie studios usually do - lower the cost a bit for the media and the public. However, taking into consideration that, say, shooting the scenes in New York cost $1 million per day, the massive promotional tour, the stars (who have to cash in their salaries and be pampered accordingly), the jaw-breaking special effects and the fact that Sony is hoping to break all boundaries with this third part, the rumor that the budget sky-rocketed to $500 million could be, against all odds and whatever else is being claimed, true.

Making multi-million dollar movies is not something new in Hollywood but this is one exception: until now, the only movie which cost more than that was the 1963 epic 'Cleopatra', whose budget was estimated at $290 million (inflation-adjusted budget for the sake of comparison). This literally makes 'Spider-Man 3' the most expensive movie ever made in the history of cinematography. It'd better be worth all that money!