A Quora user posted on the question-and-answer site asking, "How much money has been spent attempting to bring Matt Damon back from distant places?"
The user cited "Saving Private Ryan," "Interstellar," and this year's "The Martian" as examples of films in which Damon's character must be rescued.
It turns out there are quite a few more.
Another user, Kynan Eng, calculated how much it would've actually cost to retrieve Damon from faraway places in his films, using 2015 currency rates. Eng also tallied the budgets of the movies in which he's rescued, all of which come to $729 million.
But to save Damon? Eng estimates it would reach a whopping $900 billion, with the space mission of "Interstellar" costing the most.
The breakdown is as follows:
Movie Budgets
"Courage under Fire": $46m
"Saving Private Ryan": $70m
"Titan AE": $75m
"Syriana": $50m
"Green Zone": $100m
"Elysium": $115m
"Interstellar": $165m
"The Martian": $108m
TOTAL: $729m
Fictional Costs of Saving Matt Damon
(costs are in 2015 currency)
"Courage Under Fire" (Gulf War 1 helicopter rescue): $300k
"Saving Private Ryan" (WW2 Europe search party): $100k
"Titan AE" (Earth evacuation spaceship): $200B
"Syriana" (Middle East private security return flight): $50k
"Green Zone" (US Army transport from Middle East): $50k
"Elysium" (Space station security deployment and damages): $100m
"Interstellar" (Interstellar spaceship): $500B
"The Martian" (Mars mission): $200B
TOTAL: $900B plus change