Other forms: blockbusters
A blockbuster is a film that makes an enormous amount of money — the summer release with the long queues and the merchandise. The word has spread to books and to drugs: a blockbuster novel, a blockbuster medicine earning a billion a year.
It is a word about scale and money, not about quality, and it is often used with a note of resignation by people who would rather the money went elsewhere. Note the related blockbusting, which in American history means something else entirely and unpleasant — a property trick played on racially changing neighbourhoods — so the -ing form is not a safe extension of the noun.
1nounblockbusterA film, book or product that is hugely successful.
“The studio needed a blockbuster and got one.”
2adjectiveexpensiveHugely successful and expensive.
“It was given a blockbuster release in four thousand cinemas.”
blockbuster is a very successful film or product.
A blockbuster was a bomb, and the name was literal: an aerial bomb heavy enough to destroy a whole city block. The film industry took the word in the 1950s for a release that would do comparable damage to everything else in the cinema that week.
From block + buster, referring originally to aerial bombs capable of destroying a whole block of buildings.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA
Practised in Music, Art & Culture, Photography & Film