Disney shells out £1.3bn to make Marvel films in the UK

Accounts have revealed that Disney spent more than £1.3bn British ­elements of its Marvel super hero movies, including those featuring Captain America - Jay Maidment/Disney/Marvel/AP

Marvel films have had an heroic ­impact in Britain, according to ­accounts that show Disney has spent more than £1.3bn to produce elements of the series here over the years.

Avengers: Infinity War, the latest blockbuster in the series, is due out this month and filming included ­locations in Glasgow and Durham.

Accounts for the production show that £248m was spent in the UK on staff and services.

The detail of Hollywood budgets is usually a closely-guarded secret. ­However, the costs of movies filmed in Britain are consolidated in single ­companies which have to file publicly-available accounts. The company ­behind Infinity War is Assembled ­Productions III.

A review of production accounts dating back to Captain America in 2011, the first Marvel film partly made in the UK, shows that Disney has spend more than £1.3bn overall on the British ­elements including special effects.

Disney bought Marvel for $4bn ($2.8bn) in 2009 and since then seven of the 18 movies based on its comic book characters have been produced in Britain. It is expected that the costs of Infinity War will increase in the next set of accounts as it was still in production after the year end. Its predecessor, which was made entirely in Britain, had costs of £306.1m including £52.3m spent on staff. At the other end of the spectrum is 2015’s Ant Man as it was largely made in Atlanta. However, even that had an economic impact of £121m in Britain.

Figures released by the British Film Institute (BFI) show that £1.9bn was spent on the production of movies in Britain last year with £1.7bn of it ­coming from foreign firms.

They include live-action versions of classic Disney cartoons Dumbo and Aladdin as well as the next instalment in the Star Wars saga.

It was a 23pc increase on the ­previous year and the highest since the BFI ­began collecting records more than 20 years ago.

It has even prompted Disney to open a new London base for Industrial Light and Magic, its post-production studio responsible for special effects.