Plain Clothes backdrop
Plain Clothes poster
#11,898 All-time worldwide
#202 1988 releases

Movie profile

Plain Clothes

1988 · 98 min · Sierra Alta Productions

Comedy Thriller Mystery Crime Romance Action
IMDb FilmDB Where to watch

Box office snapshot

Financial performance

Reference figures based on available reported data.
Worldwide gross $289,323
Budget $7.5M
Gross minus budget -$7.2M
ROI 0.04x

Domestic gross

$115,729

Estimated from worldwide gross

International gross

$173,594

Estimated from worldwide gross

Opening weekend

$32,404

Estimated from worldwide gross

Ranking context

Where Plain Clothes ranks

Positioned across the all-time chart, release year, studio, franchise and genre indexes where enough mapped data exists.
Open rankings
All-time worldwide #11,898 All-time chart position of 12,922 titles Compared with every rankable movie in the current worldwide dataset. 1988 releases #202 Release-year chart position of 248 titles Ranked against movies released in 1988. Primary genre #4,524 Comedy of 4,840 titles Genre context based on the first mapped genre on this profile.

Nearby worldwide ranks

Comparable titles immediately around this movie by reported worldwide gross.

#11,895 I'm Dancing as Fast as I Can 1982 · $291,390 #11,896 Cold Feet 1989 · $290,000 #11,897 Lovelines 1984 · $289,814 #11,899 Continental 1989 · $288,486 #11,900 Matador 1986 · $286,126 #11,901 Cold Steel 1987 · $285,885

Quick answer

How did Plain Clothes (1988) perform at the box office?

High confidence

Plain Clothes (1988) earned a reported $289.3K worldwide against a reported $7.5M production budget. Its gross-minus-budget figure is about -$7.2M. The current gross-to-budget multiple is 0.04x. In this database it currently ranks #11,898 in the current all-time worldwide chart set and #202 among 1988 releases.

Worldwide gross
$289,323
Budget
$7,500,000
Gross minus budget
-$7,210,677
ROI
0.04x
Source: TMDb. Last updated: Jul 13, 2026. View source Gross-minus-budget is not studio net profit. It excludes marketing, distribution fees, revenue splits, tax incentives and later home/streaming revenue.

Synopsis

Story

To prove his brother's innocence, undercover officer Nick enrolls in high school again, dealing with crushes, bullies, humiliations, popularity swings, and quirky teachers and staff to find the real murderer.

Movie facts

Production details

Release date
Apr 15, 1988
Production
Sierra Alta Productions, Paramount Pictures
Countries
US

Related indexes

Browse related box office pages

Studio / production companySierra Alta Productions Release year chart1988 box office Genre chartComedy Genre chartThriller Genre chartMystery Genre chartCrime

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AI summary

Why this movie matters

Released in 1988, Plain Clothes is positioned in this dataset as a Comedy, Thriller, Mystery title from Sierra Alta Productions. Its box office profile shows that available worldwide gross is $289,323, reported production budget is $7.5M, gross-minus-budget is -$7.2M, ROI is 0.04x. For comparison, it currently sits #11,898 all-time in the current chart set and #202 among 1988 releases. Streaming availability should be checked against the selected United States region because provider rights can change.

AI-generated contextual summary based on available movie, genre, ranking and box office data. It does not replace official distributor notes or financial reporting.
Data noteGross minus budget is not studio net profit. It excludes marketing, distribution fees, revenue splits, tax incentives and downstream revenue. Domestic, international and opening weekend figures marked as estimated are modelled estimates.