With $158 million already in the bank, I think it is safe to say this movie is a hit. What makes this record breaking opening taste even sweeter is that the movie is so extraordinarily good. This movie is, quite simply, jaw droppingly awesome. I sat there in rapt attention for each and every one of its 152 minutes. When it ended, my friends and I seriously thought about refusing to leave our seats until after a second screening.
We all know that The Dark Knight broke records this weekend, let's take a look at some of the records it now owns:
- Widest opening release.
- Biggest midnight open.
- Biggest IMAX open.
- Biggest July open.
- Biggest Summer open.
- Biggest single day gross.
- Biggest opening weekend (3-day) gross of 2008.
- Biggest opening weekend (3-day) gross of all time.
- Biggest PG-13 open.
- Fastest to $100 million.
I am sure there are more to come as it racks up the money during its first full week in release. Now, let me say that I cannot recommend this movie enough. It is certainly not the cheeriest piece of cinema out there, but it is endlessly compelling and Heath Ledger is an absolute force of nature. See this movie. Period.
The Dark Knight wasn't the only new kid on the marquee this week. Coming in a distant second place is the stage musical turned big screen film, Mamma Mia! This is a film which opened well with $27.7 million. It is a big, bright, sunny, feel good film that failed to connect with me.If you like this, you already know who you are. Unfortunately for me, it failed to deliver on the level that Hairspray did last year, now there is a tow tapping fun time at the cinema.
The other wide release this weekend is a low-rent animated affair called Space Chimps. On the surface level of the title alone it sounds like a can't miss proposition. You have space and chimps, it can't be anything but a match made in heaven, right? Guess again. This turned out to be a poorly animated, poorly thought out, often boring time in the theater. Even the kids seemed to be bored. I would recommend checking out either Wall*E or Kung Fu Panda again.
As for the rest of the field, last week's top film, Hellboy II: The Golden Army plummeted to fifth place, slipping more than 70%. I, like the studio, hoped it would catch The Dark Knight overflow, which does not seem to have happened. For some reason people stayed away from this endlessly imaginative and fun take on comic book material. Hopefully it will level off before catching a second wind on DVD.
Next week will see new competition from the Will Ferrell/John C. Reilley collaboration Step Brothers and X-Files: I Want to Believe, which, a week away from release has had a pretty poor promotional campaign.
Two movies dropped off the top ten this week: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (11) and Sex and the City (12).
| This Week | Last Week | Title | Wknd Gross | Overall | Week in release |
| 1 | N | The Dark Knight | $158,411,483 | $158,411,483 | 1 |
| 2 | N | Mamma Mia! | $27,751,240 | $27,751,240 | 1 |
| 3 | 2 | Hancock | $14,040,178 | $191,543,979 | 3 |
| 4 | 3 | Journey to the Center of the Earth | $12,340,435 | $43,504,712 | 2 |
| 5 | 1 | Hellboy II: The Golden Army | $10,117,815 | $56,526,885 | 2 |
| 6 | 4 | Wall*E | $10,070,396 | $182,732,709 | 4 |
| 7 | N | Space Chimps | $7,181,374 | $7,181,374 | 1 |
| 8 | 5 | Wanted | $5,072,805 | $123,322,635 | 4 |
| 9 | 6 | Get Smart | $4,125,021 | $119,608,695 | 5 |
| 10 | 8 | Kung Fu Panda | $1,860,854 | $206,616,381 | 7 |
Box Office Predictions Recap
What else can I say, but "Wow!" I thought I was stretching when I hoped for a Spider-Man 3 topping weekend. I truly thought that it would be a monster open, but come in some $20 million less than I was hoping. As it turns out, I was a lot closer with my hopes than I imagined. It will be interesting to see how high it will fly, I remember a few weeks back, while talking to some friends, I made a prediction of $375 million for the run. It will be interesting to see how its legs stand up. As for the rest of the field, I cannot believe that Hellboy II dropped as much as it did, aside from that, I was pretty close on most placements and gross predictions.
Here is how the field matched up:
| Actual | Prediction | Title | Wknd Gross | Prediction |
| 1 | The Dark Knight | $158,411,483 | $152 million | |
| 2 | 2 | Mamma Mia! | $27,751,240 | $24 million |
| 5 | 3 | Hellboy II: The Golden Army | $10,117,815 | $15 million |
| 3 | 4 | Hancock | $14,040,178 | $13.5 million |
| 5 | Journey to the Center of the Earth | $12,340,435 | $11 million | |
| 6 | 6 | Wall*E | $10,070,396 | $10 million |
| 7 | 7 | Space Chimps | $7,181,374 | $7 million |
| 8 | 8 | Wanted | $5,072,805 | $5.5 million |
| 9 | 9 | Get Smart | $4,125,021 | $3.5 million |
| 11 | 10 | Meet Dave | $1,659,424 | $2.5 million |
0 comments:
Post a Comment