Two words to describe 'The Dark Knight'; F@#%$&* Awesome!!. Move over Ironman, Hulk, Hellboy...there's a new hero in town. Christopher Nolan's brilliant masterpiece is totally rocks, this is how Batman movies should be made. Darker plot, an edge of your seat thrills and suspense added by cutting edge mind blowing special effects and jaw dropping action [Kapow!! - Gotham City was actually shot in Chicago]. A big thanks to Heath Ledger as the anarchic Joker for his outstanding and impressive performance [if I'm with the Academy Awards, I'll be giving him the 'Best Supporting Role Award' though], best villain ever for 2008. He really brings the character alive. For me I'm going to watch it the second time. Fantastic! This movie is too perfect. - Ibrahem.SThe eagerly awaited new Batman film The Dark Knight broke the all-time opening weekend box office record and drove the overall North American marketplace to the largest frame in history with moviegoers dumping over $250M into theater cash registers over three days. The new musical Mamma Mia! managed to connect with its non-superhero fan base and posted a strong opening of its own in Knight's shadow while the animated comedy Space Chimps debuted to mild numbers. After back-to-back weekends when ticket sales were softer than last year's, the box office soared to heights never before seen.
Records fell this weekend thanks to sky high demand to see the latest Caped Crusader vehicle The Dark Knight which hauled in a jaw-dropping $155.3M over the Friday-to-Sunday period to set a new industry benchmark. Averaging a stunning $35,579 from 4,366 theaters, the PG-13 comic book flick edged past the previous opening weekend record of $151.1M held by another superhero sequel Spider-Man 3 from the first weekend of May last year. The Peter Parker pic even had more total screens with roughly 10,000 which was about 800 more than Knight's tally. Batman's gross included $18.5M from Thursday night shows between midnight and 3am which also set a record beating the $16.9M of 2005's Star Wars Episode III. Critics piled on praise for the $180M-budgeted Dark Knight which scored some of the best reviews of the year.
The new Batman film reunited director Christopher Nolan and actor Christian Bale who successfully rebooted the franchise with 2005's Batman Begins after the series was left for dead after 1997's disastrous Batman & Robin starring George Clooney and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Begins opened on a Wednesday in mid-June with $48.7M over three days and $72.9M over its five-day opening period leading to a solid $205.3M domestic final. The Dark Knight will surpass that mark in under a week's time. Veteran character actors Gary Oldman, Michael Caine, and Morgan Freeman also returned while Aaron Eckhart, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Heath Ledger joined the cast. Ledger's acclaimed performance as The Joker became a magnet attracting millions of comic and action fans and his accidental death in January only heightened the curiosity factor making the must-see film of 2008.
The Dark Knight blew open the bank vault door on Friday and made off with an eye-popping $67.9M (including Thursday night midnight sales) smashing the records for best opening day and best single day gross ever. Both of those marks were held by Spider-Man 3 with $59.8M. Sales fell sharply on Saturday by 29% to $48M, still an amazing haul, and Warner Bros. is estimating that Sunday's gross will slip by only 18% and come in at $39.5M. Knight's Saturday and Sunday tallies were the second best ever. The Spidey threequel can still claim those records with $51.3M and $39.9M, respectively. Rival studios on Sunday projected a three-day tally between $151-153M. Final numbers will be released on Monday.
Also adding excitement to the film's release was the fact that Dark Knight was the first regular movie to use IMAX cameras during filming. Six action sequences were shot with the heavy-duty equipment allowing those who see the film in IMAX theaters a greater entertainment experience. This helped Knight set a new record for biggest IMAX opening with $6.2M from 94 venues this weekend for a scorching $66,000 average. Ticket prices are also higher for the large screen format.
After just three days of release, The Dark Knight is already the sixth biggest blockbuster of the summer and is virtually guaranteed to swipe the 2008 box office crown away from Iron Man in the coming weeks. With all students out of school in July, midweek grosses will be much stronger than in early May when the metal man and the last webslinger pic debuted.
This weekend's achievement was nothing new for the Caped Crusader. In fact, Dark Knight is the fourth Batman film to break the all-time opening weekend record. The first Batman did the deed in 1989 with its $42.7M bow at a time when no film had ever debuted to $30M, much less $40M, over a three-day weekend. That record stayed for three years and was broken in 1992 by Batman Returns which bowed to $47.7M. Jurassic Park would swipe the record the following summer but Batman Forever took the title back with its $52.8M launch in 1995. All three Batman films opened in mid-June.
Warner Bros. did not opt for a global attack with The Dark Knight, but it did release the superhero pic in 20 markets this weekend and grossed an estimated $40M from 4,500 international screens led by Australia's $13.1M over five days. Many European markets open this coming weekend including Italy and the United Kingdom while Asia's top markets Japan and Korea will launch in early August.
Led by the staggering sales for the new Batman-Joker feud, the overall box office soared to more than $255M in ticket sales making it the best weekend in movie history. The previous high was $218.4M over the July 7-9, 2006 frame when Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest bowed to a then-record $135.6M. Studios are hoping that the roughly 36 million moviegoers who saw trailers and posters at multiplexes this weekend will keep coming back in the weeks ahead for more summer films. [Source from: boxofficeguru.com]
| # | Title | Jul 18 - 20 | Weeks | Cumulative | Distributor | ||||
| 1 | The Dark Knight | $ 155,340,000 | 1 | $ 155,340,000 | Warner Bros. | ||||
| 2 | Mamma Mia! | 27,605,000 | 1 | 27,605,000 | Universal | ||||
| 3 | Hancock | 14,000,000 | 3 | 191,504,000 | Sony | ||||
| 4 | Journey to the Center of the Earth | 11,910,000 | 2 | 43,074,000 | New Line | ||||
| 5 | Hellboy II: The Golden Army | 10,038,000 | 2 | 56,447,000 | Universal | ||||
| 6 | WALL•E | 9,813,000 | 4 | 182,476,000 | Buena Vista | ||||
| 7 | Space Chimps | 7,350,000 | 1 | 7,350,000 | Fox | ||||
| 8 | Wanted | 5,097,000 | 4 | 123,347,000 | Universal | ||||
| 9 | Get Smart | 4,080,000 | 5 | 119,564,000 | Warner Bros. | ||||
| 10 | Kung Fu Panda | 1,750,000 | 7 | 206,506,000 | Paramount |
