Vampires and werewolves, plus a certain mortal gal in between, ruled the four-day Independence Day holiday frame as The Twilight Saga: Eclipse exploded with a massive top spot debut. Also generating muscular results by bringing a property with a large built-in fan base to the big screen was The Last Airbender which counter-programmed Bella and company by appealing to boys resulting in a strong finish in the runner-up spot despite some of the year's worst reviews. With Toy Story 3 still attracting large crowds, the overall marketplace swelled delivering spectacular results to kick off the second half of 2010. Summit's crown jewel kept getting bigger. Eclipse, the third installment of the lucrative five-film Twilight franchise, debuted to heated anticipation and generated a stunning $175.3M in ticket sales in its first six days of release from Wednesday to Monday, according to estimates. The figure consisted of $92.8M during the week on Wednesday and Thursday and $82.5M over the Friday-to-Monday period. The weekend figure was deflated by the mid-week bow which pushed the intense upfront demand to Wednesday, but the overall extended start is truly remarkable.
The PG-13 Eclipse flexed major muscles with a stellar $68.5M on Wednesday becoming the second largest opening day in box office history trailing just the $72.7M Friday of The Twilight Saga: New Moon from last November. Eclipse set a new benchmark as the widest release ever playing in 4,468 locations. The four-day weekend average hit $18,465. Exit polls showed a broadening of the audience with the new pic's crowd being 65% female compared to 80% for New Moon. Eclipse was also the first in the series to play on IMAX screens which helped out the grosses too. That format has pulled in a remarkable $9M to date from 193 playdates.
Overseas, Eclipse was red hot too with an estimated $100.2M since Wednesday from 42 territories with major markets like the UK, France, Germany, Japan, and Korea still to come. New Moon grossed $709M worldwide and this new saga could beat it.
M. Night Shyamalan enjoyed the best opening - and total gross - for any film in six years with the 3D fantasy adventure The Last Airbender which debuted in second place with an estimated $53.2M over the Friday-to-Sunday period. The PG-rated film based on the popular Nickelodeon cartoon series averaged a sturdy $16,772 from 3,169 locations and has collected an impressive $70.5M in its first five days since its Thursday launch putting it ahead of the director's last two films The Happening and Lady in the Water which grossed $64.5M and $42.3M, respectively. All three share a common trait - they were all panned by critics. Airbender, with a reported production cost of $150M, has been met with the worst reviews of the filmmaker's career, but the target audience of young males came out on opening weekend anyway for the special effects and the franchise's brand name. A late-in-the-game upgrade to 3D added to the ticket prices too. Despite what should be large declines in the days and weeks ahead, market share leader Paramount should still score its fifth $100M+ grosser of 2010.
| # | Title | Jul 2 - 5 | Theaters | Weeks | Cumulative | Distributor | |||
| 1 | The Twilight Saga: Eclipse | $ 82,500,000 | 4,468 | 1 | $ 175,300,000 | Summit | |||
| 2 | The Last Airbender | 53,150,000 | 3,169 | 1 | 70,500,000 | Paramount | |||
| 3 | Toy Story 3 | 42,223,000 | 4,028 | 3 | 301,050,000 | Buena Vista | |||
| 4 | Grown Ups | 26,500,000 | 3,534 | 2 | 85,082,000 | Sony | |||
| 5 | Knight and Day | 14,000,000 | 3,104 | 2 | 49,309,000 | Fox | |||
| 6 | The Karate Kid | 11,500,000 | 3,109 | 4 | 155,023,000 | Sony | |||
| 7 | The A-Team | 4,275,000 | 2,153 | 4 | 70,366,000 | Fox | |||
| 8 | Get Him to the Greek | 1,693,000 | 884 | 5 | 57,934,000 | Universal | |||
| 9 | Shrek Forever After | 1,258,000 | 957 | 7 | 232,641,000 | Paramount | |||
| 10 | Cyrus | 1,019,000 | 77 | 3 | 1,737,000 | Fox Searchlight |
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