The Dark Knight Sets Weekend Box Office Record – Other Movies Join In

This weekend the year’s most highly anticipated film opened to soaring box office as The Dark Knight broke the all time opening weekend box office record while leading a strong supporting group of films to break the record for the largest weekend in North American box office history.

The Dark Knight showed the rest of Hollywood how it’s done this weekend as it brought in ticket sales of an estimated $155.3M to snatch the record of largest opening weekend in box office history. The Caped Crusader actually broke several records as it averaged an amazing $35,579 from 4,366 theaters and edged its way past the $151.1M take of Spider-Man 3 just over one year ago. The Dark Knight managed to take the record with about 800 less screens than Spider-Man 3.

The Dark Knight was also the first regular movie to use IMAX cameras during filming. Six action sequences accounting for around 30 minutes of screen time were filmed using the special cameras that gave IMAX audiences a special treat. This helped The Dark Knight set several IMAX records and lifted its IMAX per theater average to over $66,000.

As I mentioned, The Dark Knight actually broke more than one record on its way to a gargantuan weekend. Here is a listing of the records The Dark Knight has set thus far:

1. Largest number of opening theaters with 4,366 (beating the 4,362 theaters of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End in 2007).
2. Largest number of total theaters at one time with 4,366.
3. Largest midnight preview gross with $18.489M in 3,040 theaters (beating Star Wars: Episode III: Revenge of the Sith which had $16.9M from 2,915 theaters in 2005).
4. Largest IMAX midnight preview gross with $640,000 (this amount is included in the above record of $18.489M).
5. Largest single day gross in box office history with $67.2M (beating the $58,841,919 collected by Spider-Man 3 in 2007).
6. Largest opening weekend gross in box office history with $158.4M (beating the $151,116,516 collected by Spider-Man 3 in 2007).
7. Largest opening weekend gross for an IMAX release in box office history with $6,214,061 in 94 theaters for a $66,107 per theater average (beating the $4.7M set by Spider-Man 3 in 2007). It’s interesting to note that IMAX showed at FULL CAPACITY on Saturday, July 19, and collected $1.9M on that day alone.
8. At MovieTickets.com The Dark Knight broke the record for tickets sold by a single film in a single day on Friday, surpassing the previous mark set by Spider-Man 3 on May 4, 2007. MovieTickets.com also reports that Friday they sold the most tickets (for all movies) in a single day in their eight year history.

Online ticket reseller, Fandango, which most of us are probably familiar with by now reports that The Dark Knight now holds many of their records as well including:

• Daily/Hourly/Weekend Top Ticket-Seller – The Dark Knight broke Fandango’s daily and hourly ticket sales records on Friday, July 18. The previous record holder in both categories was Spider-Man 3. TDK broke Fandango’s 3 day weekend record on Sunday.
• Fastest Seller – The Dark Knight tickets were selling as fast as 15 tickets per second during extended periods on Friday. Spider-Man 3 held the record previously with tickets that sold as fast as 10 per second on Friday, May 4, 2007.
• Significant Percentage of Tickets Sold Online – It didn’t quite get the record, but The Dark Knight accounted for one of Fandango’s largest percentages of tickets sold for a feature film’s opening weekend at 13%. By comparison, Fandango sold 16% of Sex and the City, nearly 12% of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and 10.5% of Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith domestic opening weekends.

Although ticket sales for The Dark Knight fell sharply on Saturday by 29% to $48M, it was an expected drop considering the Friday sales. Ticket sales for Sunday were only expected to drop by 18% to $39.5M. If the numbers hold up, Saturday and Sunday box office grosses will be the second best ever coming in behind Spider-Man 3 which brought in $51.3M and $39.9M, respectively. It took only three days for The Dark Knight to take the sixth spot on the Top Ten Summer Blockbuster list (so far):

1. Iron Man – 314.4M
2. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull – 312.6M
3. Kung Fu Panda – 206.5M
4. Hancock – 191.5M
5. WALL-E – 182.5M
6. The Dark Knight – 155.3M
7. Sex and the City – 149.9M
8. The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian – 139.5M
9. The Incredible Hulk – 131.8M
10. Wanted – 123.3M

The $67.85M that The Dark Knight brought in on Friday was only $5M less than the five day opening gross of Batman Begins which brought in $72.9M in 2005. In fact, The Dark Knight will surpass the entire $205.3M domestic haul of Batman Begins in under a week’s time.

This weekend marks the fourth time that a Batman movie has broken the opening weekend record:

• Batman broke the record in 1989 with its $42.7M bow at a time when no film had ever debuted to $30M.
• Batman Returns broke the record (still held by Batman) in 1992 when it debuted with $47.7M.
• Batman Forever broke the record (held since 1993 by Jurassic Park) in 1995 when it opened with $52.8M.
• The Dark Knight broke the record in 2008 (held by Spider-Man 3 since 2007) when it opened with an estimated $155.3M.

The rest of the films at the box office didn’t exactly lay down and die (like they did when Spider-Man 3 opened) this weekend. Instead, the market somehow managed to expand to a record shattering level allowing the total box office to bring in $255M in ticket sales. The previous record was $218.4M over the July 7-9, 2006 frame when Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest opened to (a then-record) $135.6M (also Superman Returns did $21.8M in it’s 2nd weekend and The Devil Wears Prada did $15M in its 2nd weekend). If the projected $255M number holds, this three day weekend will actually be bigger than the top 12 for any 4-day Memorial Day weekend in history.

A large part of the credit for the box office record also has to go to Mamma Mia! which came in second for the weekend and managed to average a stellar $9,276 from 2,976 locations and bring in total ticket sales of an estimated $27.6M over the weekend. The film performed almost exactly like Hairspray which opened with $27.5M this very weekend last year and The Devil Wears Prada which opened to $27.5M against Superman Returns in 2006. The $65M production is doing boffo business internationally and has already scored a global gross of $100M with much more to come.

Hancock fell by 56% in its third frame to an estimated $14M which was good enough for third place this weekend. The Will Smith superhero film has already grossed $191.5M in 19.5 days and is still following the same course as War of the Worlds from 2005 which had done $192.4M at the same point in its run. That movie finished with $234M while Hancock looks to finish with slightly less domestically. Globally, however, Hancock has brought in $444M and looks to pass the half a billion mark in a week.

Journey to the Center of the Earth came in fourth and showed respectable legs as it slipped by only 43% in its second weekend to gross $11.9M. New Line Cinema’s final film which cost $60M to produce has taken in $43.1M for Warner Bros. in two weekends and looks to be headed for a $75-80M final tally.

Last weekend’s number one film fell hard to fifth place in it’s second weekend at the box office. Hellboy II: The Golden Army fell by a disturbing 71% to bring in only an estimated $10M. The $85M production has brought in $56.4M in ten days, but looks to be headed for a final gross of only about $75M making it the summer’s only number one movie so far to not reach a gross of at least $100M.

Wall-E came in sixth this weekend with an estimated gross of $9.8M which puts it just behind Hellboy II. The Disney and Pixar film has collected $182.5M, but they are hoping to be able to push that total past the $215M mark which should edge it past Kung Fu Panda to make it the number one animated movie of the year. The critical praise that was being heaped on Wall-E has shifted the past couple of weeks to The Dark Knight which puts in doubt any possible Oscar talk other than Best Animated Feature.

The weekends third wide release, Space Chimps, did not fair as well as the first two and only brought in an estimated $7.4M averaging a very mild $2,927 per location, good enough for seventh place. Fox has had a rough summer with their three releases, The Happening, Meet Dave, and now Space Chimps either under-performing or completely tanking. They remain the only one of the six major studios without a $100M hit this summer and now must pin their hopes on next week’s release of The X-Files: I Want To Believe. Unfortunately, studio tracking for The X-Files is running considerably behind Will Ferrell’s comedy, Step Brothers, which also opens next week (which itself is running behind Ferrell’s previously disappointing Semi-Pro).

Rounding out the top ten for the weekend were Wanted (dropping 58% to $5.1M and $123.3M cume), Get Smart (down 43% to $4.1M and $119.6M cume), and Kung Fu Panda (down 60% to $1.8M for a cume of $206.5M).

The record setting box office weekend was up an astounding 72% from last year when I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry opened at number one with $34.2M and up an astronomical 80% from 2006 when Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest spent its third weekend at number one with $35.2M.

My official box office prediction for The Dark Knight was $138-$147M. It looks like I was off by a fairly good sized chunk of change. However, I’d like to point out that I predicted Mamma Mia! would open to $25-30M and it actually opened to $27.6M.

Weekend Box Office (July 18–20, 2008)

Next week The Dark Knight looks to retain control of the number one spot while The X-Files: I Want To Believe and Step Brothers try to remove the Caped Crusader from his throne. Look for The Dark Knight to stay on top while Step Brothers will open with around $17-18M and The X-Files: I Want To Believe with slightly less at $15-17M.