Batman Breaks $500 Million Barrier
The summer box office ended anemically although The Dark Knight did as expected, and sailed past the $500 million domestic box office mark. By doing so in just 45 days puts it on a faster pace than the #1 champ, Titanic. With $11 million for the four-day weekend, the film stands at $504,696,000. Add in the $416,700,000 from foreign receipts and the film has earned Warner Bros. $919,121,000 (this despite our report that it’s tanking in Japan).
Warner Bros. has recently revised their estimate of the film’s final domestic number to $530 million, down from the $550 million it announced in mid-August. On the other hand, adjusted for inflation, the film rises from 49th on the All-Time chart to 30th as of this weekend and will likely climb a little higher before all is said and done. Not bad for a sequel to a super-hero movie.
To put this into additional perspective, The Dark Knight alone will account for almost one-eighth of the summer box office, which saw dozens of films open and many turned out to underperform. The summer b.o. is anticipated to close today with $4.2 billion in ticket sales.
Tropic Thunder remained atop the weekend chart in its third week of release, locating some $83.8 million along the way. Right behind it was the opening weekend for Babylon A.D. which was savaged by its director and the critics but still took in $9.7 million. The better-reviewed Traitor, with Don Cheadle, opened in fifth place, taking in just $7.9 million.
Comedy had a tough summer as veterans Mike Meyers and Eddie Murphy crashed and burned and even inexpensive spoofs like the just opened Disaster Movie and the beer-soaked College opened poorly. Thunder and Pineapple Express were the exceptions, showing a shifting taste in theatrical comedies.
If any studio suffered, it was 20th-Century Fox which misfired with Meet Dave, Space Chimps, The Rocker, Mirrors, and most notably X-Files: I Want To Believe.
This is something I don't get. Back in 1997-8, it took the Titanic roughly 9-10 months to make 600 million domestically, started showing in Dec. 1997- Oct. 1998. 66 days to pass the 400 mill. mark.The Dark Knight passed the 400 mill. mark at 18 days, and 500 mill. mark at 45 days.My question where is WB getting their estimates from? When does TDK ends its showing?It seems to me that WB is rather pessimistic in their estimates. Unless they are planning to stop showing TDK at the end of Sept.