Walt Disney‘s been dead some 45 years…
However this weekend he’s probably having a heavenly party up there somewhere with St. Peter and the gang. Matter of fact, I’ll bet they’re spiking the holy water for the occasion.
Why all the celebrating?
The company he founded with his brother (and a mouse) has just generated the biggest grossing movie opening weekend in the history of the Industry!
MARVEL’s-THE AVENGERS has sold an estimated $200.3 million in tickets domestically during its first three days out of the box.
You may recall I had predicted $160 million. So I was off by $40 million—but in a good way.
$18.7 million of this rather shocking three day gross came from the Thursday night/ Friday morning 12:01 a.m. midnight shows. Add to that the film’s wordwide performance and the total 12 day take to date stands at a shattering $641.8 million.
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(Note that the film had a nine day foreign head start prior to its North American openings.)
So who got kicked out of first place?
That honor goes to the final chapter of the Harry Potter franchise—specifically last summer’s HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS-PART 2 which enjoyed an opening weekend of $169.2 million.
Industry insiders are now revising their predictions for the tentpole blockbuster’s eventual all-in numbers to $1 billion.
In all fairness, it should be pointed out that 3-D and IMAX up charges have certainly contributed mightily to THE AVENGERS phenomenal performance to date.
Can you imagine what THE DARK KNIGHT RISES could and WILL do beginning on ?????
So who’s going to see this super hero smorgasbord?
Looks like just about everyone. Exit polls indicate that 50% of the audience is made up of people under the age of 25 while the other half is 25-54 and beyond. And audiences seem to be split fairly even between men and women.
So from Walt to his descendants at the Mouse Factory in Burbank, hey all about JOHN CARTER is forgiven—for the time being.
Wrong. Some of us want entertainment not faggy superhero shit. Take your stupid Batman and go to hell. It’s all as original as shit that has been eaten, digested, and shit out again.
Faggy?
Hey ‘Wrong’…..
….Sorry about your bad weekend my friend. I’m glad my column helped you get it off your chest.
For the record THE DARK KNIGHT RISES opens here on July 20.
I remember when super hero movies had soul. Now they’re all overly slick, treated with unnatural color correction and wade in the shallow end of character development. “Super” with Rainn Wilson had more depth than these big-budget fireworks displays on celluloid have, and that movie was borderline satire.
After 9/11 the country was hungry for super hero movies and Hollywood started cranking them out one after the other. Here we are 11 years later and they just keep coming. When will the fad fade?
Hello Merle
Disney paid billions (..with a B) to buy MARVEL. And Marvel’s latest just set another gigantic wold-wide boxoffice record. So the answer to your question is: THE FAD WILL FADE WHEN THESE FLIX QUIT MAKING MONEY!
And that’s not happening soon.
Jack, not a jab, just found this one line funny…..
….but I’m a numbers/stats guy:
“Exit polls indicate that 50% of the audience is made up of people under the age of 25 while the other half is 25-54 and beyond.”
So, roughly, this movie was seen by “people”, correct?