2008 July 19 « Entertainment Today and Beyond

Early Box office report – Results show people are going BATTY!

According to Nikki Finke’s Deadline Hollywood Daily, Warner Bros THE DARK KNIGHT had a record Friday opening doing 65 million in ticket sales. That includes all midnight to 3AM shows. It’s quite clear that the overall audience for this film went way beyond the core comic book fan crowd as this one’s attracting an audience of all demographics across the board. At this point it appears the movie will beat the 151 mill opening weekend record of Spiderman 3. The big question going forward is how many repeat viewers will this new Batman film get? I think a sizable amount as Heath Ledger’s turn as the Joker is something many people will want to see twice! It really is that good!

Mamma Mia!

Universal’s MAMMA MIA! Proved to be good counter programming move by the studio as the movie musical starring Meryl Streep took in a solid 9 mill on Friday, on target for a 25 million dollar opening weekend.

One other interesting box-office bit of info to report… HELLBOY 2: The Golden Army was off a substantial 77% Friday to Friday doing 3.1 mill, on target for an 8 mill weekend. As I predicted last week, no other movie this summer will have more of a front loaded audience as comic book characters with horns and a tail are a tough sell to people outside the core following. These numbers certainly dampen the prospects for a third entry in this Franchise.