Robert Pattinson, Taylor Lautner, Kristen Stewart in The Twilight Saga: New Moon (top); Penélope Cruz in Broken Embraces (middle); Sandra Bullock in The Blind Side (bottom)
The Twilight Saga: New Moon's estimated take of $140.7 million broke (or rather, is breaking) several box-office records, but not the one for best opening weekend ever. That one still belongs to Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight, followed by Spider-Man 3. But third place ever isn't bad at all. (Even if the box-office rankings haven't been adjusted for inflation.)
As per Box Office Mojo and other sources, The Twilight Saga: New Moon, starring Robert Pattinson (vampire), Kristen Stewart (human), and Taylor Lautner (werewolf), shattered the following records:
- Biggest November opening ever, by far surpassing Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire's take of $102.7 million
- Biggest opening two-day gross ever ($115.9 million Friday-Saturday), a little ahead of The Dark Knight's $114.8 million;
- Biggest opening day ever ($67.2 million)
- Biggest single day ever ($67.2 million)
- Biggest midnight showing ever ($26.3 million)
It's unclear about which movie retains the record for best 5:45 p.m. showing ever, but I'm willing to bet that New Moon shattered that one to pieces as well.
Also, it's unclear as to why New Moon's distributor Summit Entertainment has estimated that their film will gross "only" $24 million on Sunday (The Dark Knight earned $43.6; Spider-Man 3 $39.9). Is something going on today that will keep New Moon's fan base (reportedly half of it under 21 and 80% female) at home or elsewhere?
Indeed, no one had predicted that New Moon would become such a mammoth box-office hit. Internationally, New Moon has thus far grossed $118.1 million, bringing its three-day worldwide total to $258 million.
Eclipse, the third Twilight movie, is scheduled to hit theaters in June 2010. Breaking Dawn, the fourth movie in the series, doesn't have a planned release date, yet.
I should add that this weekend had box-office registers ringing elsewhere as well: the Sandra Bullock vehicle The Blind Side grossed $34.5 million, thus becoming the biggest-opening Bullock movie ever.
Also, in limited released the Pedro Almodóvar-Penélope Cruz collaboration Broken Embraces and Wes Anderson's animated Fantastic Mr. Fox (above), featuring the voices of George Clooney, Meryl Streep, Jason Schwartzman, Bill Murray, Michael Gambon, and others, did quite well for themselves — respectively, $107,597 at two theaters and $199,142 at four theaters.
i will watch every sequel of Twilight because i find this movie so good. the graphics is good, the cast is good and of course the storyline is great.