Phew! 'New Moon' Fails to Clinch Opening Weekend Record
Filed under: Box Office, Fandom, Newsstand
According to estimates over at Variety, The Twilight Saga: New Moon failed to top The Dark Knight's three-day opening weekend record of $158 million, bringing what I'm sure will be a huge sigh of relief to all those folks (and there's lots of them) who felt the film was in no way deserving of these historic milestones. Instead, after clinching the Best Midnight Opening record and Best Opening Day record, New Moon will have to settle for third on the Best Opening Weekend list after walking away with a pretty astonishing
If that number holds up (and it should), the film will replace Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End for third place on the list of all-time best opening weekends (domestic), and will settle in behind only Spider-Man 3 (second) and The Dark Knight (first). Still, with
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
11-22-2009 @ 11:46AM
Damien said...
Minor note but I never knew $130 Million was more than double $68 Million.
$68M * 2 = $136M
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11-22-2009 @ 11:47AM
GrimReaper said...
I think you meant $140M rather than $130M
11-22-2009 @ 11:50AM
Wayne said...
Erik, what happened to the "Insert Caption" contest this week?
Reply
11-22-2009 @ 12:00PM
Scott Nye said...
Who cares if it ended up making more money than The Dark Knight? "Deserving" of such a historic milestone? It "deserves" whatever it makes based on how many people buy tickets. That's all. It doesn't make it a better film or a worse one.
The obsession over box office these days...
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11-22-2009 @ 12:50PM
Chris said...
It matters because - well when you become on top of the box office list or even on any record list there are people out there that look upon the list as films worth or deserving of viewing.
and in my opinion and many others the franchise is not worth viewing.
Its a mega success from tackling a demographic with a high success ratio of making money.
That in my opinion is not worth people seeing.
However when you top the list.
You become worth seeing to many people you wouldn't normally go see it.
Not to mention these movies making the top box office weekend list keep setting the record for most screens on opening weekend.
but no-one ever talks about the fact that it was on over 4100 screens and the raising cost of seeing movies.
you stack a movie in 5 of your 10 screens on friday or saturday night... many other films either sell out or look less interesting because of the ratio of people seeing the big hit of the weekend.
Thank god trash like that isn't on top.
Less talked about the better.
11-22-2009 @ 1:49PM
Wray said...
I agree completely. It is common knowledge that big box office success has little to nothing to do with the quality of a film.
11-22-2009 @ 7:46PM
Booby Jones said...
No one talks about the number of screens a movie plays on or the cost of tickets? Everyone talks about that, but only when a movie breaks a record. What's the point in getting into all that if a movie just has a big opening?
Just because you don't like a movie does not mean that everyone all of the sudden has to start writing stories to downplay how much it made. There are a lot of people who think The Dark Knight was overrated, so why not we all start writing stuff to make it's success seem not as impressive to make them happy. Can;t be selective.
Maybe movies make more than they used to because of ticket prices, but they also have more to compete with in order to get someone to buy a ticket than they did even 15 - 20 years ago.
But at the end of the day it does not make a difference if next weekend it only makes 30,
11-22-2009 @ 12:46PM
amanda said...
Note to author of report:
"According to estimates over at Variety, The Twilight Saga: New Moon failed to top The Dark Knight's three-day opening weekend record of $158 million, bringing what I'm sure will be a huge sigh of relief to all those folks (and there's lots of them) who felt the film was in no way deserving of these historic milestones."
Considering your little pathetic comments about how many people are glad New Moon didn't break any records for opening weekend; how about you SHUT THE F@#K UP!!! Seriously??? Twilight fans compared to YOUR little group of pathetic losers who don't have girlfriends, I'm pretty sure we out number you idiots.
Reply
11-22-2009 @ 1:00PM
chris said...
amanda.
guess what...
but twilight fans are the demographic...
not people who DON'T like twilight...
you being the fan are in a group of 10-20 year old girls who are being fueled by a fade of bad movies...
There is very little group of people in this world that know what a good movie is... however that doesn't affect twilight haters because to hate twilight doesn't take much... there is actually ALOT of people that don't think the franchise is any good... Including the movies own actors... the amount they complain about making them or being a part of... that group must contain them too...
oh and by the way...
out numbering means nothing in the big world out of high school...
however someone had to tell you your the demographic... your the one outnumbered...
300 million people in the united states alone...
you think there is more then 150 million twilight lovers out there... probably not..
11-22-2009 @ 3:03PM
Michael Byng said...
Calm down little fan girl...we can still kick Twilight's ass when Avatar comes out.
11-22-2009 @ 3:55PM
Hector said...
Yet you're the one who's getting histrionic and butthurt about movies on the internet. I hope the irony of your comment isn't lost on you.
11-22-2009 @ 1:09PM
Trudan said...
Chris, I think it's worth to point out that the demographic for TDK was actually 18-30yr old males. Because that show is targeted at men and the Twilight show is targeted to women, does that mean an instant drop of quality?
Well to some chauvenistic people it does, and as this is the internet, there are nothing but chauvenistic/mysoginistic posters out and about these days. (Just check out the archaic bull crap that the Mad Men message boards draw)
Also, it is fair to note that anybody who is not a violent Fanboy of TDK, is capable of admitting that TDK was only as big as it was because of Heath Ledger's untimely death. Coming off of the controversial hit that was Broke Back Mountain, and how many found that it was robbed at the Oscars the year before, combined with Ledger's death, there was no way TDK wasn't going to be huge.
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11-22-2009 @ 3:48PM
CParis said...
Agree!
And it's not like "Pirates" and "Spiderman" are going to end up on some Best Films of History list, either.
Alot of very popular films are popcorn entertainment, not cinematic masterpieces.
11-22-2009 @ 2:31PM
Sarah said...
Because that show is targeted at men and the Twilight show is targeted to women, does that mean an instant drop of quality?
Not necessarily, but that's exactly what happened. Speaking as a woman, I thought TDK was awesome - fantastic acting, tight and compelling storyline, beautiful artistry, and more. I saw Twilight with my sister and thought it was terrible. It's a trite, stereotypical storyline with absolutely nothing to say and nothing to add. I utterly fail to see the appeal - there are much better romances out there. Do you have the right to like it? Absolutely. But don't accuse people of sexism just because they happen to think a movie you like sucked.
11-22-2009 @ 2:33PM
BloodwerK said...
Here's an idea: Watch what you want to watch and shut the fuck up...
Reply
11-22-2009 @ 2:50PM
Sabbs said...
To put it mildly, I agree with BloodwerK
Reply
11-22-2009 @ 6:00PM
Alex said...
I think that Avatar is going to crush the sales of The Dark Knight.
Reply
11-23-2009 @ 2:31PM
Robert said...
I don't think it's going to come close.
11-22-2009 @ 6:41PM
Rich Drees said...
Welcome Twilight fans, to the world of fandom. People are going to crap all over what you like, simple because they don't like it. There reasons may vary- from their feeling that sparkly vampires is a rather stupid idea to well thought out and argued critiques that the relationships presented in the series are all unhealthy and not really good examples for its target audience.
Trust me, I've been around long enough to remember literary science-fiction fans bitching about Star Wars when it first came out, Star Trek fans complaining that there should only be their franchise on TV and Babylon 5 should disappear immediately and we'll see it again in the future.
Reply
11-22-2009 @ 8:01PM
Mike D said...
Even if "Avatar" crushes the sales of "The Dark Knight", it still might be a flop. Around 350 million plus marketing is a dicey play any way you slice it. James Cameron is a great writer- director("The Abyss", "Aliens", "The Terminator"), but I, for one, do not like those odds. Also, if you are somehow personally offended that "New Moon" beat "The Dark Knight" single-day opening, you are a fucking loser with no sense of life's priorities. "The Dark Knight" is one of the best films of the last ten years, easily, but is it better than "Apocalypse Now", "Citizen Kane", Close Encounters of the Third Kind", "Jaws", "All The President's Men", "Alien", Blade Runner", "The French Connection", "Cross of Iron", "Rocky, "The Graduate", Midnight Cowboy", "The Bridge on the River Kwai", "Platoon". "Taxi Driver", "Sorcerer", "2001: A Space Odyssey", "Barry Lyndon, "The Deer Hunter", "THX-1138", "American Graffitti", "Marathon Man", "The Big Red One", "The Great Escape", "A Bridge Too Far", "All That Jazz", or "The Stunt Man", to name a few? Let's not go ga-ga, and let some time pass before we go applying historical designations?
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