After a midnight opening garnering $30.6 million, Christopher Nolan’s ‘The Dark Knight Rises’ went on to rule the box office’s #1 spot over the past weekend. The estimated gross for the film is currently at $161.8 million. I say estimated because both Warner Brothers and Rentrack have chosen not to release official numbers until later today out of respect for the the family’s of Thursday night’s tragedy in Colorado. Since official numbers are not out, the numbers reported so far are from a tally at Deadline.
The numbers so far put the final film in the ‘Dark Knight’ trilogy as the #1 2D opening of all time. There’s no 3D costs factored in because director Nolan refused to film his movie in 3D, citing that story was more important than the 3D component. And while that choice may have hindered the film a bit, it did open on more IMAX screens than any film so far, which helped to offset the lack of 3D ticket sales.
Also hanging tough in the box office is Sony Pictures ‘Amazing Spider-Man’, coming in at the #3 spot with $10.9 million over the weekend, bringing its total to $228.7 million. The rest of the top 10 movies were curiously lacking in sci-fi as the summer blockbuster season begins to wind down. Rounding out the top 5 spots were Dreamwork’s new CGI fest ‘Ice Age 4’ at #2 with $20.3 million, Seth McFarlane’s ‘Ted’ at #4 with $10.1 million, and Disney/Pixar’s ‘Brave’ at #5 with $6 million.
As for sci-fi films coming up for the remainder of the summer, it looks pretty bare. We’ve got ‘The Watch’, a comedy about a neighborhood watch that encounters aliens, next week and the ‘Total Recall’ remake on August 3. After that, it’s pretty slow other than a few indie films and horror movies.
