SATURDAY UPDATE: Audiences at the domestic, global and international box office this weekend are going bonkers for Barbenheimer. Warner Bros’ Barbie is now poised for an estimated $300M+ worldwide start through tomorrow (eyeing $150M+ each, from North America and a combined 69 overseas markets). Meanwhile, Universal’s Oppenheimer is now pegged for a $165.9M worldwide bow through Sunday, including $88.9M internationally.
These figures are, for both titles, beyond expectations, confirming that there’s room and a desire for a diverse quality offering at global turnstiles.
Looking at Barbie’s trajectory, the Friday on the Greta Gerwig-directed film was its best day so far internationally with $43M on 25,451 screens from 69 markets. The overseas cume through Friday is $88.4M.
Yesterday’s newcomers included the UK which grossed $8.3M from 1,703 screens. This was a No. 1 launch with a 60% share of the Top 5 films. The Margot Robbie- and Ryan Gosling-starrer logged the best opening day since the pandemic and the 3rd biggest Friday for a WB film ever behind Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 and Batman V Superman.
Along with the massive start in the UK, Latin America continues to overperform with Mexico leading all play through Friday at $11.2M.
In new records, Barbie debuted to the best score ever for a Warner Bros movie in Poland.
In China, where we really didn’t expect anything significant, Barbie opened amid a slew of local titles with $1.2M and (not included in the total above) is at $4M through Saturday. It has a 9.4 from audiences on Maoyan (note that this strangely appears to be the same score for a number of recent Hollywood titles that haven’t converted to big box office).
Also of note, family-leaning Brazil, which has grossed $8.9M through Friday, is seeing unprecedented and unusual showtimes added by exhibition. We also hear that Australia on Saturday positively skyrocketed.
As for Christopher Nolan’s Cillian Murphy-led Oppenheimer, the estimated overseas launch of $88.9M would mark the filmmaker’s 3rd highest grossing opening weekend ever, behind only The Dark Knight Rises ($131M) and The Dark Knight ($94M).
What’s more, the $166M worldwide projection through Sunday would mark the biggest global day-and-date debut for a biographical film, overtaking Bohemian Rhapsody ($124M) and the top worldwide start for a drama since 2019.
In other milestones for Nolan, he’s also seeing his biggest launch day of all time in 33 markets including Saudi Arabia, the UAE, India, Netherlands, Argentina and Belgium; as well as the 2nd biggest opening day in six markets including Germany, Brazil and UK/Ireland; and the top day-one start for a non-Nolan Batman title in 46 markets including Australia, France and Mexico.
Market highlights include the UK where Oppenheimer opened to $4.2M on Friday. That’s 14% higher than Dunkirk, which we thought might have had an edge given its UK-centric story. The start was the 2nd biggest Friday ever for a Nolan film and the biggest opening Friday for a non-superhero Nolan film as well as the 10th biggest Universal opening day of all time.
Fifty-two IMAX and 70mm IMAX screens took 19% share of the Friday total in the UK with top site BFI IMAX’s Friday gross the biggest ever result for that cinema.
In France, Oppenheimer is at a running total of $3.5M through Friday, performing above most Nolan comps. Germany has reached a running total of $2.8M through yesterday; Saudi Arabia is at $2.6M and Mexico has reached a running total of $1.9M. In the latter, this is the biggest Nolan opening in IMAX with performance in the format 15% ahead of Spider-Man: No Way Home and just 13% below Avengers: Infinity War.
We will have a full rundown on Sunday.
PREVIOUS, FRIDAY: Barbenheimer has begun. With Warner Bros’ Barbie and Universal’s Oppenheimer rolling out globally this weekend, we’ve got the first numbers for both from their various international box office markets through the first two days of release.
As expected, the Greta Gerwig-directed Barbie is coming out on top with $41.4M through Thursday in 51 markets. Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer is also thriving with $15.9M across its first 57 markets through Thursday. Both are breaking various records.
It’s important to remember that these movies are not direct comps to one another, with runtimes and demos differing. Still, we’re in what is hoped to be an expanded marketplace situation that encourages moviegoing and benefits from the Barbenheimer phenom (although Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One may end up taking a breath this frame, it was still tops in Korea today).
So let’s take a closer look at the Barbie and Oppenheimer numbers across their first two days internationally.
Barbie, through Thursday, is in release in 51 offshore markets, and has shattered a number of records. Thursday alone was worth $31.8M on 15,700 screens – that is simply a hugely impressive number. An additional 18 markets are opening today, including the UK and China (in the latter, and not included in the totals above, the movie did approximately $1.2M on Friday).
The top-grossing market to date is Mexico with $6.4M, logging the biggest opening day for a Warner Bros film ever. It is also the 2nd biggest opening day of 2023, and the 3rd biggest opening day post-pandemic (wow!).
Brazil dominated Thursday at No.1 with $4.9M and an 84% market share of Top 5 films, and is the biggest opening day ever for a WB title, the biggest opening day post-pandemic ahead of Spider-Man: No Way Home, the biggest opening day of 2023 ahead of both Fast X and The Super Mario Bros Movie, and the 2nd biggest opening day of all time, only behind Avengers: Endgame.
France, which unboxed the doll very strongly on Wednesday, has grossed $4.5M while Australia (also a Wednesday opener) amassed $3.4M through Thursday. The latter gave it a dominant No. 1 with a 60% share of the Top 10 films. Results in Oz are tracking well ahead of all comps, and even came in 5% above Avatar: The Way of Water (another wow!). It scored the biggest opening day of 2023 at more than double Super Mario.
Italy and Germany round out the Top 5 grossers to date with $2.4M apiece.
Looking at regions, Barbie had the biggest opening day of all time for a WB film in 13 Latin America markets, and was the biggest industry opening day ever in Argentina ($1.2M) and Colombia ($1.5M). It was also the biggest industry opening day of 2023 regionally and in eight markets. The doll further scored the 4th biggest opening day ever regionally behind Avengers: Endgame, Avengers: Infinity War and Spider-Man: No Way Home.
Elsewhere, Barbie saw the biggest opening day of all time for a WB title in Croatia, Serbia and Slovenia. And in Denmark, it clocked the biggest opening day for a WB film in 13 years while Portugal had the 2nd biggest opening ever for a WB title behind only Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2.
As regards Christopher Nolan’s epic Oppenheimer, yesterday added 47 offshore markets. The Cillian Murphy-starrer will be out in a total 78 through today.
Nolan started racking up milestones on Wednesday with Oppenheimer (see below), and has now logged his biggest opening day in 23 markets including Saudi Arabia and the UAE as well as the Middle East as a whole, Netherlands and Colombia. Thursday was further the No. 2 biggest Nolan opening day in Germany, Brazil, Peru and Ecuador and his best non-Batman start in 30 markets including Germany, Australia, France, Mexico and Brazil.
Also, Oppenheimer, which was filmed with IMAX cameras, captured the best opening day ever for the format in Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Czech Republic, Egypt, Bahrain, Oman, Argentina, Mexico and Chile.
Breaking down the Thursday openers, Saudi Arabia launched to No. 1 with $1.5M for the 2nd biggest opening day of all time (behind Spider-Man: No Way Home) and the biggest opening day of 2023 (85% above Fast X), also more than double the opening Thursday of MI:7.
Australia, where Oppenheimer opened as the widest ever release for a Nolan film in 296 locations, scored $1.1M on Thursday – for Nolan, only topped by The Dark Knight Rises.
Germany debuted to No. 1 with $1.3M, more than double Dunkirk, Interstellar and Tenet.
Mexico bowed with $900K on Thursday, more than double the Friday openings of Dunkirk, Interstellar and Tenet, and well above the first Thursday for MI:7. It is the widest IMAX footprint for a Nolan title and achieved the 3rd biggest IMAX opening day of all time (behind Avengers: Endgame and Infinity War) and the biggest IMAX opening day for a Nolan film, far outperforming Tenet, Interstellar and Dunkirk.
Spain opened with $700K on Thursday and is the biggest IMAX opening day of 2023. Reactions are strong, with a very high 8 audience score on FilmAffinity, placing it within the Top 10 films of this century (yeah, again, wow!).
Brazil opened with $488K on Thursday, followed by Netherlands with an estimated $485K at No. 1 and delivering the biggest opening Thursday ever for a Nolan film. Oppenheimer also achieved the biggest IMAX opening Thursday for a Nolan film, also beating Top Gun Maverick (+23%), Avengers: Infinity War (+18%), Avatar 2 (+114%) and MI:7 (+232%).
Hong Kong too launched at No.1, with $340K on Thursday. This is the 2nd biggest IMAX opening day ever (only behind Endgame).
Other impressive Thursday starts include Denmark ($328K – biggest opening day ever for a Nolan film) and Colombia ($236K – biggest opening day for a Nolan film and biggest Thursday total box office of all time).
After debuting on Wednesday, France added $1M on Thursday for a running total of $2.4M. Indonesia added $209K on Thursday for a running total of $661K. Thursday’s result makes it the biggest Thursday gross ever for a Nolan film and the 3rd biggest Thursday of all time in the market. Belgium added $211k on Thursday for a running total of $462K. Philippines added $107K on Thursday for a running total of $232K.
We’ll have much more throughout the weekend…
PREVIOUS, THURSDAY: Christopher Nolan’s highly-anticipated and highly-reviewed Oppenheimer has begun overseas rollout with strong results versus some of the director’s previous titles. On Wednesday, the Universal film opened in 10 offshore markets, grossing $2.4M and led by France and Indonesia. These are early days as the critically-lauded Cillian Murphy-led biographical drama/political thriller will be playing a total 78 markets through Friday, across over 9,600 locations, 13,000 screens, and more than 320 IMAX screens.
While we wait for the full onslaught of the much-anticipated “Barbenheimer” double-bill this weekend, and will have a fuller picture including Warner Bros’ Barbie tomorrow, we already have initial international box office numbers for Oppenheimer, the story of the building of the atomic bomb, and the resultant aftermath.
In France, Oppenheimer debuted to $1.4M o Wednesday from 725 screens including 18 IMAX and two 70mm screens, as well as 11 Dolby Vision and six ultra-laser Kinepolis screens. The launch day is the biggest opening Wednesday for a Nolan film since The Dark Knight Rises. Excluding previews, the Wednesday admissions are above MI:7 (+23%), Dunkirk (+14%), Tenet (+28%) and Interstellar (+76%). Audience reactions are highly positive with mainstream audiences rating it 4.4/5 and cinephile audiences rating it 7.3/10, one of the top ratings for the market.
Indonesia bowed Wednesday with an estimated $451K to mark the biggest opening day ever for a Nolan film (38% ahead of The Dark Knight Rises). IMAX delivered the biggest opening day ever in the format and the biggest single day gross in IMAX, beating Avatar 2 (+11%). Oppenheimer is playing across 10 IMAX screens and a total of 495 screens in the market. Wednesday was a public holiday in Indonesia for Islamic New Year.
Belgium opened with $251K on Wednesday, the biggest start ever for a Nolan film in the market, beating The Dark Knight Rises (+13%), Inception (+23%) and The Dark Knight (+31%) as well as all other key comps.
Philippines launched with $125K on Wednesday, the top opening day ever for a non-superhero Nolan film. Oppenheimer played across nine IMAX screens and in a total of 198 screens.
Egypt had a terrific start at $74K on Wednesday with Oppenheimer delivering the 2nd biggest opening day for any studio movie since the pandemic hit, only behind Spider-Man: No Way Home. It also easily achieved the biggest Hollywood opening day of the year, more than double Fast X and the 7th biggest MPA opening day of all time in admissions, +18% above Avengers: Infinity War.
Switzerland (French-speaking) grossed $70K on opening Wednesday, more than double the launch days of Tenet and Batman Begins, above Dunkirk (+29%), Interstellar (+46%) and recent opener MI:7 (+8%).
The film also had a strong start in Iceland ($31K) for the top Nolan start outside the Batman series.
Among majors, today the film opens in Australia, Germany, Mexico, Saudi Arabia and Brazil with the UK, Spain and India following on Friday.
In terms of presales, UK/Ireland is seeing strong uptake with PLFs repping a significant portion and sell-out shows across opening weekend; Germany’s IMAX presales are above Universal’s own Fast X, Jurassic World Dominion and Fast & Furious 9. In Saudi Arabia, presales are wild, currently tracking an estimated 32x greater than Fast X at the same point in time and setting a new record.
We will have much more to come throughout the weekend…
