Since its July 21 debut, the summer blockbuster “Barbie” has broken a number of records, and it’s on the verge of doing so again.
In the wake of “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” by an estimated $48 million, “Barbie,” written and directed by Greta Gerwig, seems destined to take first place as the highest grossing domestic movie of 2023.
According to Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at Comscore, “Barbie” earned an astounding $155 million domestically in its first weekend and last week joined the $1 billion club in terms of box office sales – a feat only accomplished by about 50 movies in history, adjusted for inflation. While “Pink Fever” has slowed down over the past week, “Barbie” is predicted to have made $33.7 million this weekend to keep its stronghold in theaters.
A $525 million domestic and nearly $1.2 billion global total is estimated for the comedy about the iconic doll. Barbie made $10 million just on Friday, bringing in an average of over $11.3 million per day from August 5 – 11, while “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” needed more than five weeks to accomplish the goal.
The dual release of “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer,” dubbed “Barbenheimer,” has become a cultural phenomenon and could help the struggling movie theater business. With a total of $302 million in revenue, Barbenheimer was the fourth-highest-grossing industry weekend in North America ever. In contrast to “Barbenheimer,” most top-grossing movies frequently feature elaborate action sequences and special effects. “.
“I’ve been in this game for 30 years and the ‘Barbie’ and ‘Barbenheimer’ phenomenon is as unprecedented as it was unpredictable,” said Dergarabedian.
He continued saying the first indication that “Barbie” would be a box office success was the marketing campaign for the film.
“The marketing campaign for ‘Barbie’ set into motion a chain of events that led to the word ‘Barbenheimer’ being added to the popular lexicon by virtue of its shared release date with ‘Oppenheimer,’ and that’s when we all knew something very special and unique was going to create a much bigger than expected outcome for the film not only for the opening weekend, but for its global run in theaters,” said Dergarabedian.
Margot Robbie, who not only starred in the film but also produced it, revealed a vision she had during a studio greenlight meeting in a recent interview with Collider.
“I think I told them they’d make a billion dollars which, maybe I was overselling, but we had a movie to make!” she said.
“Barbie” is distributed by Warner Bros., which is owned by CNN’s parent company Warner Bros. Discovery.
Source-CNN
