'The Batman' Has Disappointing Opening in China
by EG
Without any real competition at the box office, The Batman stayed atop the charts for one more week, but it wasn't all good news over the weekend. Amid pandemic restrictions, the superhero movie had a disappointing opening in China, one of the world's biggest movie markets. With its momentum slowing, The Batman is still far behind the most recent superhero blockbuster, Spider-Man: No Way Home. Read on for details.
There’s no stopping The Batman.
The Warner Bros. and DC hit movie placed number one at the box office for the third consecutive weekend, grossing $36 million for a superhero-like domestic total of $300.1 million and nearly $600 million worldwide after earning another $49.1 million overseas for a foreign tally of $298 million.
One downer: With 43 percent or more of theaters closed in China because of another COVID-19 surge, Batman debuted to a lowly $12.1 million. Before the closures, it had been tracking for a $25 million-plus debut.
Matt Reeves’ Batman was only down 45 percent in North America, as well as overseas. (It didn’t hurt that there no new major Hollywood studio releases.)
That landscape will change next weekend when Paramount opens the Sandra Bullock-Channing Tatum action-adventure The Lost City, which held advance screenings on Saturday night, with more than two-thirds of showings sold out.
Coming in No. 2 behind Batman in North America was the Japanese anime offering Jujutsu Kaisen 0, which did a better-than-expected $17.7 million from 2,340 locations thanks to perfect 100 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes and great exits, especially from kids. Crunchyroll and Funimation distributed the film in North America. Directed by Sunghoo Park, the film is a prequel to the hugely popular Gege Akutami-created Jujutsu Kaisen series.
Uncharted came in No. 3, earning $8 million from 3,700 theaters to hit a hearty $125.9 million for Sony, which is also reporting that Spider-Man: No Way Home has all but crossed the historic $800 million mark domestically with a total through Sunday of $797.5 million. The studio didn’t fare as well by Stage 6’s supernatural thriller Umma, which opened to $917,000 from 800 theaters.
Get the rest of the story at The Hollywood Reporter.