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Tuesday, May 5, 2009

'X-Men Origins: Wolverine' slashes at record book with $85.1m debut, May 1-3, 2009

The first of Fox's big-budget X-Men spin-offs got the 2009 summer season into full swing as the superhero pic X-Men Origins: Wolverine slashed the competition with with a powerful $85.1 million opening, posting the fifth largest debut in history for the first weekend of May.

Budgeted at a hefty $150 million, the Hugh Jackman starrer averaged a scorching $20,751 in 4,099 theaters (a studio record), posting the twelfth largest May opening ever. The biggest May opening of all-time still belongs to 2007's Spider-Man 3, which also posted a $151 million three-day bow over the first weekend of May. Wolverine also became the fifth biggest first weekend of May opening ever, behind only Spider-Man 3, 2002's Spider-Man ($114.8m), 2008's Iron Man ($98.6m), and 2003's X2: X-Men United ($85.6m). Among the X-Men franchise, Wolverine ranks third, behind 2006's X-Men: The Last Stand and X2. The original X-Men opened in 2000 with $54.4 million.

Directed by Gavin Hood, reviews were relatively poor for Wolverine, but thanks to a massive marketing campaign from Fox the film managed a monstrous $35 million opening day on Friday, followed by a 27% drop to $21.3 million on Saturday. Though Marvel Studios opened its own film studio to develop new franchises like Iron Man and The Avengers on its own, Fox still has a development deal with Marvel for the X-Men series. Up next for the franchise is a Magneto origin pic, with a release date set for summer 2011.

1 comment:

long island girl said...

me and my family was able to watch wolverine and we were all impressed with the movie effects, graphics, and even with the actors. my son really loved it and he kept on watching it over and over. we are all looking forward for part 2 of the movie.