(Bloomberg) -- , the new installment in a sprawling film series based on the sci-fi story by Frank Herbert, generated weekend ticket sales of $82.5 million in US and Canadian theaters, delivering the best debut this year.
Researchers at Box Office Pro, owned by a theater industry trade group, were forecasting sales of about $80.9 million. Warner Bros. Discovery Inc., which released the film in partnership with Legendary Entertainment, was predicting a more conservative $65 million.
Advance ticket sales ran far ahead of the original, Box Office Pro said, and went on to gross more than $400 million worldwide. Some fans packed theaters at 3 a.m. just to get good seats at a 70 mm Imax screening.
“We're thrilled with these results, and I really want to know who's going to those 3 a.m. screenings,” Jeff Goldstein, president of domestic distribution at Warner Bros. Pictures, said by phone. “It's clear we're having a cultural moment globally.”
The film took in an additional $100 million in international markets, Warner Bros. said on Monday.
The domestic opening is the biggest sincebrought in $93.2 million last October. It's also the biggest opening of the year after a slow start for the box office, with North American ticket sales down 18% through Feb. 25. was helped by raves from critics, with 94% recommending the picture, according to Rotten Tomatoes, a website that aggregates reviews. No movie released this year has exceeded $50 million in a domestic debut.
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“Strong early reviews, an aggressive marketing campaign against weak competition and the expected skew toward premium large-screen formats (like Imax) lifting average ticket prices are positives,” Bloomberg Intelligence said in a research note. “On the other hand, the film's two hour, 46-minute runtime means fewer screenings.”
Close to half of ticket sales were for larger format screens such as Imax and Dolby. “All the data we're seeing indicates that this film will have a long, successful run in Imax,” Imax Chief Executive Officer Rich Gelfond said by email.
The new is the second in what director Denis Villeneuve intends to be a trilogy. It features Timothée Chalamet returning in the starring role of Paul Atreides, an aristocrat on a desert planet, and Zendaya as Chani, his partner. The pair seek revenge against those who destroyed his family.
The development of any third film will depend on a range of factors, including “whether performs and whether creatively we feel it's a story we have to tell,” Legendary Entertainment CEO Josh Grode said by phone. “Everyone's working very hard to make it happen.”
The first picture premiered in 2021 in theaters and on the HBO Max streaming platform simultaneously, while Hollywood was still coping with the Covid-19 pandemic.
Domestic ticket sales this year are down 13% from the same period in 2023. Next week's new releases include Universal's and , a horror film from Lions Gate.
(Updates with latest numbers in first and fifth paragraphs.)
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