Star Wars: The Force Awakenswisely gave fans what they wanted, and fans are rewarding the film in kind with multiple viewings that are driving the picture to record-breaking box office. This weekend, the film shattered the current record for the Christmas weekend by hauling in $153.5 million. To give you some perspective, on Christmas Day alone, when the movie had already been in theaters for a week, it grossed $49 million compared to previous record,Sherlock Holmes, which brought in $24 million.
In addition to taking the record for Christmas Day,Star Wars: The Force Awakensnow has the highest second weekend of all-time, and it’s the fastest film to cross $1 billion globally. Both records previously belonged toJurassic World, butStar Wars’ joining the increasingly inclusive $1 billion club is made more impressive by the fact that the film still hasn’t opened in China and won’t do so until January 9th (Jurassic Worldopened day-and-date in China).
At this pace,THRbelieves thatThe Force Awakensis likely to become the highest-grossing domestic film of all-time, which would finally knock offAvatar($760.5 million), and perhaps even worldwide as well, but we’ll have to see how it weathers January.
But there were other movies at the multiplex this weekend. TheWill Ferrell/Mark WahlbergcomedyDaddy’s Homepulled in $38.8 million over the weekend, which was good enough to net it second place. We also saw the wide-release ofDavid O. Russell’sJoy, which nabbed the #3 slot by making $17.5 million at the box office.
However, not all was merry among the Christmas weekend releases. TheWill SmithdramaConcussionopened at #6 with an estimated gross of $11 million, which makes it the lowest wide release opening of Smith’s career. But it could be worse. It could be the expensive remake ofPoint Break, which bombed into 8th place with a gross of $10.2 million.
Finally,Quentin Tarantino’sThe Hateful Eightgot a limited release with a 70mm roadshow release in 100 theaters that was good enough to land it in the Top 10 with a haul of $4.5 million, which shakes out to a location average of $45,366.The Revenantalso played in limited release, and it grossed an impressive $471,000 from four theaters in New York and Los Angeles for a location average of $117,750.
