Greta Gerwig’s Barbie blasts into the blockbuster record books with $155 million US opening


Legions of Barbie-core and biopic fans descended onto theaters this weekend for the “Barbenheimer” box office phenomenon, but one pink-plastered performance, in particular, came out on top. Greta Gerwig’s Barbie has already smashed several records, raking in $155 million domestically over the weekend — the highest US opening ever for a film directed by a woman — beating the previous $153 million achieved by Anna Boden’s Captain Marvel.
“The massive, overwhelming response we’ve seen out there proves what we’ve known from the beginning: that ‘Barbie’ is not only an incredibly special film, but clearly the theatrical event of the summer, if not the year,” said Jeff Goldstein, Warner Bros. Pictures president of domestic distribution in a statement. “We couldn’t be more thrilled to be part of it, and congratulate everyone involved in this brilliant labor of love.”
The “Barbenheimer” combo is the biggest US blockbuster opening weekend ever that’s not driven by a Disney IP
Barbie also dethrones The Super Mario Bros Movie ($146 million) as the highest-grossing domestic opening for 2023, and achieved $337 million in combined worldwide box-office sales. There are no real losers this weekend though — Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer opened ahead of industry estimations with $174.2 million earned worldwide, with around $80.5 million achieved domestically. According to AVClub, “Barbenheimer’s” combined earnings contributed to this being the fourth-biggest box office weekend for all movies in US history, and the largest not driven by Disney franchises like Star Wars or Marvel.
Oppenheimer similarly broke several records on its own. According to Deadline (which has compiled a list of all the box office records achieved by both movies) the R-rated historical drama had the biggest global opening day and weekend for a biopic, having outperformed Bohemian Rhapsody’s $124 million. It’s also Nolan’s third-highest-grossing opening weekend ever in both domestic and global markets, and his biggest non-superhero movie to date behind The Dark Knight Rises ($161 million domestic) and The Dark Knight ($158 million).
If anything, these figures show that the hype surrounding “Barbenheimer” was earnest. What initially started as a joke — playing off that two movies with such stark differences in tone would be sharing an opening weekend — grew to an internet phenomenon that saw 200,000 US theater-goers buying tickets to see both movies on the same day, according to the National Association of Theater Owners. Rather than pick the low-hanging fruit of making this event a “boys vs girls” contest, viewers have chosen to support both movies. It’s wonderful to see such a celebration of cinema that doesn’t involve a multiversal superhero movie or its 15th sequel.
Legions of Barbie-core and biopic fans descended onto theaters this weekend for the “Barbenheimer” box office phenomenon, but one pink-plastered performance, in particular, came out on top. Greta Gerwig’s Barbie has already smashed several records, raking in $155 million domestically over the weekend — the highest US opening ever for…
Recent Posts
- Meta is firing about 20 employees for leaking
- TikTok’s revamped desktop version lets you livestream games in landscape view
- World’s first 122.88TB SSD gets ‘reviewed’ with two very odd bedfellows: the controversial DeepSeek and Nvidia’s Jetson Orin AI SBC
- EA is releasing the source code for Command & Conquer and adding Steam Workshop support to further ’empower’ the community to create content for the classic games
- Microsoft pushes ahead with AI in gaming
Archives
- February 2025
- January 2025
- December 2024
- November 2024
- October 2024
- September 2024
- August 2024
- July 2024
- June 2024
- May 2024
- April 2024
- March 2024
- February 2024
- January 2024
- December 2023
- November 2023
- October 2023
- September 2023
- August 2023
- July 2023
- June 2023
- May 2023
- April 2023
- March 2023
- February 2023
- January 2023
- December 2022
- November 2022
- October 2022
- September 2022
- August 2022
- July 2022
- June 2022
- May 2022
- April 2022
- March 2022
- February 2022
- January 2022
- December 2021
- November 2021
- October 2021
- September 2021
- August 2021
- July 2021
- June 2021
- May 2021
- April 2021
- March 2021
- February 2021
- January 2021
- December 2020
- November 2020
- October 2020
- September 2020
- August 2020
- July 2020
- June 2020
- May 2020
- April 2020
- March 2020
- February 2020
- January 2020
- December 2019
- November 2019
- September 2018
- October 2017
- December 2011
- August 2010